The year 1967 in film involved some significant events. It is widely considered one of the most ground-breaking years in American cinema, with "revolutionary" films highlighting the shift towards forward thinking European standards at the time, including: Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Cool Hand Luke, The Dirty Dozen, In Cold Blood, In the Heat of the Night, The Jungle Book and You Only Live Twice.
The year 1966 in film involved some significant events. A Man for All Seasons won six Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
Matt Helm is a fictional character created by American author Donald Hamilton (1916-2006). Helm is a U.S. government counter-agent, a man whose primary job is to kill or nullify enemy agents—not a spy or secret agent in the ordinary sense of the term as used in most spy thrillers.
Victor Tayback was an American actor. He was best known for his role as diner owner Mel Sharples on the television sitcom Alice (1976–1985), as well as his multiple guest appearances on The Love Boat (1977–1987). The former earned him two consecutive Golden Globe Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Continuing Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.
Irving Allen was an Austro-Hungarian–born American theatrical and cinematic producer and director.
James Gregory was an American character actor who played roles such as Schaffer in Al Capone (1959), the McCarthy-like Sen. John Iselin in The Manchurian Candidate (1962), the audacious General Ursus in Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), and crusty Inspector Frank Luger in the television sitcom Barney Miller (1975–1982).
Camelot is a 1967 American musical fantasy drama film directed by Joshua Logan and written by Alan Jay Lerner, based on the 1960 stage musical of the same name by Lerner and Frederick Loewe. It stars Richard Harris as King Arthur, Vanessa Redgrave as Guenevere, and Franco Nero as Lancelot, with David Hemmings, Lionel Jeffries and Laurence Naismith.
Murderers' Row is a 1966 American comedy spy-fi film starring Dean Martin as Matt Helm. It is the second of four films in the Matt Helm series, and is very loosely based upon the 1962 spy novel Murderers' Row by Donald Hamilton.
The Wrecking Crew is a 1968 American spy comedy film directed by Phil Karlson and starring Dean Martin as Matt Helm, along with Elke Sommer, Sharon Tate, Nancy Kwan, Nigel Green, and Tina Louise. It is the fourth and final film in the Matt Helm series, and is loosely based on the 1960 novel of the same name by Donald Hamilton. The film opened in Canada in December 1968 before premiering in the United States in February 1969.
Akira Takarada was a Japanese film actor best known for his roles in the Godzilla film series.
Douglas Netter was a United States television industry executive, his credits largely being in the field of science fiction. He was first credited as associate producer of the 1967 Matt Helm movie The Ambushers which involved a US-government built flying saucer.
The Silencers is a 1966 American spy comedy film directed by Phil Karlson, starring Dean Martin as agent Matt Helm. The screenplay by Oscar Saul is based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Donald Hamilton, while also adapting elements of Hamilton's first Helm novel, Death of a Citizen (1960). The film co-stars Stella Stevens, Daliah Lavi, Victor Buono, Arthur O'Connell, Robert Webber, James Gregory, Roger C. Carmel, Beverly Adams, and Cyd Charisse.
Mary Janice Rule was an American actress and psychotherapist, earning her PhD while still acting, then acting occasionally while working in her new profession.
The Menacers, first published in 1968, was the eleventh novel in the Matt Helm spy series by Donald Hamilton and the first published since the launch of the Matt Helm film series starring Dean Martin.
Henry Levin began as a stage actor and director but was most notable as an American film director of over fifty feature films. His best known credits were Jolson Sings Again (1949), Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959) and Where the Boys Are (1960).
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.
Eurospy film, or Spaghetti spy film, is a genre of spy films produced in Europe, especially in Italy, France, and Spain, that either sincerely imitated or else parodied the British James Bond spy series feature films. The first wave of Eurospy films was released in 1964, two years after the first James Bond film, Dr. No, and in the same year as the premiere of what many consider to be the apotheosis of the Bond series, Goldfinger. For the most part, the Eurospy craze lasted until around 1967 or 1968. In Italy, where most of these films were produced, this trend replaced the declining sword-and-sandal genre.
Hammerhead is a 1968 British Eurospy thriller film directed by David Miller and starring Vince Edwards, Judy Geeson and Diana Dors. Its plot concerns a criminal mastermind who attempts to steal NATO secrets, with an American agent hot on his trail. It is based on the 1964 novel of the same title by English novelist James Mayo, and produced by Irving Allen and written by Herbert Baker, who made the Matt Helm films for Columbia Pictures. It was filmed in London and Portugal.
Jenna Marie Ortega is an American actress. She began her career as a child and received recognition for her role as young Jane in The CW comedy-drama series Jane the Virgin (2014–2019). From 2016 to 2018, Ortega had a leading role as Harley Diaz in the Disney Channel series Stuck in the Middle; she won an Imagen Award for the part. She played Ellie Alves in the second season of the thriller series You in 2019 and starred in the family film Yes Day in 2021, both for Netflix.
