Man on a String | |
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Directed by | André De Toth (as Andre De Toth) |
Screenplay by |
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Based on | My Ten Years as a Counterspy by Boris Morros with Charles Samuels |
Produced by | Louis de Rochemont |
Starring | |
Cinematography |
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Edited by | Al Clark |
Music by | George Duning |
Color process | Black and white |
Production company | RD-DR Productions |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 93 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Man on a String is a 1960 American spy thriller directed by Andre de Toth and starring Ernest Borgnine and Kerwin Mathews. [1] It was the last film that DeToth directed in the United States.
A government intelligence agency in Washington, D.C. wants agent Frank Sanford to follow Boris Mitrov, a film producer who appears to also be a Russian spy. Helen and Adrian Benson, a wealthy American couple with a home in Beverly Hills and a film studio, are communist sympathizers as well, in league with Colonel Vadja Kubelov, the top KGB man in the U.S.
Boris's office is bugged by his assistant, Bob Avery, a plant who is working for the Americans. Now that he has been caught red-handed, Boris is willing to turn double agent, going to Berlin under the pretense of making a documentary film there.
Helen is having an affair with Kubelov, but the Bensons' home has been bugged and they try to flee to Mexico. In the meantime, Boris is sent to Moscow to be entrusted with a new assignment, so Avery gives him a code word ("cinerama") to use should he find himself in danger.
Upon learning that Adrian intends to publicly expose Boris and Kubelov, Avery is able to alert Boris to return to Germany as soon as possible. A checkpoint is closed, but Boris shoots a police officer and escapes safely to West Berlin, only to end up in a fight for his life with a Russian assassin.
Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic wrote: "The dialogue and characterizations in this picture cripple the putative truth of the message it intends to deliver. This Grade C melodrama may exist in life, but that is insufficient excuse for it in art." [2]
Man on a String was released on DVD by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment on March 4, 2011 via its DVD-on-demand system available through Amazon. [3]
Boris Morros was an American Communist Party member, Soviet agent, and FBI double agent. He also worked at Paramount Pictures, where he produced films as well as supervising their music department.
The House on 92nd Street is a 1945 black-and-white American spy film directed by Henry Hathaway. The movie, shot mostly in New York City, was released shortly after the end of World War II. The House on 92nd Street was made with the full cooperation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), whose director, J. Edgar Hoover, appears during the introductory montage. The FBI agents shown in Washington, D.C. were played by actual agents. The film's semidocumentary style inspired other films, including The Naked City and Boomerang.
Philadelphia, Here I Come! is a 1964 play by Irish dramatist Brian Friel. Set in the fictional town of Ballybeg, County Donegal, the play launched Friel onto the international stage. The play was first staged at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin on September 28, 1964.
Endre Antal Miksa de Toth, known as Andre de Toth, was a Hungarian-American film director, born and raised in Makó, Austria-Hungary.
André Hunebelle was a French maître verrier and film director.
The Gunfighter is a 1950 American Western film directed by Henry King and starring Gregory Peck, Helen Westcott, Millard Mitchell and Karl Malden. It was written by screenwriters William Bowers and William Sellers, with an uncredited rewrite by writer and producer Nunnally Johnson, from a story by Bowers, Roger Corman, and screenwriter and director Andre de Toth. The film was the second of King's six collaborations with Peck.
The 3 Worlds of Gulliver is a 1960 American Eastmancolor fantasy adventure film loosely based upon the 1726 novel Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift. The film stars Kerwin Mathews as the title character, June Thorburn as his fiancée Elizabeth, and child actress Sherry Alberoni as Glumdalclitch.
Play Dirty is a 1969 British war film starring Michael Caine, Nigel Davenport, Nigel Green and Harry Andrews. It was director Andre de Toth's last film, based on a screenplay by Melvyn Bragg and Lotte Colin.
Ice Station Zebra is a 1968 American espionage thriller film directed by John Sturges and starring Rock Hudson, Patrick McGoohan, Ernest Borgnine, and Jim Brown. The screenplay is by Douglas Heyes, Harry Julian Fink, and W. R. Burnett, loosely based on Alistair MacLean's 1963 novel. Both have parallels to real-life events that took place in 1959. The film concerns a US nuclear submarine that must rush to the North Pole to rescue the members of the Ice Station Zebra.
Kerwin Mathews was an American actor best known for playing the titular heroes in The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958), The Three Worlds of Gulliver (1960), and Jack the Giant Killer (1962).
Charles Samuels was an American journalist, and writer best known for his biographies of celebrities, He penned as-told-to autobiographies for Buster Keaton and Ethel Waters which was a best seller. Among his other books were Magnificent Rube: The Life and Gaudy Times of Tex Rickard and The King: A Biography of Clark Gable.
OSS 117 is the codename for Hubert Bonisseur de La Bath, a fictional secret agent created by French writer Jean Bruce. Hubert Bonisseur de La Bath is described as being an American Colonel from Louisiana of French descent. After service in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), de La Bath worked for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), then the National Security Council (NSC).
Banco à Bangkok pour OSS 117, released in the USA as Shadow of Evil, is a 1964 French/Italian international co-production Eurospy spy-fi film. It was based on Jean Bruce's 1960 novel Lila de Calcutta, the 74th OSS 117 novel. It was the second OSS 117 film directed by André Hunebelle and produced by Paul Cadéac, the first in the series in colour, the first co-produced by the Italian company Da.Ma. Cinematografica and the last to star Kerwin Mathews as OSS 117.
Ravagers is a 1979 American science fiction action film directed by Richard Compton and based on the 1966 novel Path to Savagery by Robert Edmond Alter. The screenplay concerns survivors of a nuclear holocaust, who do what they can to protect themselves against ravagers, a mutated group of vicious marauders who terrorize the few remaining civilized inhabitants.
The Stranger Wore a Gun is a 1953 American Western film directed by Andre de Toth and starring Randolph Scott and Claire Trevor. Based on the short story "Yankee Gold" by John W. Cunningham, the film is about a war criminal wanted for the slaughter of women and children who moves to Arizona to join a gold robbery but reconsiders and decides to change his life. The film is one of the first 3-D western movies; it earned an estimated $1.6 million at the North American box office in 1953. The supporting cast includes Joan Weldon, George Macready, Alfonso Bedoya, Lee Marvin, and Ernest Borgnine.
Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2 is a Blu-ray and DVD box set by Warner Home Video released on October 16, 2012. It contains 50 Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons and numerous supplements. Disc 3 is exclusive to the Blu-ray version of the set. Unlike Volume 1, which was released in a digibook, Volume 2 was released in a standard 1 movie case. This release was followed by Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 3
Gummibärchen küßt man nicht is a 1989 West German comedy film. Despite featuring mainly American actors, the film was never released outside of Germany.
Pan-Americana is a 1945 American romantic comedy film produced and directed by John H. Auer, from a screenplay by Lawrence Kimble, based on a story by Auer and Frederick Kohner. RKO released the film on March 22, 1945, and the picture stars Phillip Terry, Audrey Long, Robert Benchley, Eve Arden, Ernest Truex, Marc Cramer, and Jane Greer (uncredited) in her feature film debut. The film was an example of the Good Neighbor policy encouraging Americans to travel to South America for holidays and the last of a film genre.
Events in 1917 in animation.