THE SWISS CONSPIRACY

		Review by E.C. McMullen Jr.
THE SWISS CONSPIRACY - - 1976 USA Release: Sept. 1977 Bavaria Atelier, Bavaria Film, Durham Productions, S.J. International Pictures Rated: USA: R

When it comes to movies, young acolyte, you have Horror Thriller, Horror by itself, and Thriller by itself. I prefer Horror movies that are thrilling, but I can also be taken in by a Thriller that is Thrilling without the Horror. The fact is, I've never seen a Horror movie that wasn't suffused with Mystery and Suspense (Edgar Allen Poe didn't see his work as Horror, but as Mysteries). The same goes for Thrillers. Like THE SWISS CONSPIRACY.

Caveat: One of the chief ways movie producers go about trashing an otherwise good movie is when they post a shit-ton of text, paragraph after paragraph of the explanatory stuff at the opening of the movie. It's so rare that a movie can survive this garbage that out of hundreds of thousands, only one success comes to mind, the first Star Wars (1977) made around the same time.

Even Director George Lucas, who wanted that opening scrawl, had the presence of mind to know that no one should be reading the opening text to the audience, even if that intended audience was children and young adult.

His opening text also moved. It had action and he expected children to read and understand it and the second it was over? The action started with the Pew! Pew! Pew!

So what does it say about the producers of THE SWISS CONSPIRACY that they had both a static slab of three paragraphs worth of opening text, but also had a narrator reading said text for the intended adult audience?

It says they're morons!

What that text is really there for is to advertise Switzerland as a luxurious vacation land and the dependable trustworthiness found in the intricate security layers of Swiss Banks (bring you and your money to Switzerland!).

However, I'm pretty sure that isn't director Jack Arnold's fault.

After all, the man was known and renown for making classic Science Fiction Horror movies1 (IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE, CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, REVENGE OF THE CREATURE, THIS ISLAND EARTH, TARANTULA, SCIENCE FICTION THEATER [TV], THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN, THE SPACE CHILDREN, MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS). Jack wasn't always the writer and when he wasn't, the science got a little wonky (boy could it ever!). When he was writing he gave us the most bizarre monsters in cinema history (THE MONOLITH MONSTERS).

For all of his success in Horror and Science Fiction movies, the very studios that hired him and knew they could make bank with him, also dismissed him as a mere Horror and SciFi director who wasn't worth their big pictures.

Such shabby treatment, especially from Universal, tainted his enjoyment of the Horror classics he made for decades of his life.

Though he did his share of Cowboy shit-kickers (nearly every Hollywood director had to. It was easy money and the rent won't pay itself), Jack was most excited about the future. His crew found his enthusiasm infectious and together they set flocks of 1950s through 1960s audiences progressing forward to the future (and all the technological leaps that happened in the 1950s through 1990s) instead of regressing backward (where we are now in the 2010s to the present).

What set Jack's Science Fiction Horror movies apart from others of his era is that he was always about the action!

It's a Movie! It's got to Move! Seemed to be the ethos of Jack.

After the terrible opening text exposition, we see fine dining at an upscale swanky Swiss restaurant. A waiter who appears to enjoy being an assassin, happily delivers both barrels to a customer.

That's not the kind of service I expect at a restaurant, not even in Switzerland.

Now the audience is treated to a postcard that reads "Welcome to Switzerland!". Then, to the gentle strains of Oompa-pa Polka music we're treated to the movie credits with Swiss postcards as interstitials.

E-Gad!

I first saw this in a 4th run Arthouse theater in the days when I would go to see whatever movie was playing, then hold onto my seat for the second movie, which was the movie I wanted to see. In those days I spent every Friday and Saturday at the midnight showings of THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW.

If my memory is accurate, one week they played Monty Python's The Holy Grail. The next, THE SWISS CONSPIRACY. During the opening credits of the rumpy-dumpy tuba music (complete with yodelers - I'm not kidding!), I was thinking they were made by the same folks who were fired, mid-credits, from the Monty Python movie. If you seen it, you know what I'm talking about.

So you'll have to forgive me if I thought I was going to see a comedy, because THE SWISS CONSPIRACY ain't a comedy - but shoo! It sure starts like one!

Unbelievably MSTK3 beginning for a filmmaker of Jack's caliber, but again, it's what the Producer wanted. And who was this producer who got the money for this flick? Maurice Silverstein.

There must have been a box on his Bucket List that read, Produce an All-Star Feature Film, because at the age of 65 he did just that. THE SWISS CONSPIRACY is Silverstein's first and only movie.

And Jack? Well before his name comes up as director, this farce with the titles abruptly stops and jazzy, catchy complicated music, kind of like a cross between Quincy Jones and Barry De Vorzon, begins. The postcards stop, and we are treated to Jack Arnold-style aerial movement toward a city. It's to this modern music, (modern for 1976) by composer Klaus Doldinger (DAS BOOT, THE NEVER ENDING STORY) that Jack's name is emblazoned across the screen as if to say, "Okay, enough of that bullshit, this is the REAL movie!"

Inside a palatial bank, an elderly woman of means notifies the guard that there is trash on the floor. She walks away, shaking her head at how the standards have fallen, while the guard picks up the letter and appears to find it disheartening.

For one thing, the writing on it is in red magic marker.

He acts as though he wants to open it, thinks better of it, and takes it to the bank bigwig's secretary.

She looks it over as though she wants to open it, looks around at the other staff in the room with her, thinks better of it, and takes it to her Big Wig.

Big Wig is Franz Denninger (Anton Differing: TALES OF FRANKENSTEIN, THE MAN WHO COULD CHEAT DEATH, CIRCUS OF HORRORS, FAHRENHEIT 451, MARK OF THE DEVIL PART II, SEVEN DEATHS IN THE CAT'S EYES, THE BEAST MUST DIE, H.P. LOVECRAFT: SCHATTEN AUS DER ZEIT, SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE MASKS OF DEATH). He too considers opening it, thinks better of it, and takes it to his Big Wig, and this is where we get to the head honcho who runs the bank, Johann Hurtil (Ray Milland: THE UNINVITED [1944], MINISTRY OF FEAR, DIAL M FOR MURDER, PANIC IN YEAR ZERO!, X: THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES, FROGS, THE THING WITH TWO HEADS, THE HOUSE IN NIGHTMARE PARK, TERROR IN THE WAX MUSEAUM [1973], THE STUDENT CONNECTION, THE DEAD DON'T DIE, ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN [1975], THE UNCANNY, CRUISE INTO TERROR, THE DARKER SIDE OF TERROR, THE ATTIC [1980], STARFLIGHT: THE PLANE THAT COULDN'T LAND, THE SEA SERPENT, SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE MASKS OF DEATH).

It's a ransom letter. Someone has the secret names of many of the customers of Johann's bank. What's more they demand a hefty ransom not only from the bank, but from the customers whose names they have. And if they don't get it in a timely fashion? Refer to the former customer who took two shotgun blasts to the chest in the restaurant last night.

Everything is exceedingly touchy about the case besides the obvious. Johann can't notify the police, because they'll want to question the clients and that will become public. What is public in a free country like Switzerland becomes news to the world. Worse, the stumble of even one Swiss bank shades them all. Swiss banks have been renown for their secrecy for centuries. The scale of such a scandal would be damaging to the reputation of Switzerland itself (true!). No, Johann needs a capable man of discretion and that's where former U.S. Department of Justice agent, David Christopher (David Janssen: CULT OF THE COBRA, FRANCIS IN THE HAUNTED HOUSE, MAROONED, MOON OF THE WOLF) comes in. He left under a cloud it seems and now he works freelance.

Meanwhile, a short-tempered, flinchy small-time crook named Robert Hayes (John Saxon: THE EVIL EYE, BLOOD BEAST FROM OUTER SPACE, QUEEN OF BLOOD, THE DOOMSDAY FLIGHT, BLACK CHRISTMAS, PLANET EARTH, STRANGE NEW WORLD, BEYOND EVIL, CANNIBALS IN THE STREETS, BLOOD BEACH, WRONG IS RIGHT, THE SCORPION WITH TWO TAILS, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, TENEBRE, A NIGHTMARE ON EML STREET 3, MY MOM'S A WEREWOLF, NIGHTMARE BEACH, AFTER SHOCK, BLOOD SALVAGE, THE ARRIVAL [1991], HELLMASTER, NEW NIGHTMARE, Masters Of Horror: PELTS) enters Switzerland with a briefcase full of cash.

He's off to his Swiss bank and headed for the big time if he can keep his embezzling secret. There's just one thing: He got a letter written in red magic marker...

If Robert was angry before he came to Switzerland, he can barely contain his rage upon meeting David. DOJ agent to mobster, the two have a history together and it wasn't all fun and frolic.

Speaking of fun and frolic, another bank customer being threatened is Denise Abbot (Senta Berger: THE TERROR OF DOCTOR MABUSE, PUZZLE). Since he's investigating the case, David has questions and none of the victims of the extortionist want to answer them. Hell, anonymity is the whole point of having a Swiss bank account and the idea of talking to a former U.S. agent of the DOJ and U.S. treasury is as threatening as the anonymous extortionist.

Director Jack Arnold wasn't about to shoot a tense interrogation and conversation movie, as deeply interesting as that could be (like Alfred Hitchcock and Francis Ford Coppola did and do with ease), so there are plenty of chases. Because this is Jack Arnold and not Michael Bay, the spectacle of every chase isn't shoe-horned in, but is as intense and integral to the story as the hit-men who are getting involved, including David Hess (THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, SWAMP THING [1982]) as the killer, Sando.

Still, I couldn't get that damn opening out of my head and even with this new watch, it still taints the experience.

Three Shriek Girls

This review copyright 2024 E.C.McMullen Jr.

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