User Reviews

Jeff Randall arrives at his flat in the wee small hours after a night out to find an attractive young nun (Juliet Harmer) waiting inside for him. She tells him that the St Ursula's Convent has been robbed by a man called Douglas Kershaw (Jeremy Young), their accountant. She asks Jeff if he will come down to Winchester and collect the papers that they believe will incriminate Kershaw and to try and recover the stolen money. The ghostly Marty Hopkirk accompanies Jeff and immediately suspects that something fishy is afoot. The nun appears at the convent gate, hands Jeff an envelope supposedly containing the tell tale documents and promptly disappears. Marty is convinced that she is a phoney and warns his friend and partner that he has most likely walked into a trap. Jeff starts to think that he could be right and tosses the envelope into the bushes. But, before he can leave he is cornered by a security guard called Edwards (Garfield Morgan) and taken to the main building. Here Jeff discovers that the "convent" is in reality the headquarters of an electronics research firm and its chairman, Philip Yateman (Patrick Barr), accuses him of theft and demands the papers return. Matters are not helped by the fact that Jeff has a card with Kershaw's name and address in his pocket. With Marty's help, he escapes and retrieves the envelope he discarded in the bushes and finds it contains old newsprint. Jeff visits Kershaw and he finds out that he specialises in industrial espionage; the buying and selling of information. He tells him that whoever is stealing secrets from the Winchester electronics company fears detection and is setting Jeff up to be the fall guy. Jeff realises the gravity of the situation he is in and Jeannie (Annette Andre) tips him off that the police are waiting for him at his office. But who is framing him? Edwards or maybe somebody who is much higher up in the company. Jeff and Marty race against the clock to clear his name, but there is danger at every turn.

A good, solid and reliable entry in the classic Randall and Hopkirk series, which plays for the most part as a serious thriller set in the world of industrial espionage. The emotional centre to the show between the ghostly Marty and his widow Jeannie is still there and it is moving while providing some moments of humour as well. In this instance, Jeff's car is in the dock and he asks to borrow Jeannie's car. She says "Of course you can borrow Marty's car", before stopping and suddenly remembering that it is her car now with a tear in her eye. The laughs are provided by Marty's criticisms of his old friend's driving fearing that he'll write the old mini off. In the end, as well as having to find thirty odd quid to get his own car out of the garage, at Marty's behest he now has to take Jeannie's car in for repairs too. Mike Pratt and Kenneth Cope were a natural teaming for this series and the chemistry between them was always a joy to watch. As well as their row over the car, Marty is deeply unhappy about Jeff taking his widow with him as a witness to get a confession out of Kershaw to the effect that he had never once stolen or tried to sell him secrets from the Winchester electronics firm. Pratt played the part of the happy go lucky, sometimes easily led and down to earth private eye with consummate ease. When he confronts the real villain who tells him about his scheme to make half-a-million pounds out of the company, he says "You don't look short of a few pounds as it is...(a senior manager's)... pay, the six thousand you got for selling the information to Kershaw, you're doing all right mate". Pratt's delivery of the lines sounds just like what an average Joe in the street would say to someone if they found them self in the situation that Jeff finds himself in. Cope's Marty Hopkirk provided the laughs and, compared with Randall's happy go lucky attitude to life, he was always anxious about everything. Yet, more often than not, he could see when his old friend was being had whereas he could not and often always invariably dug him out of a hole. The climax in which Marty rescues Jeff by visiting a hospital and speaking to the spirit of a man who is close to death on the operating table and getting him to call the police when he comes round delves into the realms of supernatural fantasy. Good suspense here and it also has great charm like when Jeff visits a guy whom he has never seen before in his life and presents him with a thank you gift for saving his life. Of course, the guy in hospital has no idea about what he did; phoning the police and sending them down to Winchester but his surgeon and nurse were totally puzzled as to what happened when he came round. They are even more so when they read the card on the gift, which is addressed as having come from Winchester. The acting from the supporting cast is good all round with Patrick Barr totally convincing as the hard nosed and ruthless company director as is Garfield Morgan as Edwards whose rather mysterious character leads us to think that he could be the arch villain of the piece since it is hard to tell what side of the game he is on. The efficient direction is again by Ray Austin.