Mind-numbingly dull spy movie starring Robert Vaughn. I only watched this for Boris Karloff, who appears in a small role. He's good but not in this enough to matter much. Still, Karloff completists will want to check it out. Everyone else should just avoid it like the plague. It's such a boring, lifeless movie. I thought spy movies were supposed to be fun and full of action and intrigue? Apparently the people behind this didn't get the memo. Vaughn does fine as the lead but the script and direction give him little to work with. Elke Sommer and Felicia Farr provide the pretty. Ed Asner is decent in a supporting role. I fell asleep while watching this. I'm not kidding -- it literally put me to sleep during the scene where Vaughn finds the suitcase while the flute music is playing. When I woke up, I forced myself to rewind to this point and finish the movie. But man, it was a chore to do so. I can't and won't recommend this to anyone looking for a good '60s spy flick. This is the pits.

Two things are noteworthy about The Venetian Affair. One was that Robert Vaughn tried to break out into the big screen like such television contemporaries as James Garner and Steve McQueen without the success that they had. The second was that this was the last film Boris Karloff did that was not related to the horror genre.The film begins with a bang. An American diplomat is given a bomb and it detonates in a disarmament conference in Venice. No one can figure out why, but you can bet the USA does not want to be held responsible when forensics prove it was our guy who was the suicide bomber.Our man in Venice for the CIA Edward Asner sends for former agent Robert Vaughn who is now an alcoholic newspaperman working for a wire service. They suspect his ex-wife Elke Sommer has something to do with it and he's the best at finding her. She's also the reason that he's no longer with the CIA.Boris Karloff plays an elderly man of geopolitical mystery. He knows what's going on, but some sinister folks are controlling him.The Venetian Affair is a pedestrian affair moving at a paint drying pace and Vaughn after being television's urbane Napoleon Solo in The Man From UNCLE never quite got his teeth in this part. Karl Boehm is a good villain and only at the very end do we find out who he is working for. As for the reason why the diplomat did the foul deed, that you watch The Venetian Affair for.

NOT a compilation of MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. episodes, THE VENETIAN AFFAIR is an exciting spy film starring Robert Vaughn and Karl Böhm. Vaughn is an ex-CIA agent lured back into work by cranky former superior Ed Asner. Trying to figure out why a US diplomat set off a bomb, blowing himself up along with 13 others, Vaughn runs into the likes of Elke Sommmer (as a shifty triple agent), Boris Karloff and Böhm, who plays a certifiable madman. The plot involves cold war espionage and mind-control and it's handled well by Jerry Thorpe, an episodic television director making a rare foray into features. The location work in Venice helps a lot. Vaughn is very Napoleon Solo-like (minus even a hint of humor) and he's well teamed with Roger C. Carmel as a paranoid co-worker. Lalo Schifrin provided the fun music score.

"The Venetian Affair", based on Helen MacInnes bestseller, is one of the seemingly endless number of James Bond-inspired spy films that flooded cinemas in the mid to late 1960's. Despite a pedestrian script and direction, the film benefits from some great on-location scenery in Venice as well as a talented and eclectic cast. Robert Vaughn plays against type as an alcoholic reporter who is swept into an espionage case with international repercussions. Vaughn delivers the goods with a convincing, world-weary performance that was at odds with his weekly heroics as The Man From UNCLE (despite popular belief, this is not an UNCLE-related film). Karl Boehm is fine as the obligatory charming villain, Roger C. Carmel provides some light moments in the otherwise downbeat script, Boris Karloff has one of his last quality roles, and Thunderball Bond girl Luciana Paluzzi, queen of the '60's spy films, makes a brief but welcome appearance. Only Elke Sommer gums up the works with a typically wooden performance that is little more animated than the stone gargoyles that adorn the ancient Venetian buildings. In summary, an unremarkable, but entertaining film. Rarely seen in recent years, TCM has recently begun telecasting it in a glorious widescreen version. One hopes that a video release will eventually take place.