The Ipcress File can't rightly be called a classic. Or iconic. Or "landmark". But it is one of those films emblematic or an era, and clearly fondly regarded by many if all the 9 and 10 ratings on IMDB are anything to go by. But one has to wonder how many of those near-perfect scores are awarded from memory, rather than recent reappraisal. It must be that there's an over-abundant nostalgia for the rebellious anti-Bond aspects of the film and/or the supposedly radical working-class / everyman / humdrum makeover of the spy genre. And, yes, Caine brings a certain naughty-boy irreverence to the often po-faced and pretentious world of movie espionage. But, all of that notwithstanding, The Ipcress File is actually seriously dull and very, very silly. Even more silly, if judged against its own aim at s sort of realism, than the Bond films, which never pretend to be anything other than outlandish. The plot of Ipcress is barely there, not much concerned with logic, and never more than lazily superficial. Somebody is stealing Britain's best scientists. Why? We're never told. How? It's pretty vague. Who? Never entirely clear. Caine's Harry Palmer is supposed to be both the anti-Bond, yet till somehow sexy, smart, dangerous, sophisticated, etc. Unfortunately, neither the writer nor the director manage to make much of a case on any level. Palmer is supposed to be a gourmet cook, yet in an extended supermarket scene he buys all kinds of rubbish canned goods, including canned prawn curry - so really not much of a gourmet, even by 60s standards. When Palmer is captured it's at gunpoint in a train compartment, even though he already suspects he's about to be jumped. So not much chop as an undercover agent either. In the one fist-fight sequence (wisely obscured partly by a phone box) he doesn't even equip himself as well as the ex-soldier he's supposed to be. The best you can say about Palmer is that he exhibits slightly more initiative than his colleagues, and he manages not to look bored and impatient when there's nothing happening, which is for long stretches of screen time. If The Ipcress File has anything still to offer it's as a time capsule of an interesting phase in the evolution of male screen heroes, particularly in relation to class in Britain. And, I guess, as a curious footnote in the spy movie genre. Beyond that it's just a very dated, very lame, very unconvincing spy movie.
Review of The Ipcress File
