Adventures of a Private Eye (1977)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

"Adventures of a private eye" is the old version of the several sex-flicks that you can watch nowadays. It brings us the story of a dumbly assistant of a private investigator, that tries to solve a case while his boss is away on vacation. What follows is a lot of chaos and sex sells.While some see this movie very critically, I was all in all relatively entertained by it. Of course some of the jokes and punchlines turn out rather simple and there is no doubt that it was of high interest for the producers to add some nudity, but if you accept this as given, there are actually quite a few funny moments in the film. The story of someone failing his job badly is of course not very creative in itself, but the way this is used to create a plot with some humorous potential is at least solid.This is something to turn our head off and relax. Don't watch it for the plot or any message. Under this condition, you can actually have some fun with it.

I thought that, by working backwards through the 'Adventures of…' films, I might see a slight rise in quality with each one I watch, ending with the best, but that is most definitely not the case: in fact, Adventures of a Private Eye, the middle film in the 'trilogy', is so diabolical that it's a wonder they ever made a third film.The action starts in expected low-rent Confessions knock-off style, with private eye assistant Bob West (Christopher Neil) unable to resist taking over the role of detective while his womanising boss (Jon Pertwee) is out of the office for a few days. Agreeing to help sexy Laura Sutton (Suzy Kendall), who is being blackmailed for £50k, he takes off for the countryside to see which of the other potential heirs to Laura's late husband's fortune could be the the extortionist. As the silly plot progresses, the film turns into a very tired murder/mystery farce, albeit one with plenty of gratuitous nudity and soft-core sex featuring some very attractive British babes.A cavalcade of crass and not in the least bit funny japes, Private Eye is a sorry state of affairs that makes even the weakest of the Confessions movies look like pure comedic genius. But what is REALLY sad about this film is seeing such a talented cast of British comic actors going to such waste: among those given absolutely nothing to work with are Irene Handl, Diana Dors, Liz Fraser, Harry H. Corbett, Willie Rushton, and Ian Lavender.2.5/10, generously rounded up to 3 for the nostalgia factor, the film showing me West Byfleet Railway Station in all of its 70s glory and an early appearance by Peter Moran, who would go on to play obnoxious ginger Pogo Patterson in classic kids' TV series Grange Hill.

Adventures of a Private Eye introduces us to a number of dense, almost unsolvable mysteries: has Britain ever produced a worse director than Stanley A. Long? why does Long not know, despite spending over 15 years in the film business prior to making this film, how to pace a sequence or end one on a proper punchline? why does he hire enormously talented actors like Harry H. Corbett, Irene Handl, Diana Dors, Jon Pertwee, Anna Quayle and Julien Orchard and give them absolutely nothing to do? why did 70s English audiences flock to see absolute rubbish like this in their droves? It can't be the sex, as compared to the likes of the then-contemporary Swedish and French cinema, there's hardly any flesh on display here, and none of it is even remotely erotic; nor can it be the comedy, which is a lot of things (incompetent, mean spirited, offensive, banal, ignorant, half-hearted, old hat) but not even remotely funny; it can't be the story, which makes British comedy capers of the period which were less successful at the Box Office (House in Nightmare Park for example) look like Chinatown.To be fair, Private Dick is a smidgeon better than the first entry into the series, purely because it actually has some kind of story as opposed to being a merely string of idiot vignettes. And the film does look good, especially on the new Region 2 Dvds, where the gorgeous lighting of the interiors and night time scenes is genuinely impressive (catch the shot of photographer Scott walking towards the mansion after dark, the screen awash with breathtaking colours). And Adrienne Posta does a mean Liza Minelli impression, supported would you believe by the boy from the Tomorrow People playing a Bugsy Malone-type Italian gangster, all school play amateurism and elbows."Bloody amateurs" is a phrase a police inspector in the film uses about private eyes, and it's apt given the star of the movie can't act: Christopher Neil is a nullity into oblivion as the title character, taking over from Barry Evans (who instead chose to appear in the flop sex comedy Under the Doctor). Yet another document on the sexual, spiritual and social dereliction of the UK in the 1970s. It does bear the distinction of having a cameo by Shaw Taylor, tipping the wink to TV's then current Police 5, which just goes to show how narrowly culturally specific an audience of TV morons the producer was aiming at with this.

The second of the "Adventures" series, this one features Chris Neil as Bob, an assistant to a P.I. who tries to crack a case when his boss is on vacation. The whole ordeal is done in a slow, boring, unfunny, contrived sort of way.However, the film perks up when Adrienne Posta comes in. Posta delivers a superb impersonation of Oscar-winning actress Liza Minelli (named Lisa Moroni here) who gives him shelter when the bad guys attempt to eliminate him when he's starting to get a bead on solving the case. Posta portrays Minelli from her role in Bob Fosse's "Cabaret" and looks and sounds like her as well. It's a darkhorse candidate in my book for the best mimic job in the history of cinema. Otherwise, there's not much here to like.