Simon Templar promises his old college chum Monty Hayward a relaxing vacation in Europe, but the press are sure he's onto something big. So much so that reporter Mary Langdon follows him over half of France & Switzerland before catching up with him at a hotel. Well, Simon may have meant what he said, but no sooner does Mary arrive than Simon crosses paths with his ARCH-NEMESIS, Rudolph Hauser, and when he sees a man being attacked in the woods, he can't help but stick his nose in. Next thing, he finds himself between 2 different groups trying to get their hands on a mysterious box containing who knows what, which leads to a murder in his hotel, a confrontation at Rudolph's castle home, a chase on board a speeding train, an escape from a small local jail, a kidnapping, a rescue, and finally being arrested by the British police on returning to England. Just another typical adventure for "THE SAINT"!
My GOD, what a serious, MAJOR upgrade this film was to its predecessor! Made by the newly-formed RKO Radio British Productions and filmed entirely in England, it returns Simon Templar to his natural environment, recasts the part with someone who actually looks right for the role, and give us, instead of another dreary crime story, an actual ADVENTURE, which is the sort of thing RKO in Hollywood should have been doing from the start but NEVER did!
Contrary to several comments, this film was not a swipe of THE LADY VANISHES (1938) or its source novel "The Wheel Spins" (1936) but was in fact adapted from Leslie Charteris' novel "Getaway" from 1932! Any complaints about the lack of Nazis or World War Two can be put down to this being adapted from a story written 9 YEARS earlier. (Not every film adaptation is or should be "updated" to the year it was filmed. I really wish more "classic" characters would be presented in their authentic time as "period pieces".)
Hugh Sinclair takes over as Simon, and is insanely-relaxed regardless of the situation, but also good in a fight. He's a bit skinny for the part, but the only thing that actually bothers me is his moustache-- The Saint should ALWAYS be clean-shaven! I've seen a photo of him from some other film, where he looked more right than he does here.
Arthur Macrae is Simon's pal "Monty Hayward". Unlike a number of Simon's sidekicks, this guy is NOT an ex-con who's decided to go straight, but clearly someone Simon probably went to college with. He's such a "Nervous Nellie" I'm sure he's bound to get on the nerves of most modern audiences, but you have to take into account when these characters were created. I've also seen Macrae in SILVER BLAZE (1937) opposite Arthur Wontner's Sherlock Holmes.
Sally Gray, my FAVORITE "Saint girl", plays relentless girl reporter Mary Langdon, who proves handy in some tough situations. It's very odd that both SAINT films she appeared in were based on stories that originally featured Simon's sometimes-girlfriend Patricia Holm, and would have been PERFECT in the role, but both times was playing other people!
Gordon McLeod makes his 2nd appearance as Inspector Teal, but only in a brief cameo at the end, seeming rather disappointed that Templar wasn't being charged with anything. As it turns out, this was the 2nd story he was in where Templar wound up doing a favor for the British government-- although this time, he didn't tell them that until the whole case was over with!
Amazingly, the person who completely STEALS the movie is Cecil Parker. As "Rudolph Hauser", he's my FAVORITE Saint villain, a guy so smooth, so suave, so cool, so calculating (yet not shy when it comes to murdering people himself when the situation calls for it), he is this series' equivalent of a BOND villain, decades early! This story is also the ONLY time in the RKO series where we see a baddie with a genuine "villain hideout", in the form of Rudolph's castle. Something I didn't realize for many years was, the character of "Prince Rudolph" was the main villain in 3 different novels-- "The Last Hero", "The Avenging Saint" (alias "Knight Templar"), and "Getaway"-- and I've READ the first 2, but never the 3rd! I really need to make up for that. Realizing this now, and re-watching the film, I feel it's downright CRIMINAL that RKO spent so much time doing tedious crime stories when they should have been adapting Charteris' ADVENTURE novels. My estimation of some of these has altered a bit over the decades, and right now, I'd rank this as the 2nd-best in the series (right after ...IN LONDON).
There's some great dialogue in this, including... "What am I under arrest for?" "Murder!" "Oh, is that all?" ...and... "I'm not as stupid as you think I am!" "That practically impossible."
It's a shame they only did 2 SAINT films in England with Sinclair, and judging by the release date of the 2nd one, I'd guess the abrupt end of the series may have had something to do with WW2 being officially declared at that point. I'd have loved to have seen a DOZEN of them as good as this one was.
My GOD, what a serious, MAJOR upgrade this film was to its predecessor! Made by the newly-formed RKO Radio British Productions and filmed entirely in England, it returns Simon Templar to his natural environment, recasts the part with someone who actually looks right for the role, and give us, instead of another dreary crime story, an actual ADVENTURE, which is the sort of thing RKO in Hollywood should have been doing from the start but NEVER did!
Contrary to several comments, this film was not a swipe of THE LADY VANISHES (1938) or its source novel "The Wheel Spins" (1936) but was in fact adapted from Leslie Charteris' novel "Getaway" from 1932! Any complaints about the lack of Nazis or World War Two can be put down to this being adapted from a story written 9 YEARS earlier. (Not every film adaptation is or should be "updated" to the year it was filmed. I really wish more "classic" characters would be presented in their authentic time as "period pieces".)
Hugh Sinclair takes over as Simon, and is insanely-relaxed regardless of the situation, but also good in a fight. He's a bit skinny for the part, but the only thing that actually bothers me is his moustache-- The Saint should ALWAYS be clean-shaven! I've seen a photo of him from some other film, where he looked more right than he does here.
Arthur Macrae is Simon's pal "Monty Hayward". Unlike a number of Simon's sidekicks, this guy is NOT an ex-con who's decided to go straight, but clearly someone Simon probably went to college with. He's such a "Nervous Nellie" I'm sure he's bound to get on the nerves of most modern audiences, but you have to take into account when these characters were created. I've also seen Macrae in SILVER BLAZE (1937) opposite Arthur Wontner's Sherlock Holmes.
Sally Gray, my FAVORITE "Saint girl", plays relentless girl reporter Mary Langdon, who proves handy in some tough situations. It's very odd that both SAINT films she appeared in were based on stories that originally featured Simon's sometimes-girlfriend Patricia Holm, and would have been PERFECT in the role, but both times was playing other people!
Gordon McLeod makes his 2nd appearance as Inspector Teal, but only in a brief cameo at the end, seeming rather disappointed that Templar wasn't being charged with anything. As it turns out, this was the 2nd story he was in where Templar wound up doing a favor for the British government-- although this time, he didn't tell them that until the whole case was over with!
Amazingly, the person who completely STEALS the movie is Cecil Parker. As "Rudolph Hauser", he's my FAVORITE Saint villain, a guy so smooth, so suave, so cool, so calculating (yet not shy when it comes to murdering people himself when the situation calls for it), he is this series' equivalent of a BOND villain, decades early! This story is also the ONLY time in the RKO series where we see a baddie with a genuine "villain hideout", in the form of Rudolph's castle. Something I didn't realize for many years was, the character of "Prince Rudolph" was the main villain in 3 different novels-- "The Last Hero", "The Avenging Saint" (alias "Knight Templar"), and "Getaway"-- and I've READ the first 2, but never the 3rd! I really need to make up for that. Realizing this now, and re-watching the film, I feel it's downright CRIMINAL that RKO spent so much time doing tedious crime stories when they should have been adapting Charteris' ADVENTURE novels. My estimation of some of these has altered a bit over the decades, and right now, I'd rank this as the 2nd-best in the series (right after ...IN LONDON).
There's some great dialogue in this, including... "What am I under arrest for?" "Murder!" "Oh, is that all?" ...and... "I'm not as stupid as you think I am!" "That practically impossible."
It's a shame they only did 2 SAINT films in England with Sinclair, and judging by the release date of the 2nd one, I'd guess the abrupt end of the series may have had something to do with WW2 being officially declared at that point. I'd have loved to have seen a DOZEN of them as good as this one was.