A Dandy in Aspic * (1968, Laurence Harvey, Tom Courtenay, Lionel Stander, Mia Farrow, Harry Andrews, Peter Cook, Per Oscarsson, Barbara Murray) – Classic Movie Review 13,557

The 1968 British spy thriller film A Dandy in Aspic is based on the 1966 novel by Derek Marlowe, and stars Laurence Harvey, Tom Courtenay, Lionel Stander, Mia Farrow, Harry Andrews, Peter Cook.

Directors Anthony Mann and Laurence Harvey’s 1968 Columbia Pictures’ British spy thriller film A Dandy in Aspic is based on the 1966 novel by Derek Marlowe, and stars Laurence Harvey, Tom Courtenay, Lionel Stander, Mia Farrow, Harry Andrews, Peter Cook, Per Oscarsson, and Barbara Murray.

Hooray for the vintage cast in this absurdly labyrinthine, yet dull and uninspired spy tale set in Berlin, with double agent known by the code name Eberlin (Laurence Harvey) ordered to assassinate himself.

Krasnevin (Laurence Harvey) is a KGB agent and assassin who has infiltrated London society and British Intelligence as wealthy businessman Alexander Eberlin. Kraznevin kills several British agent and British Intelligence Chief Fraser (Harry Andrews) orders Eberlin to eliminate Krasnevin.

Derek Marlowe’s screenplay from his own novel is full of meaningless double and triple-crosses, leaving a plot that even this strong cast can’t pull through to success.

It is filmed in Technicolor and Panavision by Christopher Challis and Austin Dempster, mostly on location in London and Berlin. It is very modish, with costumes by Pierre Cardin.

Director Mann died of a heart attack during location filming and Harvey took over the job. Mann died in his hotel room in Berlin on 29 April 1967 after two weeks of filming. A Dandy in Aspic was completed by the film’s star Laurence Harvey, who went uncredited. 

Also in the cast are John Bird as Henderson, Norman Bird as Copperfield, Geoffrey Bayldon as Lake, Calvin Lockhart as Brogue, Michael Trubshawe as Flowers, James Cossins as Heston-Stevas, Geoffrey Lumsden as Ridley, Elspeth March as Lady Hetherington, Richard O’Sullivan as Nevil, Mike Pratt as Greff, George Murcell as Sergeant Harris, and Vernon Dobtcheff as Stein.

The score is by Quincy Jones, who conducts the orchestra including  Carol Kaye on electric bass and Earl Palmer on drums.

English writer Derek Marlowe published his first novel A Dandy in Aspic in 1966, prompted by going to Berlin on a Ford Foundation grant to attend a ‘colloquium on creative writing’ with Günter Grass and Uwe Johnson. He wrote nine novels, including the 1970 espionage story Echoes of Celandine, later filmed as The Disappearance, starring Donald Sutherland.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,557

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