A sample of an advanced new metal is stolen and made into a cigarette case in Brussels ready for smuggling to the East. An American jewel thief accidentally finds it in his possession and becomes the centre of much attention
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Thriller
Blast of Silence (1961) Allen Baron, Molly McCarthy, Allen Baron, Larry Tucker, Crime, Thriller, Drama
Having been ‘away’ for some time, professional killer Frankie Bono returns to New York to do another job: assassinate some mid-level mobster. Although intending to avoid unnecessary ‘contact’ while carefully stalking his victim, Bono is recognized by an old fellow from the orphanage, whose calm and unambitious citizen’s life and happy marriage contrast heavily with Bono’s solitary and haunted existence. Exhausted and distracted, Bono makes another mistake, but his contract is not one to back out of.
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The Karate Killers (1967) Barry Shear, Robert Vaughn, David McCallum, Joan Crawford, Comedy, Crime, Thriller
U.N.C.L.E. agents Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin travel around the globe in an effort to track down a secret formula that was divided into four parts and left by a dying scientist with his four daughters, all of whom live in different countries. Evil THRUSH agent Randolph also wants the formula, and is aided by his karate-chopping henchmen.
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Scorpio (1973) Michael Winner, Burt Lancaster, Alain Delon, Paul Scofield, Action, Drama, Thriller
Cross is an old hand at the CIA, in charge of assassinating high-ranking foreign personalities who are an obstacle to the policies of the USA. He often teams up with Frenchman Jean Laurier, alias “Scorpio”, a gifted free-lance operative. One day, the CIA orders Scorpio to eliminate Cross — and leaves him no choice but to obey. Scorpio is cold-blooded and very systematic; however, as a veteran agent, Cross knows many tricks. He can also rely upon a network of unusual personal contacts, some dating back to the troubled years preceding WWII. A lethal game of hide-and-seek is programmed, but what are the true motives of every single player?
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Die Screaming, Marianne (1971) Pete Walker
After their parents divorce, one daughter lives with her mother in England while the other lives with her father in Portugal. After the untimely death of her mother, the one daughter stands to inherit a large sum of money and also a number of documents containing information that will incriminate her father, who was a crooked judge. While her father wants the documents, her sister wants the money and they will each stop at nothing, even murder, to get what they want.
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L’espion / The Defector (1966) Raoul Lévy
Montgomery Cliff (in his last role) plays James Bower, an American physicist visiting West Germany who’s recruited by a shady CIA agent, named Adam, to help them with the defection of a Russian scientist. But an East German secret agent, named Peter Heinzeman, learns of Bower’s meeting with Adam and threatens Bower to mind his own business, while Bower learns of a back story to all this involving stolen microfilm that each side wants.
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Tiger Bay (1959) J. Lee Thompson
Gille Jenkins, a 12 year old tomboy and compulsive liar living in a sordid tenement with her single parent mother, witnesses the murder of an immigrant Polish woman living in an nearby apartment by her former boyfriend, Bronislaus Korchinski. The young merchant marine becomes distraught when he discovers that she has become the mistress of a married British sports announcer and shoots her with her own gun. Gillie lies about the circumstances in order to keep the gun which she discovers where Korchinsky hid it. She ultimately bonds with him and misleads the police in their investigation.
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Verboten! (1959) Samuel Fuller
A young American serviceman, stationed in Germany after the fall of the Third Reich, jeopardises his position with the Marshall Plan relief effort by breaking the non-fraternisatiom rule and falling in love with a young German woman. He uses his position to obtain food and luxuries for her that are in short supply, and all seems to be going well for the couple. What he doesn’t realise is that the Werewolves, the Nazi guerrilla movement, have plans in which he features heavily.
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House of Games (1987) David Mamet, Lindsay Crouse, Joe Mantegna, Mike Nussbaum, Crime, Thriller
A famous psychologist, Margaret Ford, decides to try to help one of her patients get out of a gambling debt. She visits the bar where Mike, to whom the debt is owed, runs poker games. He convinces her to help him in a game: her assignment is to look for “tells”, or give-away body language. What seems easy to her becomes much more complex.
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La menace / The Threat (1977) Alain Corneau, Yves Montand, Carole Laure, Marie Dubois
Henri Savin has managed a trucking company for his lover, Dominique Montlaur, for many years. Now he is planning to leave her for Julie Manet, the woman he has made pregnant, and Dominique is hysterical. She first threatens suicide, then shows up at a meeting of Savin and Julie. Dominique tries everything she can think of to break Savin and Julie apart, to no avail. Frustrated in her efforts, she jumps off a cliff and dies. Savin insists that he and Julie lie to the police about the encounter, although Dominique’s death was a suicide and therefore they had no direct hand in it. Detective Waldeck investigates Dominique’s death.
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