REVIEWED BY DAVID VINEYARD:

   

CHARLES EXBRAYAT – A Ravishing Idiot. Popular Library, US, paperback, 1965. Originally published in France as Une Ravissante Idiote (1962); translated by Peter Sourian.

UNE RAVISSANTE IDIOTE. France, 1964. Released in the US as Agent 38-24-36 (Seven Arts, 1964). Brigitte Bardot, Anthony Perkins, Gregoire Aslan. Screenplay by François Billettdoux, based on the novel by Charles Exbrayat. Directed by Edouard Molinaro.

   Harry was suffering from the worst of the Capitalists’ diseases: he was in love and he dreamed of giving the girl a Rolls Royce, a mink coat, and a cottage in Dorset — ideas, which had the Kremlin known about them, would have classified him as a hopeless reactionary.

   
   Harry Compton (Piotr Sergievitch Miloukine) is a Russian agent in London who is in love with the beautiful and very blonde Miss Penelope “Penny” Lightfeather, who it seems is Harry’s ticket into the Admiralty for a mission from Moscow run by Armenian restaurant owner Ter-Bagdassarian to uncover the recently completed British Naval plan to attack the Russian bases in the Baltic known as Avalanche.

   Moscow is desperate to uncover Avalanche, Ter-Bagdassarian is ruthless in his plans, and Harry and Penny are key to his success — poor devil, because his serious spy mission has just landed in the middle of a screwball comedy romance.

   The problem is Russian spy and traitor Harry is head over heels in love, and not overly bright or overly loyal, and Penny, well, Penny is her own way is a genius, or a lightweight flake, or possibly the finest agent in the British Secret Service, or just possibly all those things and more.

   In France where this was first published the book won the Gran Prix du Roman d’Advenures and was a bestseller so it isn’t surprising it was tagged to be filmed with Brigitte Bardot as Penny, Anthony Perkins as Harry, and Gregoire Aslan as the Armenian.

   Like the book the film is a fairly slight affair, a souffle rather than a main dish, and dependent on the viewers patience watching Miss Bardot look like Miss Bardot and Mr. Perkins mugging attractively as the inept spy Harry.

   I’ll grant I find the movie amusing, but I have no real problem with anyone who complains the souffle falls flat or that Bardot and Perkins aren’t quite enough to leave them satisfied. As comedy spy films go it is more romantic comedy than spy film and lacks even the relative excitement of a similar American souffle like the Doris Day/Richard Harris Caprice (which at least has a good opening).

   All things considered it is mostly a vehicle for Bardot to look like Bardot while Perkins mugs.

   That is enough for me, but I won’t argue with anyone who does not find it so.

   â€œBut of course I forgive you! You’re so funny…always asking me to forgive you without ever telling me what it is you want me to forgive.”

   
   … Penny tells Harry, and that pretty much sums up the film. I forgave it without ever being exactly sure why.

   The book is much more successful all around, written by a firm hand at keeping the reader turning pages for barely fifty thousand spare words since neither the conceit nor the story could stand up to one more paragraph than what is there, but manage to hold up playfully for its exact length.

   The book even manages to build a bit of suspense, which is more than the film does. It is a quick, literate, and very funny read thanks to its attractive leads, and the film only fails to the extent it doesn’t manage to send up the whole spy thing with the same panache, but handles that end of things all too ham-handedly. Harry is mindful of one of the hapless heroes of one of Graham Greene’s lighter entertainments and Penny is a delight on paper, less so on film.

   The film needed to be The Tall Blonde Man With One Red Shoe, but is too busy mugging to rise to that level. The book manages that delicate balancing act with precision.

   I liked the one, and was surprised how much I loved the other.