Pierce Brosnan made his mark in the 1980 British classic THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY in a small but significant role as a silent henchman and years later, director John MacKenzie gave him a key role opposite Michael Caine in an adaptation of Frederick Forsyth’s thriller novel THE FOURTH PROTOCOL.
Brosnan plays Valeri Pretofsky, a Russian agent who is tasked with posing as a British businessman who takes up residence near a US Air Force base. The goal? To detonate an atomic bomb and compromise NATO.
On his tale is British agent John Preston (Michael Caine) who starts the ball rolling when he breaks into the flat of associate George Berenson (Anton Rodgers) to retrieve top secret documents that he has been leaking to a South African plant from Moscow. All kinds of obstacles from both sides beckon….
Given the state of play in Ukraine, the Russians are the seeming bad guys once again in this effective, old-style thriller, co-executive produced by Caine and Forsyth, which was one of the last films to be both produced and released by the old British label Rank Film Distributors.
Brosnan demonstrates the lean and mean tone that he brought to his tenure as James Bond between 1995 and 2002 in four films, whilst Caine returns to the territory that he defined in the likes of THE IPCRESS FILE. Great score by Lalo Schifrin (BULLITT, DIRTY HARRY)