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Favourite quote:
“Stefan, don’t close your mind to me now…”
--Walter Townsend pleading his innocence to Stefan Miklos
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Happy 79th birthday to MISSION composer Benny Golson!
Name: Benny Golson
Birthdate: January 25, 1929
Profession: jazz composer, saxophonist, conductor, arranger, occasional film music and TV composer.
Trivia:
For “Mission: Impossible”, he creates the Syndicate sound of the last two seasons (1971-1972) because one of his scores (entitled “Blind”) is endlessly recycled and tracked over and over. For “Blues”, he writes not only a score but writes one song (“Judy’s Gone Now”) with actor Greg Morris (who performs it) and arranges Otis Redding’s “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay”.
Favourite Works:
• Television
IRONSIDE
IT TAKES A THIEF
• Bruce Geller shows
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE
(season 5)
“Flip Side”
“A Ghost Story”
(season 6)
“Blind”
“Blues”
MANNIX
(season 6)
“See No Evil”
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This is going to be the last season I'll be keyed up about seeing since I can remember many episodes ("El Lider") that I haven't seen in more than 20 years. After that, the show's sense of decline became more evident to me with the music change, miscasting of Lesley Ann Warren (who is usually enjoyable in anything else she did but was all wrong here) and then the caving-in to PC standards of the day by doing no more foreign adventures (the backlash against "meddling in other countries") and making it all organized crime fights. I still want to see them all come out, but this season will be the plateau point for me.
You're right about season 5 ideological shift: the producer tried vainly to attract the pinko youth movement and some episodes were biased: see "Takeover" with its students' agitators, see "The Rebel" and "The Hostage" with far left revolutionaries, see "The Innocent" with a hippie scientist forces to work with the IMF.
But out of these hip episodes came a masterpiece entitled:
"The Killer" starring Robert Conrad (our good friend James West)!
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66-THE MIND OF STEFAN MIKLOS
Quotes:
"His proof had better be valid. It had better be able to withstand the closest scrutiny. (...) Just so you understand me. I despise witch-hunts. And I despise those people who instigate them."
--Stefan Miklos talking to Rollin-as-Simpson
"I wish I could meet the man that masterminded their operation. He was brilliant. I feel sorry for him. He played the game well, but he lost. It'll destroy him."
--Stefan Miklos talking about Jim’s plan
Tape scene:
Jim opens the padlock of an iron curtain to step into a closed movie theatre in renovation (a sign says: “closed for alterations”), passes by two film posters (the 1959 western “The Jayhawkers” and the 1961 drama “Summer and Smoke”) distributed by Paramount Pictures and enters a tickets booth. He turns on the light, opens a drawer and gets a mini reel player.
Summary:
CIA high officer Walter Townsend is a mole who actually is an elite Soviet spy. The US department counterattacks and feeds him with a false piece of information (concerning a secret treaty of nuclear weapons) but jealous Soviet contact George Simpson discovers that and thinks Townsend has defected. USSR's number 1 agent Stefan Miklos is sent to the US ground to investigate. Jim concocts a masterpiece scheme to con Miklos with his own intellectual framework. And to start with, the IMFers substitute a list of codes and the picture of agent Simpson by Rollin at Girard’s art gallery before 10:30: Miklos’ time of arrival.
Cast and details:
Pipe smoking, cold and rationalistic USSR elite agent Stefan Miklos with grey hair (posing as art collector Mr. Davis and also Washington Internal Revenue Service agent Mr. William T. Richards) and his second Vincent, CIA/Soviet agent Walter Townsend, glassware seller and US-based Soviet contact left-handed George Simpson (carrying spectacles) and his man Willoughby, Girard’s art gallery owner are played by Steve Ihnat and Joe Breen (returning from the “Pilot” tape scene), Jason Evers, Ed Asner and Arland Schubert, Vic Perrin.
Stefan Miklos’ close friend (see the picture from the safe), Walter Townsend is bugged and manipulated by the IMF via his telephone, shirt’s collar, a false passport and plane ticket under the name of Peter Marks. Miklos and Vincent, who picks the lock on, go searching Townend’s apartment. Vincent opens the safe and find meaningless items (bank notes, insurance policies, income-tax returns, a box of bonds) but Miklos inspects with a pen light, sees a hair and pushes a hidden button and a false compartment opens itself and Vincent grabs mementos and pictures of boyhood memories and an old book which contains a signed picture (“All my love, S.M.”) of a girlfriend--Cinnamon-as-Sandra Marshall. The picture of Cinnamon-as-Sandra Marshall reveals her adress: Mayfair Apts (room 109) where Miklos and Vincent picks the lock on again. On the wall of Cinnamon’s living-room, you can see Rambeau’s painting, Vincent finds packed bags and Miklos catches the clue left on purpose in the fire place: a burnt ad of a New York Stock Exchange phone number. Miklos empties her grey hand bag and dismantles her powder box to discover two keys in it--and makes an impression with a blue clay--and a matchbook. Miklos launches an investigation on Sandra Marshall via her stock exchange advisor (Barney) and he learns that she sells her $200,000 portfolio. Miklos and Vincent go to the airport and opens the lockers of Cinnamon (#963: containg a bag with a passport and an Europa Airlines ticket to Rio de Janeiro, flight 709) and Townsend (#170: white envelop containing a new passport with a “All my love Sandra” note and a ticket to Rio de Janeiro, flight 709). They catch Cinnamon and Tonwsend at 5 P.M. but at Townsend’s watch it’s 4:30. During the interrogation, we learn that both Miklos and Townsend meet Simpson at 3:00. Walter Townsend pleads his innocence to Stefan Miklos on his way to gun him down for treason and says: “Stefan, don’t close your mind to me now…” Later, Miklos remembers and recites the fake code (“Blue-nine-nine-six-six-four-bishop-five”) and Townsend corrects it by saying: “I sent pawn, not bishop.” As Alfred Belzig in "The Bank", Miklos along with Vincent and Townsend go to Girard’s art gallery and watch the video recording of the surveillance camera along with the owner that show Cinnamon, Jim, Barney and Willy in their parts. As in “The Execution”, the foe has subliminal flashes of the IMFers with their double identities.
Jim poses as gas inspector Gilbert--he simulates a gas leak thanks to a small tube as Barney in "The Survivors"--a Soviet agent posing as a Kensington Ceramics seller--who phones Simpson to reach Rollin-as-Stefan Miklos posing as ceramics buyer in order to warn him about Miklos’ arrival--and as a bogus Willoughby in front of Miklos.
Cinnamon poses as right-handed art collector Sandra Marshall, the so-called fiancé of Walter Townsend and visits Girard’s art gallery and admires a painting by artist Rambeau (an artist name created for the episode) showing a portrait of a blonde woman (executed with a dry brush giving a heavy texture a la Van Gogh) that costs $500 and helps Barney by sticking her ring to the display cabinet of the green Asian statue. Cinnamon phones Townsend’s flat and Miklos replies--notice her pink telephone. She is arrested by Stefan Miklos at the airport because of a ticket found inside a locker which reminds a trick used in "The Counterfeiter".
Before his showcase and while Townsend leaves his flat, Rollin unlocks his door with a special key, unscrews and adds a microphone in the handset of the telephone. Rollin cracks a safe hidden behind a painting by magnetizing a device on the door. Rollin imitates the mannerism of both Stefan Miklos (posing as Ceramics buyer Mr. Gordon) and his contact George Simpson (carrying spectacles). Rollin-as-Stefan Miklos meets once Simpson working at 49 High Street in the Tyler building and his shop’s name is Simpson’s Glassware (wholesale only)--for the anecdote, Simpson mentions the creation of a new spy academy in the Russian town of Granensky where Townsend used to study. Jim asks Rollin-as-Miklos to phone Simpson and orders him two things: to be at Townsend’s apartment at 3:00 sharp--so that he gives Townsend a locker’s key and a 4:30 P.M. appointment at the airport to get new information instruction--and to return to the homeland. Rollin-as-George Simpson meets Miklos three times in the shop: the introduction and the accusation of Townsend, the forged Washington credentials given to Miklos at 03:04 P.M. while he switches his golden lighter by a broken one so that he uses a matchbook to light his pipe, the proof via agent Willoughby (Jim).
Barney poses as a gas employee who does some ceiling job inside a tight vent to substitute Miklos’ message hidden at the bottom of a green statue: Barney puts a hole in the wood wall with a drill, sneak into the vent, activates a metal detector (Cf. “The Mercenaries”) to pinpoint the location of the green statue, takes off a wood square thanks to a syringe filled with acid (Cf. “The Heir Apparent” and “The Cardinal”) and a sponge to clean up, cuts a green rounded tissue and grabs a large metal tube containing the infos. Before posing as stocks expert Mr. Haskell from Williams, Monroe and Williams Brokerage who makes a research for Miklos, Barney sneaks into Townsend’s flat, adds a flexible microphone on his shirt’s collar and delays his wristwatch of a half hour.
Willy poses as a gas employee from the Municipal Gas Co.--he returns to his green truck and warns Barney with talkie-walkie about the arrival of Miklos--and also as a security officer at the airport to rescue Cinnamon from the claws of Miklos.
The corridor that leads to Simpson’s shop that you witness is from the Miami hotel in “The Bargain”. This episode features no dossier scene hence the IMF logo appears at the end of the apartement scene.
Review:
An extremely dense plot written by 26 years old Paul Playdon that features Jim Phelps' East bloc counterpart, Stefan Miklos whose photographic memory called “instant total recall” (quick cuts combined with Richard Markowitz's dissonant sound effects) shows how sharp he is. The abstract writing (tight timings, tiny details galore, ellipsis-laden) and the film editing are so intricate and intercut that it becomes an uncompromising and challenging cerebral experience never before reached in the series. The most suspenseful scene occurs when Miklos and Vincent walk in the corridor of the Tyler building and bump into Jim, Simpson and Willoughby just leaving the glassware shop. Details of the plot as fake informations to confuse the enemy remind "The Diplomat" which also features the painting depicting a woman. Notice an amusing reference to arts and crafts in this narrative: glassware with Simpson, ceramics with Jim and painting with Cinnamon--oddly enough, Girard’s art gallery and Simpsons’ glassware have the same kind of blind. Take a special attention to composer Richard Markowitz’ ambitious modernist score and its unusual sense of instrumentation. As in "The Exchange", find Rollin reciting key words to contact George Simpson in order to identify himself as Stefan Miklos: - Rollin: "I understand you specialize in glass miniatures." - Simpson replies: "Uh, what kind of miniatures were you interested in?" - Rollin carries on: "Birds." And Simpson concludes: "Any, uh, uh, special kind?" - Rollin finally answers: "Blue jays and swans." My single favourite masterpiece.
Stock music:
“Operation Rogosh” (In the vent of the art gallery, Barney does some ceiling job for getting Miklos’ information instruction)
“The Cardinal” (Vincent watches and tails by car Sandra Marshall; Miklos’ final speech in front of Townsend in the car’s backseat)
Instant total recall (fast memory process) scenes:
• The information instruction tube culled from the green Ming statue
• The matchbook
• The passport of Sandra Marshall
• The wristwatch of Townsend
• The codes of the green Ming statue
• Rambeau’s painting of the art gallery
• The video recording’s pictures of Sandra Marshall
• The video recording’s pictures of Barney and Willy
• The face of Jim-as-Willoughby
Blooper:
Instead of the Municipal Gas Co. van, Willy is sat on a delivery van serving as a communication center and, in the back, Jim and Barney listen to Townsend’s apartment.
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66-THE MIND OF STEFAN MIKLOS
Quotes:
"His proof had better be valid. It had better be able to withstand the closest scrutiny. (...) Just so you understand me. I despise witch-hunts. And I despise those people who instigate them."
--Stefan Miklos talking to Rollin-as-Simpson
"I wish I could meet the man that masterminded their operation. He was brilliant. I feel sorry for him. He played the game well, but he lost. It'll destroy him."
--Stefan Miklos talking about Jim’s plan
Instant total recall (fast memory process) scenes:
• The information instruction tube culled from the green Ming statue
• The matchbook
• The passport of Sandra Marshall
• The wristwatch of Townsend
• The codes of the green Ming statue
• Rambeau’s painting of the art gallery
• The video recording’s pictures of Sandra Marshall
• The video recording’s pictures of Barney and Willy
• The face of Jim-as-Willoughby
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THE INTERROGATOR
Silva and Landau play a fine duet on the sado-maso mode and prisoner-hangman transferences like this:
Kruger-as-interrogator: "Answer me."
Rollin (panting, breathing, moving his head) : "aahhhahhh."
Kruger-as-interrogator: "Answer."
Rollin: "No."
Kruger-as-interrogator: "You will answer me!"
Rollin: "No."
Kruger-as-interrogator: "You will answer me!"
Rollin: "No!"
Kruger-as-interrogator: "You will answer!"
Rollin: "No!"
Kruger-as-interrogator: "Answer!"
Kruger-as-prisoner: "No!"
Kruger-as-interrogator: "Answer!"
Kruger-as-prisoner: "No!"
(sound effects)
Kruger-as-prisoner: "No!"
(sound effects)
Kruger-as-prisoner: "No!"
(sound effects)
Kruger-as-prisoner: "No!"
(sound effects)
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The box also has that stomach-churning "some episodes may be edited" disclaimer...