a5c7b9f00b Mild mannered American David Pollock, a professor of ancient hieroglyphics at Oxford, has been hired by Middle Eastern shipping magnate, Nejim Beshraavi, to decode a hieroglyphic written cipher, of which he has the original. What Beshraavi is unaware of is that David only took the joba favor to Middle Eastern Prime Minister Hassan Jena, who David admires. David just met Jena for the first time on his clandestine visit to London prior to his official visit to sign a business treaty with the British government in two days&#39; time. Jena tells him that what Beshraavi is asking him to do involves some plot orchestrated by Beshraavi, a countryman of Jena&#39;s, against his government. For Jena&#39;s security, David is not to disclose to anyone that he is doing this job for Jena, that he has even met Jena, or that Jena is already in London. This job also entails some personal risk to David&#39;s lifeBeshraavi is not averse to killing to achieve whatever his goal. As David progresses on his task, he is approached by Yasmin Azir, the beautiful owner of the house where Beshraavi is staying and where David is doing the work, she who is Beshraavi&#39;s lover. She provides information which suggests that his task is more dangerous than it appears on the surface,there are more players beyond Beshraavi interested in the cipher and its message, they who will also killneeded to achieve their goal. However, David, who initially takes her information at face value, begins to have doubts if she is truly working in his best interest. A man kills Professor Ragheeb and takes a hieroglyphic from his glasses. Then he seeks out the American Professor David Pollock, who is an expert in hieroglyphics at the Oxford University, and tells that his name is Major Sylvester Pennington Sloane. He invites Pollock to travel to London to meet the wealthy Nejim Beshraavi to translate a cipher in a hieroglyphic, but Pollock refuses the work. Soon Pollock is summoned by the Arabian Prime Minister Hassan Jena, who is unofficially in England and asks him to accept the assignment and spy the activities of Beshraavi that might be plotting something evil. Beshraavi offers 30,000 dollars to Pollock to work in his mansion deciphering the hieroglyphic. Pollock meets Beshraavi&#39;s mistress Yasmin Azir (Sophia Loren), who tells him that he is in danger and Beshraavi will kill him in the end of his work the same way he did with Professor Ragheeb. Pollock and Yasmin flee from the mansion with the hieroglyphic, but he is double-crossed by Yasmin and captured by Yussef Kasim. Soon the professor is deeply involved in an international conspiracy where everybody wants the cipher and he does not know who is trustworthy. Gregory Peck, (Professor David Pollack), &quot;Old Gringo&quot;, plays a professor who is kidnapped for a brief period and is told to reveal the secrets of an Arabic writing which is his specialty. He is shot at, hit on the head and thrown out of a truck and meets up with Sophia Loren, (Yasmin Azir), &quot;The Black Orchid&quot;, who runs into him all the time and decides to help him escape from his captives. However, Yasmin tells so many lies that David does not believe her and begins to think she is working against him. There is plenty of comedy, drama, romance and action. This is not exactly an easy film to just sit back and relax, it keeps you wondering just what is really Going ON I just saw this on TCM. It is an enjoyable movie, but is it just me that found the plot incomprehensible? It&#39;s bad enough, in films of this genre, when you have two factions competing against each other and there are double crosses, double agents, etc., but when there are THREE? Come on, give the viewers a break.<br/><br/>This film was an obvious attempt to repeat the success of &quot;Charade,&quot; but it doesn&#39;t quite succeed. The wooden Gregory Peck is miscast in the male lead, and when, in a few scenes, he attempts to ham it up, he merely looks pathetic and demonstrates what a limited actor he is. (Cary Grant could have pulled it off.) Sophia Loren, with her Christian Dior wardrobe, is well casta liberated Arab women and turns out to be perfect for the part, not to mention lovely to look at. The action scenes are just plain silly, and the villains are cardboard and cartoonish.<br/><br/>Yet, in spite of all this, I found myself enjoying it, and my attention did not wander. So, does the plot really matter after all?
tremenesno Admin replied
295 weeks ago