Reaction & Review | Operation Kid Brother

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be checking out a film from 1967. That movie is "Operation Kid Brother".

Now, I do know a couple of things about this movie. I know that this movie is suppose to be a spoof of the James Bond films. Which sounds pretty cool, and I'm curious to see how that's going to fare out. Speaking of James Bond, I also know that the movie stars Neil Connery, who is Sean Connery's real brother. So that's also going to be interesting.

The only other thing I do know about this movie is that it was featured on an episode of "Mystery Science Theater". Now, I should mention that, I do enjoy watching "Mystery Science Theater". I didn't watch it back in the day when it was still airing on TV and I didn't watch the reboot, which I heard wasn't all that good, anyways. But thanks to the internet, I was able to watch some episodes of "Mystery Science Theater", and I really enjoyed what I watch. And I discovered tonight's movie through "Mystery Science Theater". Now, when I say that, I didn't watch the episode that featured "Operation Kid Brother", I discovered it when I was watching a random episode of "Mystery Science Theater". I saw the title, and I wanted to look up what this movie was. And when I saw the cover, and what little information I looked up on this movie, I wanted to cover this movie for Reaction & Review. And tonight, I finally get my chance to see this movie.

I'm certainly hoping for it to be interesting. I kinda have my doubts about this thing being good, considering that this movie was featured on "Mystery Science Theater". But who knows? This movie could surprise me and wind up being really decent. But the only way I'm gonna know if this thing is worth watching at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Operation Kid Brother".

3 minutes later

Well, guys, I can say that this opening song here is pretty good. I'm hoping that this is a good sign of things to come. Then again, I said that about "Vegas in Space", and we all know how that turned out. Still though, I have hopes.

5 minutes later

O...K. Well, I didn't know that when a remote controlled vehicle makes contact with a plane, they automatically explode. Personally, I don't think a car should be able to explode on contact with a moving a plane, but, then again, I'm trying to put real world logic into a spy movie, so maybe I should drop the subject and see where this movie goes.

19 minutes later

Wait, so according to Neil's explanation, the pilot from earlier was able to use hypnosis to send information to his girlfriend by using her as an electronic brain. I'm not gonna even begin to question how stupid that fucking sounds, I'm just gonna pretend that makes some level of sense and see if this movie gets any better.

3 minutes later

OK, guys, I'm just gonna tell you this now. The actor who is playing as Alpha is just laughably bad, and it's making this movie a little bit charming to watch. I wasn't expecting that.

13 minutes later

Wait a second here. So, Neil's going to let the woman he just hypnotized a moment ago leave, after getting some important information out of her. Mind you, he let her out of his trance before she left. But just a minute ago, when he had her in his hypnosis, he said that she was in his control and had to do whatever he wanted. Why not just keep her in his hypnosis? There's no hint as to how long Neil's hypnosis lasts, so why bother letting her go? I understand that I might reading too much into this, but it just seems really odd to me, you know?

9 minutes later

You know, I'm kinda surprised that they were able to take an army jeep and turn it into a showgirl car with all of the equipment that they had with them. That is certainly kinda impressive.

19 minutes later

Sorry, guys, if I haven't been saying a whole lot. This movie hasn't really given me much to work with within the last, almost, 20 minutes now. Right now, I'm just kinda curious to see how this movie's going to end.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Operation Kid Brother". I'm gonna shut the movie off...OK. Well, I think I know what I'm gonna do after I'm done putting this review together. I'm curious to see how "Mystery Science Theater" riffed on this thing. Now, mind you, when I say that, I'm not saying that the movie is terrible, but I could totally see how this movie got featured on an episode of "Mystery Science Theater". There is a lot here to just riff on.

But rather than me talking about how funny of an episode this would make for "Mystery Science Theater", let's talk about the movie itself. I'm gonna start with writing. As I was watching the movie, a thought occurred to me. It was something that kinda popped into my mind during the second half of the movie, and I feel the need to address that. My thought was what would happen if this had gotten a TV show? What I mean by that is that this movie could've been turned into a pilot for a TV series spinoff that featured the brother of James Bond. I should mention that Bond's name doesn't get name dropped in this movie at all. The closest we come to that is when one of the characters refers to Neil being the brother of 007. Beyond that, though, the references to Bond himself are kept to a minimum. Back to my earlier point, this movie has a ton of potential for it to have a TV show, if they had wanted to capitalize on it. I could totally see this airing on something like CBS, or maybe FOX, or some other channel that would pick up this kind of show. Maybe give it about 2 or 3 seasons tops. Because the idea of James Bond's brother using his skills in plastic surgery, lip reading, or even use his hypnosis to save the world does sound like an interesting premise. I will talk about Neil's ability to use hypnosis later on. But again, there is enough here to where someone could've turned this into a TV show, and give it at least 2 seasons to work with. On the other hand, I could totally see it backfiring, mainly because of how this movie was received. So, maybe it's just an idea that probably would've flopped, anyways. But if a studio wanted to take that chance, and give it to someone in the right hands, then this could've been a mildly successful TV show. But that's just me theorizing about something that never happened, or is even going to happen anyway. So giving this movie the "Mystery Science Theater" treatment was probably the best idea.

Now, the reason why I brought up the idea of turning this movie into a TV show has to do with the main character, Neil. So, as I mentioned before, Neil is the younger brother of James Bond, who so happens to be a master of plastic surgery, lip reading, and hypnosis abilities. I want to touch upon his hypnosis, because this kinda bothered me throughout the entire film. Now, I can let a lot of things here slide. I can accept the idea of him being able to read lips, even if he can't hear what they are saying. I can even accept the idea of him being a plastic surgeon, even though he really doesn't do very much of that in this movie, if ever. But, oh well, I'm not going to harp on that one too much. However, the idea of him using hypnotic abilities kinda bothers me. Now, it isn't so much that he has these abilities to begin, but more so of his limitations of how long they work. And the movie never really goes into detail about this. It seems as though that Neil can just use them at any time when he needs to, and not worry about anyone under his hypnotic trance being able to break it. If that's the case, then why didn't he just use these abilities when Beta was activating the Nucleus? Or even, somehow, destroying it? I ask this, because the villains don't seem to know about Neil's hypnotic abilities, or even his lip reading. They know about his skills as a plastic surgeon. Especially Beta, because he needs Neil to perform plastic surgery on this guy and make him look like Alpha, the other villain that Beta has a grudge against for...reasons that are not quite clear. But did any of them not know about him being a lip reader, or even his ability to use hypnosis? It just seems very weird to me, because Neil can almost do this at anytime, provided that the person is in front of him, of course. And it seems like there's no way for the person who's under his trance to break it off, unless Neil himself does it. Which is why I brought up the idea of Neil Connery having his own TV show. Because we could've gotten a chance to see a bit of background on how he became a plastic surgeon, or how he has the ability to read lips, or even how he's able to use his hypnotic abilities so well, that nobody is able to break them no matter who you are. Point is, this movie could've done something like this, but it decided not to. And because of it, Neil comes off as kinda...bland. But, then again, almost every character in this movie is rather bland, too. Now, I could totally see that he has some of his brother's traits, such as the ability to attract beautiful women. Of course, not in the hypnotic way. Otherwise, it would end up being kinda creepy. Now earlier, I mentioned that this movie was a spoof of the James Bond films. And it certainly does have a couple of elements brought up, such as the opening song mentioning getting any girl that he wants. Or, at one point, Neil warns Maya that she's in danger, and she tells him that he's been reading too many Ian Fleming novels. And it does kinda work here. I will also say that this movie, when it wants to be funny, it is incredibly funny. Such as one point where Neil is about to perform surgery on the guy that Beta wants him to do the surgery on. What comes after that comes off as unintentionally hilarious, that it almost took me by surprise.

Speaking of being funny, I'm gonna go straight into acting. Well, before that, I'm just gonna say that writing here is kinda weak, but, at the same time, it's something that I'm not going to rail on this movie too much for. But what makes this movie worth watching is the acting. The acting is the weirdest thing I ever have to talk about for this movie, because it varies all over the place. You'll have a couple of actors who were trying to put on good performances, you'll have some actors who sound wooden and robotic, and then you'll have actors who are trying to ham it up, to a point that it makes the movie really funny to watch. There are several actors that I do want to make mention of. The first is the actor who plays Beta. He sounds the most wooden, because he tries to sound like he's hamming up his lines, but it just doesn't work, because it doesn't really work much for his character. Then you'll have the actor playing Alpha, and he is the one who hams it up so much, that it makes the character of Dr. Evil from the "Austin Powers" movies look like a complete amateur. It's so lovably cheesy, that it makes his acting stand out amongst the entire cast. And then we have our main star, Neil Connery. Now, when I went into this movie, I was fearing that Neil Connery was going to sound exactly like his brother, Sean Connery. And the reason why I thought that was because I had never heard Neil Connery act before, and, probably, after this. So that's why I went into this movie with a little bit of caution. And I will say that while Neil doesn't sound anything like his brother, he also comes off as the one actor in this movie who turns in the worst showing. I say this, because he sounds incredibly stilted for, like, about 85% of the movie. And it just sounds so weird hearing this, because I really couldn't tell you if it was because the script he was given wasn't good enough for him to make it work, or that's just how he naturally sounds when he's asked to act. I have no idea. So, even though I just said that Neil's acting is stilted and kinda sucks, I'm gonna give his acting a pass, because, as I just stated, I have no idea if that's just how he naturally sounds. But I will say that, overall, the acting is just cheesy and stupid enough, to where you can totally get a laugh out of it. So, in that sense, at least the movie accomplishes that much.

As for special effects, we have a few shots of blood, we have explosions, and a lot of is very similar to what you would see in a James Bond movie. Well, for a James Bond movie that came out during the late 60's. Because I believe that "You Only Live Twice" came out the same year that this movie did. So, I don't know if this movie took notes from "You Only Live Twice", because I haven't seen that movie. But regardless, the special effects are passable for the standards of the late 60's.

Camerawork here is OK, until we get to anything involving fight scenes. Now, when I say that, I'm referring to anytime that the camera is up close between two people that need to fight each other. For whatever reason, the camera will stay very close to the fight, to a point where you don't get to see them battling it out properly. Now, I will say that when it comes to a much wider range, it looks fine. And I'm referring to the scene on the boat, where we have a lot of fights going on, and you can see just about everything fine. But, like I said, anything involving two people fighting each other, and the camera will zoom on them, and I don't know why that is. I will say, however, that the fight scenes in this movie are a hell of a lot better than the bullshit I watched in "Valentine: The Dark Avenger". Mostly because, they don't rely so heavily on jump cuts. But anyway, aside from the zoomed in fights, the camerawork is here OK. Lighting here is lit well. Sound-mix is decent. I will say that the sound could've been fixed better, but that might be an issue with the version of it I watched on YouTube. I don't know if this was an issue on VHS or DVD, but the sound on this version of the movie sounds a little bit choppy. However, it's not enough to ruin the movie for you, so you just have to take it for what you will. The music is pretty good. In fact, one of the two composers for this movie was the legendary Ennio Morricone. If you don't know who he is, to me, he was mostly known for his amazing scores in the Dollars Trilogy. I'm talking about films like "A Fistful of Dollars" and "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly". Those kinds of movies. And while the score in this movie is pretty good, it's certainly the weakest out of the few films from him that I've heard. Part of that has to do with the fact that some of the music will be repeated about two or three times during a few scenes, and it comes off as a bit lazy. Now, mind you, none of it is overly bad, but it's certainly nowhere near Morricone's best work. So, I can, at least, say the music here is decent. But again, it's not great.

Overall, guys, am I able to recommend "Operation Kid Brother"? Only if you watch it through "Mystery Science Theater". While the movie is OK by it's own standards, I personally think it would be better if you watch it with the "Mystery Science Theater" commentary. I don't know if the commentary is any good, but I can hazard a guess and say that it's better than watching it by yourself. But setting aside that, the movie is OK. It's just kinda there. If you're a fan of James Bond, and you're curious about what a movie involving his brother would be like, then go ahead and check it out. Personally, for me, I don't think it's worth buying on DVD, but I will say that it wasn't a complete waste of my time, either. So, at least the movie wasn't awful. But I still wouldn't add this to my DVD collection, because it was kinda dull towards the latter half of the movie. But hey, now that I've finished watching this thing, I'm kinda in the mood to watch a James Bond movie. As much as I would like to watch this movie again with the "Mystery Science Theater" commentary, I want to watch a good James Bond film to fill in that gap first. I think I'm gonna watch..."The World Is Not Enough". I haven't seen that movie in ages, so I think I'm gonna go do that. And after that, I'll come back and watch this movie again through "Mystery Science Theater".

Anyway, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.