Case of the Bugged Bulldog

The Spy with a Cold Nose. "It's the sort of thing that just isn't done!" the chief of British Intelligence brffsks indignantly--and then proceeds to do it.

With the help of a veterinary surgeon (Laurence Harvey), a tiny listening device is implanted in a bag-jowled British bulldog named Disraeli. In the name of Britain's Prime Minister, the bugged bulldog is then presented to Russia's Premier. Delighted with his new pet, the Premier takes him everywhere--even to Cabinet meetings. Clued in by verbatim broadcasts from their canine agent, the British government calls every turn of Soviet policy with a precision that appalls the Russian leaders and inspires London's penny press to speculate: Does Britain have a super James Bond?

What Britain has, in fact, is the sorriest secret agent who ever peered through a potted palm. Operation Bandylegs is conceived and carried out by Stanley Farquhar (Lionel Jeffries), an insuperably respectable old bureaucrock with a brain about as subtle as a Mickey Mouse watch, less hair on his head than Sean Connery has in his left nostril, and a blithe belief that some fine day, if he faithfully munches his cornflakes and says sir to his superiors, he will become the sort of ice-cold secret operative who has vodka in his veins and comes out of his frightful experiences shaken but not stirred.

The whimsy is flimsy in this filler thriller, but the bulldog idea never quite lets go, and the last scene has real comic bite. When the Kremlin finally twigs the Trojan dog, poor Stanley is captured by some nasty-looking Russian agents and, while still in a coma, transformed by Russian surgeons into history's first Trojan jackass.

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