After watching "Our Man Flint," audiences will realizes Mike Myers' Austin Powers character and spy spoofing owes a great deal to Hal Finberg's hysterical creation. Granted the film is draped in sixties kitsch, but Derek Flint, from the onset, is the anti-Bond: he ignores orders, has his own arsenal, pleasures four girls simultaneously (well, on the dance floor at least), and can stop his heartbeat. Weekly. And amid his obvious selfishness, he manages to rescue a few babes from being turned into Branded Pleasure Units, destined for the Reward Room, as established by the film's triple egghead villains.

Fox's production luxuriously fills the wide CinemaScope panorama with plenty of detail; every set was designed for the 2.35:1 ratio, and the film's wide camera movements make a point of showing off the sloping angles and focal points. Fox's DVD packaging is designed to mimic the candy, floral explosions of the Austin Powers videos (the first Flint case is cherry red), and certainly reflects the film's bright colour bouquet.

"Our Man Flint" was transferred from a very nice print. Oddly, the only graphics which mar the film's look is the CinemaScope logo; designed in 1953, Fox continued to use the pre-credit bit well through the sixties, and it actually dates the film, while the set décor (for the most part) looks pretty snazzy. (An Eames-inspired, multi-person, sunbathing mound is just plain amazing.)

Though a stereo soundtrack album appeared at the time of the film's original release, the DVD uses the original mono mix. Punchy with clear dialogue, however, distortion plagues the high end during the film's volcanic conclusion, as Jerry Goldsmith's relatively mono-thematic music battles with the sound effects.

Lacking major extras - of the shopworn trailers, only "Modesty Blaise" is anamorphic - This DVD nevertheless presents a gorgeous CinemaScope transfer of the first of Fox' two Flint features, followed by "In Like Flint," and Fox' other spy spoof entries, "Modest Blaise," and "Fathom."

© 2002 Mark R. Hasan