1960's secret agent spoofs tended not to attract top-tier directors......but 'Modesty' came under the supervision of Hollywood blacklist exile turned European auteur Joseph Losey......and for his va-va-voom leading lady, along came none other than Antonioni's morose Princess, Monica Vitti.......
Sounds like an odd combination to make a tongue-in-cheek, spoofy Pop-Art spy caper......and it was.
Nobody ever accused Losey of having a sense of humor...but he must have thought posing the actors in spiffy outfits against sun-drenched backdrops was funny enough. Supposedly directing an action-adventure, Losey studiously arranges his actors like they're in a still photo magazine cover instead of a movie....
A few minor pleasures pop up here and there......Dirk Bogarde camping it up as the patrician villain, sporting a blonde wig that looks like it came from a David Bowie Halloween shop costume.......Rossella Falk as Bogarde's insane lady assassin, who provides wish fulfillment for all of us when she strangles a mime with her thighs......Jack HIldyard's picture-postcard camerawork......Vitti's gorgeous legs, which she frequently dangles in front of the camera even when the rest of her's hidden behind a door.....
But really, this film, as fun as it sounds, is a slow tortuous thing to get through......even when, in its most inspired gag, it has Vitti and her boytoy cohort, Terence Stamp breaking into faux-Broadway duets with other while in the middle of gunfights. Losey's content to cast a distant, jaundiced eye on the film's little comic book world........deep down, you sense he's not that interested....
A beautiful poster illustration, though......in which you can lose yourself and imagine a far more entertaining movie than the real one.....1 & 1/2 stars (* 1/2)
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