The "Mission: Impossible" soundtrack is a high exercice of style in the field of military music, just pay attention to the many martial variations executed by Schifrin himself and all its composers which reinterprete the motif called "The Plot" over and over. I call that music: M.M.M. which stands for Modern Military Minimalism. Further more and, behind its obvious military color, the "Mission: Impossible" music is an experimental work of art that combines many folklores into an abstract jazz writing, for instance the season 1 scores as "Pilot" that is Latin America-oriented and "Memory" and "Operaton Rogosh" that are Slavic-oriented but inside an avant garde soundscape. Schifrin didn't work during the season 2 of "Mission: Impossible" due to another commission: "Mannix". Season 3 has two powerful scores: the Slavic-oriented "The Heir Apparent" and the urban jazz meets Eastern India-oriented "The Contender" which refers to two of his film scores: "Bullit" and "Coogan's Bluff". Season 4 has one single score entitled "Submarine" which is a powerful martial score in the line of "Kelly's Heroes" and which foreshadows the series "Planet of the Apes". His 1970's scores for the series follow the dissonant "THX 1138" and the streetfunk "Dirty Harry". We will focus on the two season 5 episodes whose music by Schifrin emphasizes the hipness of the early 1970’s youth movement.
End music credits for "The Killer" and "Takeover".
105-THE KILLER
(Season Opener)
(All episodes are produced by Bruce Lansbury, except when noted)
(All tape scenes appear before the opening credits)
Quote:
“Oh, get it on, baby!”
—Eddie Lorca from the prologue.
Prologue:
In a cheap hotel room—extreme close-up on the tattoo of an arm that depicts: a pair of dices (6 and 1) and the slogan “Born to Win”, followed by the MISSION logo. Eddie Lorca reads a magazine and takes a drink on a bed, launches a pair of dices and obtains a 7. A young woman with long hair dances to the funky music coming from a radio set when the phone rings. Lorca walks to pick the set, asks her to lower the sound level and accepts a contract for his usual $25,000 fee. He watches and searches his opened bag, grabs a bottle of after-shave and asks the little lady to move but kisses her goodbye.
Tape scene:
An old man fishes on the shore when Jim, dressed casual (orange sweater, white loafer) steps into and recites a password (- Jim: “How are the bass biting?” - The Old Man: “I’ve caught three” - Jim: “Yeah, good. I’ve caught six myself yesterday”): notice the heavy grain of the pictures due to the optical zooming. The old man leaves and Jim opens a fishing wood box and removes two compartments where he finds a little yellow envelop covering a mini reel player.
Summary:
This is Friday in Los Angeles, California, and irrational hired killer Eddie Lorca must eliminate the President of Local 85 named William Barton (a Union leader of the construction workers) who stays at the Knickerbocker Hotel, Room 526, and rehearses his speech between 4:30 and 5:00 P.M. The IMF replaces his target by Barney and fashions a tailor-made hotel (Bower Hotel: 215 South Elm Street) in 20 minutes to control Lorca's moves and to locate and know the identity of Scorpio, Lorca's boss.
Cast and details:
• The unsteady, suntanned, womanizer, macho killer Eddie Lorca played by Robert Conrad (returning from the season 3 “The Contender”)
• Underworld bigwig Alfred E. Chambers aka Scorpio played by Byron Morrow
• Bag woman Flo played by Carole Carle
• Union leader William Barton played by Davis Roberts
• Lorca’s hotel room girl played by Pegi Boucher
Guest IMFers:
Featuring a group of craftsmen that allow to decorate the blank Bower Hotel with all labeled items and symbols in 20 minutes and undercover agents posing as Bower Hotel customers and employees: bellhop (Tom Huff, former stuntman on “The Wild Wild West”) and maid (Victoria Hale) who brings towels; and, later, three gangsters on a black fast car whose one takes a potshot at Dana with a tommy gun.
Hitman Eddie Lorca
At the exit of the Los Angeles airport, Lorca selects a hotel at random by pointing his finger at a directory of a phone booth then he rejects the cab of Willy who makes the mistake of opening the door. He picks Paris’ cab but remains suspicious and checks him out many times: he notices his slow driving at 35 miles per hour in a highway whose speed limit is 45. He chooses his room thanks to his dices which gives him 7. He asks for a bottle of scotch. He uses a telescopic club to play golf in his room. He call Scorpio’s number (555-7177) at 2:15 in the phone booth of the hotel’s lobby and talks to bag woman Flo while an undercover receptionist presses a red button behind the desk to warn Jim who records the secret conversation and traces the call: we can see a device that displays the phone numbers. He expects Flo in 45 minutes and meets Dana that he suspects, challenges (“You’re not the girl I talked to on the phone”), teases (“The girl I talked to on the phone sounded, uh, sexy”) and fires (“You’re weird. You’re violent. Get out of here”). Later, he gives a false name—Lou Lawrence (perhaps, a veiled reference to writer Laurence Heath)—for the reservation over the phone at the Knickerbocker Hotel and demands first the fifth floor to the clerk then the sixth for Room 626. He borrows the back alley of the hotel, climbs up the fire escape ladder and picks the lock on Room 626. He first selects a pistol, lauches his dices and obtains a 11. As in "The Execution", the hitman finds an original way to achieve his job: a time bomb made with three broken golf balls and a timer (released from the tip of his telescopic club). He calls Barney and pretends to be a Union man to meet him in the lobby at 4:00. He removes the grill of the ventilation to suspend the time bomb with a wire in the air duct to Room 526 and calls back Barney. Out of the hotel, He calls again Barney in a public phone booth to keep him near the phone of his room. He finally calls Dana-as-Flo for the payoff appointment: in 20 minutes at the corner of 12th Street and Spruce. He witnesses Dana’s murder, reacts vividly while examining the contents of the brown bag (wads of newspaper) and hearing her confession. He becomes mad, does the devil sign with his two fingers and gets in a cab enroute to Scorpio’s lair. He violently breaks in the living-room of Scorpio, points a gun, shoots and gets killed by Scorpio’s hidden gun as in the tradition of the Mexican stand-off.
Jim Phelps
Jim poses as the Bower hotel receptionist. He offers Lorca a room but he refuses. He watches Lorca through a monitor. He takes a polaroid of Barney’s face and inserts it inside Lorca’s instructions envelop. Inside Barney’s room, he adds an additional part to the bottom of the phone to listen to the calls from the Bower Hotel. He has a subliminal intuition (extreme close-up on Jim’s eyes intercut with quick shots of Barney’s hotel room) about the killing method of Lorca but warns Barney about it at the last minute. After the fatal outcome, he finds Scorpio’s real name via the ex-libris of his book, takes Lorca’s dices, launches them and gets two 1 (freeze frame: end of the episode): meaning Lorca versus Scorpio.
Paris
Paris poses as first a “gutsy” cabbie with sunglasses (to Lorca: “Hey, look, mister, sit back and relax. If any cabbie in town can get you there in 15 minutes, I can” and to truck drivers: “Hey, what is it with you guys? You think you own the street or something?”) from the Red & White Cab company to delay his customer: Paris’ cab is a Plymouth and makes Lorca pay a $6,40 fare. He poses as Lorca and imitates his voice over the phone to call bag woman Flo back and changes the appointment to 3:00 at the Park (on a bench near the corner) where he intercepts the instructions envelop. He watches the corridor of Barney’s Room with his mini talkie-walkie. He verifies if lying on the floor Barney is not wounded. After the final shout-out at Scorpio’s house, he calls an ambulance and the police.
Willy Armitage
Willy poses as a Red & White cab driver with a moustache and as a maintenance employee with purple sunglasses who unlocks the traffic signal control and stops the traffic lights and Lorca’s cab. He also hides behind a car and orders two trucks by talkie-walkie to block each side of the road to slow down Lorca’s cab. Still equipped with a mini talkie-walkie to communicate with Jim, he checks the lobby, the service entrance and the main entrance of the Knickerbocker Hotel and pinpoints Lorca on his way to a public phone booth. He calls the manager of the hotel so that he runs to make a short public announcement concerning the lethal explosion (“A man’s been killed up there! Blown to pieces!”) and therefore obliquely informs Lorca of his success. He watches Lorca calling Dana-as-Flo. Later, he poses as a cab driver without moustache to lead Lorca to Scorpio’s Beverly Hills residents: 1223 Rim View, up in the hills.
Dana Lambert
Oddly enough, Dana is attracted by Lorca’s methodology during the apartment scene: “That’s quite a philosophy. If I don’t know what I’m doing, then neither does anybody else, so I’m safe.” Dana has a hipster look (see her colored trousers and her hairstyle during the hotel preparation) and installs a camouflaged camera in a wall lamp. Dana poses as Scorpio’s bag woman Flo with a blue mini-skirt to misinform Lorca (she gives him the updated instructions envelop and, later, a message with a new phone number for the payoff)—she asks Lorca for a drink (scotch and water) and kisses him but slaps him and makes a scene to leave (“You lousy ape! You guys think you can just come into town, have your fun and split...”); she plays the dead woman in front of him thanks to a blue belt stained with blood in the backlot of Paramount that is supposed to be the corner of 12th Street and Spruce in Los Angeles. Before dying, she reveals to Lorca that Scorpio sets thing up to get rid of him: “My payoff… from Scorpio. He tried to get you… too… too.” A few minutes later, she moves out while the bogus bills fly and spread all over the ground and gets in Jim’s black Chrysler along with Barney and Paris to track Lorca’s trail to Scorpio.
Barney Collier
Barney first poses as a cab driver but in vain and replaces a Union figure and also adopts the young look and wears a blue casual trendy jacket. He opens up a black case and adds a dummy of himself in the room of the human target. Barney tries to figure it out how Lorca will murder him. He receivs a warning call from Jim and rushes to the door: the bomb blows up! The Knickerbocker Hotel is already seen during the Act 1 kidnapping scene from the season 1 “Operation Rogosh”.
Comments:
The astrological name Scorpio is typical of the early 1970's movies folklore: see the killers in Michael Winner's “Scorpio” and Don Siegel's “Dirty Harry”. From that season, the dossier scene is deleted. The end credits still mentions Bruce Geller as “executive producer” but that means “created by” because Geller left the show at the end of season 4. Pay attention to the new end credits graphics: a freeze frame (with heavy grain) of the hand that lights the match—this is the last graphics and that will remain until the final season 7. The character vignette of Willy from the opening credits comes from this apartment scene. The character vignette of Barney hasn’t changed since season 3. It still contains the original opening theme and Kenyon Hopkins is credited as “music surpervisor”.
Review:
This is the season masterpiece and unpredictable episode: the TV companion piece that foreshadows Michael Winner's 1972 "The Mechanic". Producer Lansbury re-hires Robert Conrad (a.k.a. spy James West) from his previous series: “The Wild Wild West”, and carries the show on his shoulder as a great performer—incidentally, the name Lorca implies some Spanish origin which is confirmed when he drinks a toast to Dana and says: “Salud”. This is the first script by Arthur Weiss (former associate producer on “The Fugitive”) in a trilogy of irrational foes: Lorca has no modus operandi but functions at random due to his dices and wild impulses—both Lansbury and Heath also sweat hard over the details of the script. In a way, Eddie Lorca can be interpreted as the anti-thesis of Stefan Miklos: Eddie goes with the forces of hyper-sensitivy (hot) unlike Stefan who follows the the rigid logic of hyper-rationality (cold). The moral of the story is a gambling one: he lives by the dices (start of prologue: Lorca launches one 6 and on 1 as in his arm) and dies by the dices (end of Act 4: Jim launches two 1). Notice a deep change in the writing team which will continue until the end of the series: writer Laurence Heath’s promotion to the status of story consultant and the arrival of newcomer script supervisor Barbara Atkinson, replacing Allan Greedy. Director Paul Krasny has the knack to make a very effective three shots scene (due to his film editor background) depicting the brutal assassination of Dana, gunned down in the alley by the gangsters’ car: objective point of view of Dana carrying the brown bag then holding her stomach (medium shot from head to mid-legs), cut to a subjective point of view of Dana falling (made with a hand-held camera), cut to an objective point of view seen at remote distance of Dana falling fast and sordidly lying on the ground (long shot). For the anecdote, Krasny and Conrad used to work previously together on a “Mannix” season 3 entitled: “The Playground”. The final lethal showdown between Lorca and Scorpio is fast and furious! Listen carefully to the top-notch urban and funky down score composed by Lalo Schifrin with its "Dirty Harry" distorted and dissonant psychedelic arrangements.
The Girl of the Day:
Don't miss the prologue with Lorca and his girl of the day who dances to the funky music.
Bloopers:
• Scene of Act 1:
After Jim gives Lorca the key of Room 7, he opens the fake bookcase passageway and crosses the backroom of the Bower Hotel, we can catch a glimpse of the ceiling lights of the set.
• Scene of Act 3:
When Eddie Lorca comes out of the booth, stares at the Knickerbocker Hotel and walks towards the alley, we can see the visible vignetting around the lens of the movie camera.
118-TAKEOVER
(produced by Laurence Heath)
Prologue:
At night, in a Los Angeles’ far left hippie flat: student leader Billy Walsh makes a political speech at a militants’ meeting (extreme close-up on a hanged eye’s drawing then pan shot to Walsh’s eyes) and explains his agenda: Protest Week next Saturday with action and confrontation. The militants leave except a young woman who asks to stay but Billy turns down the offer and phones Deputy Mayor Charles Peck at his office to threaten and get a down payment ($5,000) the morning after. Peck tells his henchman police Lt. Ross to make the money delivery. Mayor Steve Tallman is reluctant to follow Peck’s crooked scheme and pours himself a glass of whisky but agrees and leaves in a hurry owing to a derogatory remark from Peck: “You drink too much”. Peck orders Ross to put a tail on Tallman.
Tape scene:
Jim unlocks the door of a closed fortune-teller shop named Madam Roberta. He opens a sideboard, grabs the A4 kraft envelop and listens to the reel player on a table.
Summary:
Corrupted Deputy Mayor Charles Peck wants to turn weak Mayor Tallman into the new governor of the State by creating a major incident: a death threat on the governor’s man (Barney) achieved by student agitator Billy Walsh. The IMF confuses Tallman’s mind with his “lost” daughter and replaces him by a lookalike to put an end to Peck’s illegal activities by testifying in court.
Cast and details:
• Puppet and coward mayor Steve Tallman played by Lloyd Bochner (returning from the season 3 “The Glass Cage”)
• Chief Danby played by Russell Thorson
• Walsh’s Militant Alec played by Gordon DeVol
• Corrupted Deputy Mayor Charles Peck played by Ken Swofford (returning from the season 4 “The Martyr”: he plays again in a students' activists plot)
*Peck’s team:
• The 11th Precinct-based corrupted police Lt. Ross played by Todd Martin
• Extreme left professional agitator Billy Walsh played by Richard Kelton
The Political Fanatics
During the apartment scene, we learn from Jim that Peck is connected to the organized crime. Long hair Billy Walsh is dressed as Paris in “My Friend, My Enemy” (black-leathered jacket and a white turtleneck sweater) and trains six students (who drive a hippie Wolkswagen van) to organize armed riots against the University.
Billy Walsh threatening undercover Dana Lambert in the office of the Mayor.
Dana Lambert
Dana poses as college student Katherine Jarvis aka Wilson, the illegitimate daughter of Tallman and a most-wanted FBI far left fanatic a la "Weatherman"; she’s dressed as a typical hipster (bell-bottom blue jeans, large hat, exotic shirts, peace symbol necklace) and has a loud mouth attitude. Dana picks the lock on the door of the College’s administrative office and on the filling cabinet to extract stacks of student records. On her way to burn them, a night watchman stops and arrests her. She’s locked up in a cell of the 11th Precinct. Lt. Ross releases her because Walsh puts up her bail and picks her on his Wolkwaken van to his home. Walsh shows Dana a hunting rifle with sights taken from his closet which also contains detonators, sticks of dynamites and plastique. Walsh kisses her and offers her the position of leader to team up with him: “Kate, listen to me. Things are gonna happen during Protest Week. But these kids don’t know anything about revolutionary tacticts”. Walsh asserts that he plans to kill a cop for the kicks (“I’m gonna shoot me a pig”) during the Protest and will let accuse the militants. In Jim’s hotel room, Dana explains to the team Walsh’s kamikaze plan (blowing up the Dean’s office). Back at the meeting flat, militant Alec doesn’t agree with Walsh’s scheme to ravage the Dean’s office. Dana, dressed with a folkloric Russian shirt, offers to takeover the Mayor’s office instead and Alec followed by the militants stand for her alternative. Walsh reluctantly concurs. Dana is tailed by a cop until Paris’ flat. She faces Tallman and does her part of the crying and complaining daughter who blackmails her father to avoid scandals and finance her cause. Tallman gives her an envelop filled with $10,000 cash that she takes and extracts three quarters and leaves the rest to Paris. At the meeting flat, Lt. Ross shows Walsh his “pig” target in the newspaper: Barney! A Wolkswagen van stop near the municipal building where four students and Walsh, armed with his rifle, step in. Walsh sets up the explosives to the main entrance’s door. The students occupy the office of Tallman when, out of the bue, Dana makes her entrance and Walsh accuses her of being a traitor (“You’re a spy for the pigs! That’s what’s the matter”) and threatens her with his rifle (“I ought to shoot you right now!”). Alec intervenes and saves Dana’s neck. Walsh adds an explosive charge to the door of the Mayor’s secretary office to get rid of the students. Dana speaks with a megaphone to the public of the streets and asks for negociation to change the Dean (on a white flag, hanged in the Mayor’s office window, you can read: “Education not slavery”). After the incident, the four students come out of the municipal building, escorted by two cops with helmets, followed alone by Dana: freeze frame (end of the episode).
The F.B.I. file of Dana Lambert posing as student activist Katherine Wilson.
Doug Robert
Doug poses as John Andrews, drives a black car and run a light and is arrested by a police car. Unable to show his registration and driving license, the policeman notices that he carries a holster so the other policeman opens, searches his trunk and discovers an arsenal of rifles and grenades. He is arrested for weapons’ possession, sent to the 11th Precinct and justifies himself in front of Lt. Ross and tells him that he works for Sandford Michaels who finances the campaign of Mayor Tallman. Lt. Ross orders a cop to unlock his handcuffs. Much later, inside an ambulance, Doug shows the real Tallman, gaged and tied up to a stretcher, his televised confession and, also, mentions his artificially-injured arm. Last, but not the least, Tallman asks Doug a confirmation about his daughter: “She wasn’t real, either… that bother you?” Tallman remains mute but relieved.
Jim Phelps
Jim poses as Sanford Michaels (carrying spectacles with a large black frame), an extreme right wealthy man and a weapon buyer. He talks to Peck in his office and gives him a $50,000 check to finance the campaign of Tallman and offers the services of his friends who are guns consumers. Peck has returned Jim’s property (meaning his weapons) in his car and phones to launch a financial inquiry on him. Jim returns to Peck’s office and offers to give a $1 million donation because of his fundamental disagreement towards the policy of the governor’s man (Barney) that he read in the newspaper and asks to meet Tallman in order to test his qualities. Lt. Ross bumps into Jim and reports Tallman’s secret appointment to Peck who orders to tail Jones (Paris). Jim finally is introduced to Tallman by Peck who leaves. After a cup of coffee and a good conversation, Jim gets out. Later, in the Utility Closet, Jim and Doug store Tallman in the filling cabinet. Back at his hotel room, Jim makes a negative description of Tallman (“I found him soft, indecisive… he’s a weakling”) to Peck and pushes him to run for governor. Peck drives Jim to the Municipal building and goes see Lt. Ross who communicate with Walsh with his talkie-walkie. Jim, seeing unbalanced Tallman, forces Peck to act up fast. Peck orders Lt. Ross to call Wash to hit Tallman. When Walsh comes out and accuse him, Peck and Ross take the leave but Chief Danby nab them at the last minute.
Barney Collier
Barney poses as a repesentative of governor Frank Harper and anti-riot police Captain Davis (carrying tinted spectacles as in “The Hostage”) to appear to Mayor Tallman and his aide Chief Danby. While showing them a brochure of anti-riot uniforms, he takes pictures of the wall of the Mayor’s office with his wristwatch. Peck and Ross enter the office and watch Barney’s stack of most-wanted provocateurs files, including Dana’s. Ross denies to know her and makes her release. Barney breaks in the municipal building, snoops around the Utility Closet, next to Tallman’s office. He measures the wall and cuts a part of it with an electric saw to create a doorway. Later, Barney arrives by police car, driven by Chief Danby, to the municipal building and borrows the back alley to break in by the window, neutralizes the explosive charges, disarms Walsh from the rear, triggers a detonation, fights and masters him to prevent the explosion of the Mayor’s office by tearing the wires of the boobytrapped door. Barney crosses the main entrance and delivers outside Walsh to the authorities. He steps into the police emergency van and gives Tallman an ultimatum to salvage his social position (freedom).
Paris
Paris poses as Canadian Richard Jones and, inside a public phone booth, calls Tallman at his office to give him an appointment (217 Elm Street, Apartment 8, in one hour) and deal with his old girlfriend Elizabeth Wilson. He is dressed with a full blue jeans outfit and meets Tallman who is tailed by a cop. Paris tells the story of Elizabeth Wilson and his daughter that he raises and asks $10,000 to remain silent about these events. He meets again Tallman for Dana’s appointment. Lt. Ross bursts in and leads Paris to Peck’s office where he is interrogated when Tallman enters. Peck tells Tallman if Dana shows, Walsh will let her die with the students in the office and concludes by saying: “Steve… got any more kids I ought to know about?” Lt. Ross puts Paris in a cell. In the tradition of “The Wild Wild West” and character James West, Paris takes off one of his black boot, removes the black Scotchtape from the heel, catches a bullet with a telescopic skeleton key to pick the lock on the door and joins in Doug in the back exit for a ride. Paris and Doug go picking the lock on the Utility Closet of the Municipal building. Paris prepares his latex mask. Tallman is all alone when the wall moves and Doug points a gun at him and warns him: “Mayor Tallman, say hello to Mayor Tallman”. Tallman faces his double (Paris) pointing a gun at him too. Doug stings the Mayor in the neck with the “golden needle ring”. Paris wears the missing clothings that Doug rips off: tie, wallet, wristwatch. Paris-as-Tallman arrives by car near the municipal building and rebels against Peck and listens to his daughter. Paris presses a hidden button to activate a fake bullet wound in his arm and confesses his guilt and Peck’s illegal and arranged deeds to the camera of WKS television. He enters the ambulance and does the peel-off in front of amazed Tallman, lying on a stretcher trolley.
Willy is absent.
Comments:
As in “Flip Side”, Dana is the daughter of a woman who used to have a relationship with a foe. As in “The Innocent”, the IMF hides a foe in a filling cabinet. A lot of characters pick the lock on: first Dana opens the College’s office, Paris comes out a tool from the heel of his boot to escape from his cell, Doug along with Paris open the Utility closet of the municipal building. As in "The Rebel", there's an informer in the students activists: Billy Walsh, their leader. Oddly enough, there are six students during the reunion and only four to invade the Mayor’s office: a male student and the female—who invites Walsh during te prologue— don’t participate? This is the second episode that shows a lefty foe, after “The Hostage”. The municipal building is located in the Paramount offices. The detail of absorbing alcoholic drinks has a political meaning: Tallman is addicted, Jim refuses it as well as Peck who both drink tea.
Weatherman or The Weather Underground is an early 1970's American radical left terrorist organization and their European counterparts are the Italian’s “Brigate Rosse”, the German’s “RAF” (Rote Armee Fraktion aka Baader-Meinhof Gang), the Greek’s “17N” and the French’s “Action Directe”.
Review:
As with the case of “Flip Side”, I find it better now. Still superior to “The Martyr” because of the writing but very talky, verbal (filled with heavy-handed rhetoric, dialectics and ideological speeches) and preachy political swindle episode not so far away from the season 1 “The Confession” plot but the hip lefty 1970’s folklore is terribly outmoded which closes the students’ agitators diptych started with the season 4 “The Martyr”; for "Mod Squad" and also “Ironside” fans only! The final latex mask’s peel-off is the best moment of this 50 minutes drama. This is the second script by Arthur Weiss, after “The Killer”, in a trilogy of irrational foes: Walsh is a political fanatic driven by his impulses to kill and ordered, as Lorca in “The Killer”, by a third party. Find a top-notch semi-abstract echo-laden jazz score by Lalo Schifrin and it is his second and final one, after “The Killer”.
Stock music:
“The Killer” (Act 3: the students van stops at the municipal building)
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