“Now, if by so much as a raised eyebrow, you attempt to betray me…”
The Fiction-Makers (1968) // dir. Roy Ward Baker // United Kingdom
Ms. Klein: Well, why don't you die of shock?
Simon: Well, I just did.
Ms. Klein: So, what's holding you up?
Simon: Rigor mortis.
Ms. Klein: Try bending.
I adore the agent of pure chaos that is Roger Moore as Simon Templar. The man loves to cause trouble and stir things up and occasionally step in to right wrongs, but mainly his purpose is essentially to troll the powerful, rich, and ridiculous by uh, *checks notes* also being powerful, rich, and ridiculous.
It’s an inside job.
In The Fiction-Makers (a 2-part episode edited into a feature film), we get a delightful plot revolving around Simon Templar being mistaken as the writer of a series of spy novels and getting kidnapped (along with the actual writer, a woman who writes under a male pen name) by a group of criminal super-fans who have decided to create a criminal organization based on her fictional series villains.
ABSOLUTE CHAOS.
It’s very probably intended to be a gentle mockery of Man From U.N.C.LE. (at one point a character is reading a celeb magazine that features Robert Vaughan on the back cover), and it is truly delightful to see. It opens with typically-meta Saint moment with Simon watching a film version of a spy movie starring someone who suspiciously looks quite like him (Roger Moore’s body double???) going through the motions of a fight scene that Simon is calling out for being rote and obvious (he names each movement as it goes).
And let me tell you, Simon Templar snob movie critic talking DURING a movie is exactly why he so often veers into the chaotic evil side of the realm.
Sylvia Sims plays the author Amos Klein / Ms. Darling, and she does incredible work here. An absolute energy match for Roger Moore, and that does not often happen. Roger Moore’s Simon Templar is so perfect because he is such a ball of silly energy expressed in a cool and calm demeanor. (This is why Roger Moore’s early ‘70s fashion choice to strictly wear white button-ups with ruffles for a period of time is endlessly iconic: finally he could look formal and ridiculous at the same time!)
Sylvia Sims has that vibe down perfectly, and together they absolutely float through this playing two people who know they are so charming and clever beyond everyone else that they can just be erratic and fun and still end up on top.
Also, she looks real good—iconically hot—in her spectacles that she wears on a chain, and she, and I, and Simon Templar all know it.
Anyway.
This was quite a bit of fun fluff and joy, and there is something so very satisfying about watching absolute ridiculousness presented with such skill and competency. I highly recommend.
Here is a taste of the sublimely silly and somewhat surprising final 30 seconds that I still have questions about tbh and these few screencaps cannot do justice to the wild, but here ya go—
