Callan (1974)

Director:  Don Sharp

Writer:  James Mitchell

Composer:  Wilfred Josephs

Starring:  Edward Woodward, Eric Porter, Carl Mohner, Catherine Schell, Peter Egan, Russell Hunter, Kenneth Griffinth, Michael Da Costa, Veronica Lang, Clifford Rose, David Prowse, Don Henderson, Nadim Sawalha

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  Callan... doesn't make friends - and all his enemies are dead!

Plot:  Greg Callan's cousin David Callan top agent/assassin for the S.I.S., was forced to retire because he had lost his nerve. Now, Callan is called back into service to handle the assassination of Schneider, a German businessman. His former boss promises Callan that he'll be returned to active status if he follows orders, but as always Callan refuses to act until he knows why Schneider has been marked for death.

My rating:   8/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

A long while ago I watched the last of the Callan movies, WET JOB (1981), and I liked it.  Now that I've seen the first, I'm full-on ready to tackle the TV series that started it all.  This movie is great.  Woodward is great as top assassin, David Callan.  He's really good at his job.  The rest of the cast do a wonderful job, too.  Eric Porter is Hunger, Callan's old boss, Peter Egan kills it as Toby Meres, Hunter's right hand man and Callan's replacement, Carl Mohner as Schneider, Callan's target, Catherine Schell as Schneider's girlfriend, Jenny and Russell Hunter as Lonely, an old contact of Callan's who gets him what he needs and takes Callan's shit when there's no one around to beat on.  It's swell cast and they all step up to James Mitchell's tight and sharp script.  

This has got two very good action sequences; one is a fight between Callan and Meres and the other is the excellent car chase in the video above.  This is some good shit!  I did not expect them to be this good.  Because this is a movie I expect the show didn't live up to this kind of quality often but I sure hope it did.  The story moves along nicely without any fat needing to be trimmed.  It's satisfying throughout but there were only two things that bothered me.  One is the odd harmonica-heavy score.  It's just damn strange and felt weird from the first few seconds of the film.  I thought it would disappear after the opening but it didn't.  The other is Callan the man and the ending.  He indicates that he knows he's being set up and he goes through with it anyway.  Now, one would assume that he's prepared something special off camera for the viewer so that we be be surprised and be impressed by his cunning.  But he doesn't have anything planned.  If he did, we don't see what it is because something unexpected happens and Callan improvises.  What he does with his improvisation is brilliant in its own right.  Sadly, what happens next with his (unbeknownst to Callan) re-classification at the hands of Hunter we'll never know what happens next.  It's a neat little suspenseful set-up for a sequel ala JOHN WICK (2014).   Having not seen the preceding series, I feel like this movie as a stand alone story is a great watch and highly recommended.