The Curator of Schlock #150 by Jeff Shuster

In Like Flint

(I give up. He’s better than Bond.)

Okay. Well…maybe that’s an overstatement. Tonight’s feature, In Like Flint, ends with Derek Flint (James Coburn) shooting off into outer space. In Like Flint came out in 1967. Moonraker came out in 1979. This means that Derek Flint made it into space a full twelve years before James Bond did. Space matters, people. Remember the Space Race? Imagine if the Russians had gotten a man into space before we did. We Americans would never live it down.

I enjoyed In Like Flint more than Our Man Flint because I think more stuff happens in this one. I mean it starts with the President of the United States being kidnapped and replaced by an actor who had plastic surgery to look like the president. This happens while he’s out golfing with Chief Cramden (Andrew Duggan), the head of Z.O.W.I.E. (Zonal Organization World Intelligence Espionage). You see, the president hits a golf ball that explodes into paralyzing dust so these women who are in disguise as prepubescent boys can switch the President out with said imposter.

Chief Cramden notices that his watch skipped ahead three minutes and he can’t account for the missing time. While at dinner at a fine Italian restaurant, a mysterious woman from Virginia joins him at dinner, asks him to light her cigarette for her, and upon lighting it, he gets knocked out, only to wake up in cheap motel room next to a skid row prostitute who is actually the pretty, Virginian woman in disguise. Chief Cramden is removed from duty after a General Carter and his men discover Cramden’s sorry state.

Derek Flint decides to investigate Cramden’s fall from grace and his missing three minutes that cannot be accounted for. Flint travels to the Soviet Union where he performs in a ballet only to be chased by KGB later that evening along snowy Russian rooftops. His investigations lead him to the Virgin Islands, where a group of women are planning world domination by brainwashing every woman on the planet with their hair salon equipment. With the fake President and General Carter under their command, a matriarchy is sure come about.

Except that it doesn’t. General Carter betrays the women and decides to take over the world himself by stealing the control of some nuclear missiles or some such nonsense. This is a silly movie. 

 Five Things I Learned About Derek Flint from Watching In Like Flint

1. Derek Flint can speak dolphin. This comes in handy when he needs a dolphin’s help to sneak into the secret base in the Virgin Islands. 
2. Derek Flint will switch out his girlfriends for new ones only after they are happily married. 
3. Five girlfriends at a time are too much even for Derek Flint. Three or four at the most.
4. Derek Flint doesn’t need bodyguards. He has trained dogs that won’t release you from their grip unless you smile.
5. Derek Flint is an author and an inventor as well as an accomplished ballerina. Where does he find the time? It’s a mystery.

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Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47, episode 102, episode 124, and episode 131) is an MFA graduate from the University of Central Florida.