Who Misplaced The Ipcress File?
We were warned to hold tight to physical media. The skeptics were right.
Like a lot of people these days, I feel increasingly disconnected from pop culture. While I was once a regular moviegoer, I’ve been taking a pass more often than not as the latest releases hold less appeal than ever before. Part of this is due to advancing age. Hollywood is most concerned with catching the attention and dollars of the cherished 18-24 year old demographic, and I’ve long since aged out of that cohort.
I’m the last person to cast aspersions at anyone trying to make a buck. If Hollywood producers are convinced that they ought to cater to a slice of the population that has the right combination of free time and disposable income, I can hardly blame them.
But as a cohort of emerging online critics are pointing out, many contemporary films lack the basics of storytelling, for instance, a plot.1 Likable characters with understandable motivations are in short supply too. So instead of heading to the theater, I often spend my time diving into the archives of the streaming services, hoping to unearth a hidden gem that I might have missed as a younger man.
I met success recently with Funeral in Berlin, a 1966 Cold War thriller directed by Guy Hamilton and starring the immortal Michael Caine. Funeral was the second in a series of three films starring Caine as the reluctant spy, Harry Palmer, and based on the novels of English author Len Deighton.2 Produced by Harry Saltzman, the Palmer films hit theaters during the same era as the Bond pictures that Saltzman co-produced with Albert Broccoli, but the two series couldn’t be more different.3
While Bond made espionage look glamorous via exotic locales, Saville Row suits and ingenious gadgets, the life of a spy in Palmer’s world was gritty and mundane. Bond was a superhero. Palmer was a civil servant struggling from paycheck to paycheck, all the while hoping he wouldn’t get an assignment that would violate his conscience.
Satisfied by my experience with Funeral, I quickly fired up the third film in the Palmer series, Billion Dollar Brain. I should have consulted reviews ahead of time. After less than 30 minutes, I was happy to stop watching and instead began to look for the first film in the series, 1965’s The Ipcress File.
It didn’t take long to find The Ipcress File. I just didn’t find the one I was looking for.
Instead of the film that helped make Caine a star, all I could find was a 2022 remake that was produced by the ITV in the UK and imported to the USA via the AMC network. What was worse, this was a six-episode miniseries. The original film was one hour and forty-nine minutes, which is far easier to digest in a single evening at home.
Of course, the economics of entertainment have changed. The streaming companies want us trapped in front of our screens at home watching their content continuously, even if it prevents one from enjoying a healthy night’s sleep. With that in mind, it’s very easy to deduce why the original film has been disappeared as a streaming option.
Back when some futurists were warning us that there would be downsides to giving up physical copies of movies and music in favor digitizing all media, I scoffed. Well, I was wrong, and tip my cap to those who warned us ahead of time. You were right.
Of course, you can get hold of a copy of The Ipcress File, it’s just that you can’t obtain it in the most convenient format available. It isn’t terribly hard to find a new or used DVD copy of the film for sale. Of course, you might not still have a gadget handy that will play that DVD, which is just what the streaming companies are counting on.
One last note: Funeral in Berlin is available on Amazon Prime Video for $3.59.
A DVD copy of The Ipcress File retails from anywhere between $12.99 and $29.99.
Two of my favorites are The Critical Drinker and Literature Devil.
The Palmer films also served as inspiration for the Austin Powers series by Mike Myers, which allowed Caine to spoof himself in the third film, Goldmember.
Deighton’s novels are written in the first person, and the name of the narrator is never specified. In conversation, Caine and Saltzman came up with the most boring name they could imagine: Harry Palmer. It was Caine who absentmindedly suggested Harry. Saltzman didn’t take offense and agreed.