More New Spy DVDs Out Last Week
On Sale Today Only!

In addition to the sets that I wrote about on Tuesday, there were some other very exciting new spy releases last week. The Warner Archive splurged on spy titles in a nearly all-spy week, including a couple of great Eurospy titles.  And some of them are on sale through tonight (Monday)!

The Double Man
This cool, dark Eurospy entry finds Yul Brynner playing a double role as a tough, cold-blooded CIA agent and his potential doppelganger.  Future Bond Girl Britt Ekland is also on board, though her loyalties are questionable.  The Cold War intrigue unfolds in one of my favorite spy locations: the Swiss Alps.  It's a bit darker than a lot of Eurospy fare, but still delivers just about everything you could hope for from the genre.  The Double Man is available to pre-order from Amazon, and available now directly through The Warner Archive. (At a substantial discount if you act fast!)

Assignment To Kill
Spies get assigned to kill all the time. After all, they've got licenses for that.  But how often do insurance investigators receive an Assignment To Kill?  Quite often, actually, if you've dabbled a bit in the Eurospy genre!  Longtime readers will be aware that I'm a big fan of this particularly curious sub-genre.  For some reason, insurance investigators were so glamorized in the Sixties that European filmmakers tended to use them as proxy spies.  The best Eurospy movie of all, Deadlier Than the Male (review here), isn't about a spy at all, but an insurance investigator.  Other movies in this mold include Ring Around the World (review here) and 1968's Assignment To Kill, though the latter has been rather elusive until now.  Patrick O'Neal plays ultra-cool insurance investigator Richard Cutter, and a globe-trotting probe into big-time fraud takes him into contact with such spy movie regulars as Herbert Lom, John Gielgud, Peter van Eyck, Eric Portman and Oscar Homolka. The action unfolds against the same great Swiss backdrop as The Double Man.  Assignment To Kill is available now from The Warner Archive, and available to pre-order on Amazon.

Avalanche Express
I've never seen Avalanche Express (1979), but I do love spy movies on trains, so I'm eager to give it a go!  Lee Marvin plays CIA agent Harry Wargrave, whose assignment is to escort a Soviet defector (played by Robert Shaw, a seasoned veteran of train-based espionage!) on Europe’s Milan-to-Rotterdam express, then cross the Atlantic and deliver his charge to Washington. But enemy agents are out to stop him–and won't think twice about causing a devastating avalanche to do so! Other passengers on the train (some of whom are bound to be foreign spies) include such nefarious types as Maximilian Schell, Mike Connors, Horst Buchholz and the ubiquitous Vladek Sheybal. Avalanche Express is available for pre-order from Amazon at $18.99 or available now directly.

24 Hours To Kill
24 Hours To Kill doesn't have former Tarzan and Eurospy dabbler Lex Barker playing an actual spy, but as an international thriller set primarily in that favorite Eurospy location, the "Paris of the Middle East," Beirut, it's essentially part of the genre. The plot concerns smuggling, and the cast includes Mickey Rooney and Walter Slezak. 24 Hours To Kill has been available before on a dubious grey market label, but the Warner Archive edition marks its widescreen debut.  This MOD edition is available to pre-order from Amazon and available now directly.

Two more titles in this wave aren't quite spy titles, but they're Sixties adventures with guns and beautiful women, and that puts them close enough in my book.  Dark of the Sun is a 1968 men-on-a-mission movie in which Rod Taylor (The Liquidator) and Jim Brown lead a group of elite commandos on a perilous train journey across the Congo out to rescue endangered civilians and recover a huge cache of diamonds.  And just look at that cover art!  Kona Coast was an unsold pilot for a Hawaiian action series based on a book by John D. Macdonald. The Kremlin Letter's Richard Boone plays a charter boat captain who turns vigilante to avenge the death of his daughter. Finally, Once Before I Die is a war movie and not a spy movie in any sense, but it does star Bond Girl Ursula Andress...

Whew!  Quite a week!  How on earth are we spy fans to keep up with so many releases at once, you might ask?  Well, fortunately The Warner Archive is having a very nice Father's Day sale lasting through the end of the day today (Monday, June 13), in which all of these titles (and many other action movies) are available at a five dollar discount.  To me, that $5 makes all the difference in the world.  The regular Warner Archive retail price of $19.95 always strikes me as prohibitive for a made-on-demand DVD, but $14.95 sounds entirely reasonable–especially with free shipping on orders of two or more!  That's the way to go if you're buying these today, but if you miss the sale or want to hold off, they're all also available to pre-order on Amazon (where they won't be available until July) for $18.99 apiece.  Other titles in the sale that might interest spy fans include Tarzan and the Valley of Gold (a bona fide Tarzan spy movie - review here), Tarzan's Greatest Adventure (co-starring Sean Connery - review here), Brass Bancroft of the Secret Service, The Sell-Out and many, many more.

Spy Bargains Continue Throughout The Weekend

Many Black Friday deals on spy DVDs continue today and in some cases through tomorrow or Cyber Monday.  I can't possibly keep track of them all, but I'll point out a few good bargains I've noticed.  If you don't have all the seasons of Burn Notice yet (and, frankly, you should!), then it's worth a trip to Target.  They're offering all of them (seasons 1-3) for $9.99 apiece! That price is also available online, though the latest season is sold out at the moment. Amazon's got the same $9.99 deal on Season 1 (review here), but 2 and 3 aren't discounted any more than usual.  Amazon also has the same deals on neo-Eurospy movies as Best Buy: you can find Taken (review here) for $7.99 on Blu-ray and $5.00 on DVD, From Paris With Love for $9.99 on Blu-ray and $5.99 on DVD and The Transporter, Transporter 2 and Transporter 3 (review here) Blu-rays for $9.99 apiece.  Killers is also just $9.99 on Blu-ray and $5.99 on DVD; Jackie Chan's The Spy Next Door is $9.99 for a Blu-ray/DVD combo.  Finally, perennial Black Friday bargain favorite The Prisoner will be an Amazon Gold Box deal at 4:30 Pacific this afternoon.  I don't know what the price will be or whether it will be for the DVD or the special feature-laden Blu-ray set, but if you or a spy fan on your Christmas list don't yet own The Prisoner in any of its past home video incarnations, I'm sure it will be worth looking into!

If you stumble across any other great deals on spy DVDs that are still active, please feel free to share them in a comment below.

Lots Of Spy DVD Deals This Week

Deep Discount's annual winter sale has begun.  It's 25% off (just enter the coupon code "25MORE" at checkout), but as with the last couple of sales, it's not quite as good as it was in the old days, because the sale doesn't apply to every item in stock and the seller has raised their prices on a lot of items in advance of the sale.  Still, prices do end up being at least a little bit cheaper, and there are some great deals if you look around.  What I'm most excited about is that the sale includes the recently released Columbia Classics DVDs on demand, and makes them just $14.74 each.  The first wave of Columbia DVD-R's included such spy titles as Otley (a true classic that everyone needs in their collection!), Duffy, The Executioner and Man on a String. The 25% off Winter Sale runs through December 10. 

Of course there are lots of amazing Black Friday deals going on this weekend, too, at brick and mortar stores.  Best Buy is selling a lot of recent neo-Eurospy movies at cut-rate prices.  From Thursday to Saturday, both Taken (review here) and From Paris With Love will be on sale for just $9.99 on Blu-ray and just $5.99 on DVD.  There are a lot of Lionsgate titles on sale, which makes me realize how many spy movies the studio put out this year (without a hit among them, sadly): besides From Paris With Love, Killers and The Spy Next Door are also part of the sale. 

Bargain Alert: Network Halloween DVD Sale This Weekend

UK DVD company Network (a name well known to spy fans) is having a Halloween sale this weekend.  (At least I think it's a Halloween sale... but it's couched in what appear to be British sitcom references that go way over the head of this American.) They bill this as their last sale of 2010, so don't expect another one before Christmas.  (However, I'd be willing to bet we'll see their annual winter sale at the end of January.)  It's a good sale: 35% off the already discounted prices on pretty much their entire inventory, excluding pre-orders and recent releases.  (The fine print also gives Network the right to exclude whatever they feel like excluding, but that doesn't seem to be very much as far as I can tell.)  For American spy fans with multi-region DVD players, be aware that the company's usual overseas shipping caveat applies with a hefty £40 surcharge on orders over a certain weight.  But if recent sales are any indication, this is easily avoidable by ordering your items seperately.  If you want to get a huge set, it might kick in though. 

Network has churned out a steady flow of amazing spy releases over the summer. This is a great opportunity to pick up many of those DVDs and soundtrack CDs cheaply.  Some to consider (although I haven't checked all of these to see if any might be excluded): The Saint: Original Soundtrack (review here), The Zoo Gang: Original Soundtrack (review here), Codename: Kyril (review here), The Corridor People: The Complete Series (review here), Saracen: The Complete Series (review here), The Four Just Men, Mr Palfrey of Westminster, The Protectors: The Complete Series, The Prisoner: The Ultimate Set or any of Network's many other spy DVDs or impressive ITC series soundtracks. International buyers, please be aware that all of Network's DVDs are PAL Region 2 releases, and you need a multi-region player (or at least a computer equipped with the free software VLC Player) to watch them.

The sale runs through midnight (GMT, presumably) on Sunday.

Network Offers Summer Sale This Weekend Only

UK DVD company Network is taking a brief break from churning out a steady stream of new spy DVDs this weekend to offer a significant sale on all these titles.  This weekend only (through midnight Sunday, UK time), the company is offering 35% off of all their DVDs and soundtrack sets.  That's 35% on top of their already normally discounted prices.  The catch for American buyers with all-region DVD players is that when your order reaches a certain weight, you get saddled with one of those untenable £40 shipping fees.  The good news, however, is that there are no minimums, so you don't need to reach that kind of weight (as one sale last winter required).  In fact, I was able to load two multi-disc sets into my order without triggering the fee, so it seems easy enough to avoid.  So no matter where you live, take advantage of this great deal to pick up on of Network's recent spy DVDs or soundtrack CD sets, like Codename: Kyril, The Corridor People, The 4 Just Men, Saracen, The Sentimental Agent, The Saint: Original Soundtrack or The Zoo Gang: Original Soundtrack.  Or any of the many older spy sets the company has offered. They're all well worth it!  Head on over to Network's website to start saving... and spending.

Bargain Alert: One Day Super Sale On The Man From U.N.C.L.E.!

Amazon is offering The Man From U.N.C.L.E.: The Complete Series for less than half price as their Deal of the Day today!  Today's price is just $85.49 for the complete series–57% off the list price of $199.92 and half of what it was yesterday–the regular Amazon price of $170.99.  But if you're missing this crucial piece of any complete spy collection, and have been patiently waiting for the price to drop this low, you better strike quickly!  This offer is good only today, July 15.  Tomorrow it will be regular price again.  And, yes, what we're talking about here is the awesome attache case-shaped box originally offered as an even costlier Time-Life exclusive, containing all four seasons of the seminal Robert Vaughn/David McCallum series along with copious, copious extras.  It's a really good set.  Get it, and watch it before the dubious Hollywood movie version comes out!  Hurry!