Eurospy

Eurospy is the cycle of European spy films made in the wake of the James Bond series: between Dr. No (1962) and the end of the decade, Italian, French, Spanish and West German producers made more than two hundred of them.

The formula never varies: an agent with a number for a name, one gadget, four European locations shot in a fortnight, a title theme working very hard, and a stolen formula. Budgets run from modest to visible-boom-mic.

Every so often one is excellent. Mario Bava's Danger: Diabolik (1968) has production design that looks ten times its cost.

The cycle died when Bond turned self-parodic and the continental industries moved on to giallo and poliziotteschi, taking the same crews with them.

Start here

1. OSS 117: Mission for a Killer (1965): the French agent who was in print four years before Bond.
2. Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die (1966): mid-tier, with a real budget and a great title.
3. Operation Kid Brother (1967): starring Sean Connery's actual brother.
4. Danger: Diabolik (1968): Bava, and the best-designed film of the lot.
5. They Call Her... Cleopatra Wong (1978): not European, but the spy formula a decade later in the Philippines, girls-with-guns edition.

Where the crews went next: The giallo, 1963 to 1976.