Whatever they paid Goldsmith, it wasn't enough; whatever they paid Bricusse, it was too much

 Pop culture time here at the blog.

I have a certain, slightly embarrassing fondness for James Coburn’s Flint films. Not exactly good, but full of good stuff, landing somewhere between the heights of Coburn’s The President's Analyst and the depths of Dean Martin’s Matt Helm films. (Along with the Cisco Kid, the Matt Helm films have the distinction of being about as far in tone from their source material as you’re likely to find. The original Donald Hamilton novels -- as archetypical of the Gold Medal line as John D. MacDonald's -- are some of the darkest books you’ll find in the spy-fi catalog, painting a far bleaker picture than, for example, the The Ipcress File.)

As films, the first installment, Our Man Flint, is the better of the two. The second, In Like Flint (a rather daring allusion to a scandalous incident involving Errol Flynn), was a troubled production saddled with a satiric take on women’s lib that has aged like room-temperature milk. Still, it had some excellent set pieces. Rumor has it that some of the action sequences were directed by the stunt coordinator, which tends to work out well.

One of the wonderful things about both movies is the scores by Jerry Goldsmith. Our Man Flint features some very early work from the young nephew of the studio’s music director, a kid named Randy Newman. In Like Flint, by comparison, features the song “Zowie Face,” with very nice music by Goldsmith and absolutely painful lyrics by Leslie Bricusse. That one misstep aside, it may be my favorite of the two soundtracks.

Both scores manage to function brilliantly on two levels, simultaneously serving as first-rate spy movie music while also acting as clever parodies of the genre—propulsive, inventive, and memorable when played straight, witty, self-referential, and genuinely funny when winking at the joke.

I can’t think of another film composer who could pull this off, and I never get tired of hearing him do it.