Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Usamah Harvey The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

classicsoncall No sense in belaboring the obvious, other reviewers have done it quite well already. This is a muddled story that's difficult to follow, with Gabriel Lee (Oliver Reed) seeking his former CIA sponsor's help to get out of Israel following a turn as a KGB double agent. Sam Lucas (Richard Widmark) is a retired operative, but as is surmised along the way, can you ever be retired from the spy business? Besides the hard to follow plot line, I kept getting distracted by Gayle Hunnicutt's uncanny resemblance to Linda Gray. That, and Richard Widmark's appearance in his early sixties, looking perhaps ten years older.What's laughable almost to the point of embarrassment is how the near final getaway scene has Lucas commandeering a vehicle through every roadblock imaginable, including more than one cement block wall. That was one durable machine, so it seems that it could have handled those pesky land mines in the desert easily enough. Considering the set up, I would have preferred seeing Widmark make it to the end of the picture instead of Reed, but ultimately, it doesn't matter that much one way or the other.

bkoganbing The Sell-Out finds Oliver Reed as an American agent who's turned and become a double agent for the Soviets. Now he wants out of their system because he's found it's not all it's cracked up to be. Unfortunately both sides want to see him taken out.What to do for Ollie. When you've got a friend like Richard Widmark who was your original sponsor at the Central Intelligence Agency and now retired to Israel with your former mistress Gayle Hunnicutt you go there for more than one reason. Widmark agrees to help him flee, but as it turns out comes at a terrible price.This Israeli made feature had the distinct aroma of tax write off around it. Everyone just walks through their parts and collects their salary. Especially Oliver Reed who it seems had to have his entire performance dubbed so he could sound convincingly American. Seems like you could have gotten another American or made him British and saved a lot of money.The cinematography in and around Jerusalem was nice to see, it took your mind off a very trite spy story.

hengir A spy story filmed in Jerusalem with Richard Widmark and Oliver Reed, supported by Sam Wanamaker has all the makings of an interesting movie at least but which this film abjectly fails to realise. There is a sort of a plot but it is hard to follow, based I think on the idea that the CIA and the KGB in cahoots are bumping off their ex-agents so they can't talk about their past. Which just seems silly. Oliver Reed is the next on the list and he calls on retired agent Richard Widmark to help. Both male actors do their best but are defeated by the script. It doesn't help that Oliver Reed is strangely dubbed. Gayle Hunnicut is given a thankless role.The star of the film is the city of Jerusalem itself, being much more interesting than the plot unfolding in it. One kept thinking, get those actors out of the way so I can enjoy the scenery. Peter Collinson was an average director and this is a very average film.

Hitchcoc A pretty good cast with lots of delightful bad guys. But what's the point. Who's who and what do they want? That's the problem. This is a mishmash of intrigue and espionage where we can't tell the characters without a program. We assume we are pulling for Richard Widmark and Oliver Reed, but we can't be sure. What makes a real spy story work is knowing the real milieu that is put forward. If everyone is flip-flopping back and forth within the story and if we don't have an identifiable end, we can't sense the suspense. I just couldn't get into this film. I like Reed and Widmark; they are two wonderful actors, but this must have been thrown together. The pyrotechnics are laughable. They use the old rule, if you can't come up with a plot, use a bunch of car chases. When all is said and done, who are these people answerable to. Is he CIA corrupt or is there a visible entity for us to fear. If there is, it's never brought forward in this film.