Undercover Girl (1958)

Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Overrated and overhyped

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

UNDERCOVER GIRL is another British B-picture with a crime story and lead role for Canadian star Paul Carpenter. Carpenter plays a slightly washed up photographer working on a local newspaper who becomes rather peeved when his brother in law is murdered by persons unknown. With the police slow to act he decides to investigate the mystery himself and soon uncovers a sinister blackmail plot centred around a strange nursing home.It's predictable stuff indeed but nonetheless a film which gets by with a certain finesse and features all of the right elements in the right order. A short running time and snappy pacing means that this is a never less than engaging thriller. Carpenter is a more than dependable leading man and second only to John Bentley in the sheer number of appearances he made in British B-thrillers during the 1950s. UNDERCOVER GIRL is a dodgy title because no girl in the film goes undercover, although the American re-titling of ASSIGNMENT REDHEAD is equally invalid and anyway had already been used for a film made the previous year.The film is particularly strong for its female characters, principal of whom is the lovely Kay Callard who looks very arresting with blonde hair. Maya Koumani has a memorable cameo as a buxom model in one randomly inserted moment, although the most notable of all is Jackie Collins as a blackmail victim. Bruce Seton was best known on TV and in film for playing detectives but makes a very good fist of the master villain here. Watch out for B-movie favourite Milton Reid in an early role as a hired thug complete with goatee beard. This is one of the best films I've seen from cheapie director Francis Searle.

Yes a typical Butchers B film from the 1950s.It moves at quite a pace particularly in the last reel.Though the title left me a bit bewildered since there is really no undercover girl in the film.The film centres around Bruce Set on a club owner who has a lifeline in blackmail and murder.Unusual to see Set on as a crook.He was to play Fabian of the yard,and lived to regret it.It typefaces him and all but ruined his career.Although essentially a British B film it was clearly made with the American market in mind.There can be no other explanation for the inordinate amount of gun play around at the end.The film is no great shakes but passes a reasonable hour.

Some confusion exists over UNDERCOVER GIRL, as it was released in the US under the equally meaningless title ASSIGNMENT REDHEAD. This happened to be the name of another British crime film, made the previous year and known in the US as MILLION DOLLAR MANHUNT, thus leading to credits for the two productions getting muddled on occasions.Here, regular 'B' lead Paul Carpenter plays a photographer taking over the investigation into a shady nightclub owner, whom, he believes, is responsible for his reporter brother-in-law's murder. He works for the kind of magazine that mixes glamour photos with articles "lifting the lid off Soho" and exposing gambling rackets - "what goes on behind the net curtains". So much for the supposedly sedate Britain of 1957. Meanwhile Carpenter's girlfriend Kay Callard is concerned about sister Jackie Collins who's also involved with the vicious club owner/gangster, played by Bruce Seton, best known at the time for his portrayal of that exemplar of 1950s law and order, Fabian of the Yard.Carpenter uncovers a blackmail racket and drug pushing, centred on a dodgy nursing home, but, flatly presented and directed, it's not as interesting as it sounds. Obviously made on a low budget, time is padded out with Carpenter taking photos of Maya Koumani as 'Miss Brazil' while the background score of Bill Trytel further reinforces the resemblance to the kind of 1930s quota quickie of which he was a veteran. As an actress, Jackie Collins doesn't do badly, though inevitably, is more memorable for her sensational figure.

One perfect example of Butcher's films. The little company which produced so many B thrillers in UK during the 50's and early 60's. Not masterpieces but good crime or drama features. The topics are, in most cases, all the same. In this little film, for instance, nothing really unusual. A guy whose brother in law - his sister's husband - has been murdered. Our hero - I don't remember the actor's name - investigates and discovers that his brother in law was the victim of a racket. Accident racket and blackmail. From that, all we see is foreseeable: gals, big boss, henchmen with hang dog looks, some fights and so on...The ending, you smell it several miles in advance.No more comment.I took it from ITV, Thames. So, maybe you can try for it too.