Open Channel D: The Man From UNCLE Affair

by Mihir Fadnavis   Aug 29, 2015 10:08 IST Suave young(ish) actors, sneering eyebrows, snazzy one liners, crackling camerawork, peppy music, split screen action montages – all the elements of Guy Ritchie’s signature style are present in his latest film, The Man from U.N.C.L.E. This is the kind of film that Ritchie’s fans expect and want more of, and on that front, it delivers. If you’re expecting anything more, you’ll have to look elsewhere. Ritchie apologists, read on. The Man from U.N.C.L.E is based on the 1964 gonzo-style, spy-comedy series of the same name. The film project has been in development for years - Steven Soderbergh was originally attached to it, but it changed hands so often that fans of the TV show gave up on the movie. When Guy Ritchie finally found himself at the helm, it was clear that he was the perfect choice for the stylistic verve of the story. It’s the 1960s, and after World War II, America has decided to have some fun spy missio...

The Man From UNCLE Episode 75 The Take Me To Your Leader Affair Writer: Bernie Giler Director: George Waggner Guests: Nancy Sinatra (Coco), Whitney Blake (Corrine Ackers), Paul Lambert (Simon Sparrow), Woodrow Parfrey (Adrian Cool) Filmed: 12-19 October 1966 Premiere: 30 December 1966 Places : Cool Island (Caribbean) and Louisiania (USA) Acts Titles: 1 - “Don't Always Believe What You Read on Radar Screens” 2 - “My Son the Thermodynamics Engineer” 3 - “Sojourn in a Wind Tunnel” 4 - “It's a Bird! It's a Bird! It's an Asteroid!” The affair: Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin arrive in the Cool Island and are greeted by Coco, the daughter of Dr Adrian Cool. Dr Cool says he is monitoring an asteroid that seems guided by aliens and will collide with Earth. Cool asks Alexander Waverly if UNCLE should create a network of observatories in a discreet way not to cause panic in the population. Coco Cool...

Warner Home Video released  The Man from U.N.C.L.E. - The Complete Series  to DVD back in 2008 but it was mighty pricey then and now. I'd only seen bits and pieces of the series through the years - for some reason it and other MGM-owned shows like  The Outer Limits  rarely if ever got syndicated in the Detroit market where I grew up - and I didn't dare chance it on a series I wasn't certain I'd like. Further, the general consensus was that this 1964-68 spy series went downhill in a big way during its third season, having been influenced by the camp and self-parody of the phenomenally if briefly-popular  Batman  TV show, as well as the ballooning if increasingly silly ‘60s spy craze. ( U.N.C.L.E.  recovered somewhat for its more serious final fourth season.) Others, like the great pop culture essayist Mark Evanier, loved the show as a child of the ‘60s only to be terribly disappointed upon revisiting it as an adult. To read the complete rev...

The Man from U.N.C.L.E.' fails to break new ground BY  BOBBY CERESIA  | AUG. 26, 2015 “The Man from U.N.C.L.E” is a Cold War-era spy movie adapted from the 1960s television series of the same name. It stars Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer as rival spies forced to work together on a mission to prevent some generic evil people from starting a nuclear war. Cavill plays a deep-voiced, smooth-talking American spy hilariously named Napoleon Solo, who, as he puts it, “specializes in the art of complicated acquisitions” (i.e., he steals really well). Hammer, in many ways, plays the yin to Cavill’s yang, portraying a ruthless but skilled KGB agent named Illya Kuryakin, a man whose troubled past often leads to violent outbursts. The two are sent on a mission to transport a criminally connected woman, played by Alicia Vikander from “Ex Machina,” across the Berlin Wall and around Europe to find her father, who is being forced to work on a nuclear bomb. Along the way are car cha...