The Assassination Bureau (1969)

As Europe teeters on the precipice of war with Kaiser Wilhelm, aspiring journalist Sonia Winter (Diana Rigg) has a plan to make a splash in the newspaper business by exposing The Assassination Bureau, a clandestine for-profit organization behind many high-profile political executions. She’s figured out how clients make contact. With financial support from newspaper publisher Lord Bostwick (Telly Savalas), she meets the Bureau’s young chief executive Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed) — and surprises Ivan with her audacious request.

“I shall need further identification,” he says.

“He is of Russian extraction, though educated in England… approximately your size, weight, and age,” says Winter.

“I was born in the province of Valenko,” says Dragomiloff. “Where was your man born?”

“In the province of Valenko.”

Dragomiloff is taken aback; “I am compelled,” he says “to believe you mean me.”

“I do,” says Winter.

To Winter’s surprise, Dragomiloff is eager to accept the contract. Later, when he puts it to the board, he explains. His father founded the company with the expectation that they would improve the world by killing only those who needed to be killed.

“It’s always possible to find a good moral reason for killing anybody. Everybody, from some point of view, deserves death,” objects Italian representative Cesare Spado. (And also probably the audience.)

Dragomiloff is concerned that the board has lost sight of the company’s moral purpose and has been pursing contracts just to enrich themselves. Or, to put it more modern terms, Dragomiloff worries the Bureau has been enshittified. He sees Winter’s proposition as a means of shaking things up — the board is welcome to kill him, assuming he doesn’t kill them first.

Meanwhile, Lord Bostwick insists Winter attempt to follow Dragomiloff so she can report on his death at the hands of the Bureau. She is no spy, though, and before long Dragomiloff and Winter are travelling together — and becoming romantically entangled.

That’s the pretty complicated setup for what turns out to be a light comedy action film with fantastic sets, witty banter, and horrible visual effects. Much of this setup is accomplished through exposition, and it’s a testament to the performances of Rigg, Bostwick, and Savalas this exposition goes down pretty easily.

The Assassination Bureau’s is based on a Jack London novel that spent its own time in development hell. Sinclair Lewis (It Can’t Happen Here, Elmer Gantry) sold the original storyline to Jack London in 1910. Jack London wrote about half the novel before giving up, saying he was unable to figure out how to finish it. Over fifty years later, London’s unfinished manuscript was picked up by crime writer Robert L. Fish. Fish, writing under the pseudonym “Robert L. Pike,” wrote a novel called Mute Witness that became 1968’s Bullitt.

The movie itself suffered from some bad timing. Between publishing The Assassination Bureau, Ltd. in 1963 and the film adaptation’s release, America saw three political assassinations. John F. Kennedy was killed November 1963, Martin Luther King in April 1968, and Robert F. Kennedy in June 1968. When The Assassination Bureau was released in March 1969, Americans were understandably not in the mood for a comedy about the murder business.

Perhaps at least somewhat attentive to the political turmoil of the period, the script makes some passing attempts to grapple with the ramifications of political assassination. But it’s clear that no one involved really has the stomach for it. It is a deeply serious topic, but Basil Dearden is eager to keep things light.

Diana Rigg gives her performance Mary Poppins overtones. She’s initially humorless and staid. Although Bostwick is intrigued by her proposal, he regrets that he can’t offer her a real job. As they walk through the newsroom, Bostwick waves at journalists. “Put you to work in this office with them,” he explains, “and they’d all walk out in a body. But they’d leap at the chance to take you out to dinner.”

“Why should they ask me out to dinner?” she asks.

“Because you are a very attractive-looking young woman,” says Bostwick.

“There can be no sexual equality whilst women exploit their physical appearance,” says Winter. But before too long Winter is cinching her girdle tighter and admiring herself in the mirror.

Telly Savalas plays the calculating Lord Bostwick. Bostwick is taking advantage of Winter’s naïveté, twisting her plot to serve his own political aspirations. Savalas performs with his typical cool unflappability. In fact, you can see faint echos of something that could become a Bond villain — given the right circumstances.

Those circumstances would happen later that year. Savalas would play Blofeld in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Riggs was in that one, too; she plays Bond Girl / Bond Wife Tracy. If Oliver Reed had been chosen to succeed Connery, perhaps OHMSS could have been an Assassination Bureau cast reunion.

Curd Jürgens would have just missed out, though. Here, he plays sidekick baddie General von Pinck. In 1977 he was trying to build an underwater city as Karl Stromberg in The Spy Who Loved Me.

Oliver Reed is utterly charming as Ivan Dragomiloff. My spouse also says Reed is “really hot in this.” That’s probably the only time in over a quarter-century of watching movies together that she’s ever commented on attractive leading men, so I have to assume he makes an impression.

Also on the screen in blink-and-you’ll-miss-them cameos are Frank “Captain Peacock” Thornton (assassinated by elevator) and a background Bureau member played by Roger “The Master” Delgado.

At just under two hours, and constructed episodically, The Assassination Bureau is a fun international romp — assuming assassinations have not been constantly in the news. It’s the cutest Bond take-off I’ve seen, but it does not withstand close scrutiny. Employing the MST3K philosophy (“it’s just a show, I should really just relax”) is highly recommended.

Published Sun May 04 2025 13:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)