Dark Mission (Operación cocaína) (1988)

User Rating:

3.9/10   

Director:

Jesus Franco

Writers:

Jesus Franco (French dialogue as A.L. Mariaux)
H.L. Rostaine (story)

Release Date:

18 August 1988 (Spain)

Genre:

Action | Adventure

Plot Keywords:

Beautiful Woman | Female Nudity | Drugs

Cast

Christopher Mitchum	...	Derek Timothy Carpenter
Cristina Higueras
Christopher Lee	...	Luis Morel
Alicia Moro	...	Elena Barrios
Daniel Katz
Richard Harrison
Brigitte Lahaie
Antonio Mayans
Henri Lambert
José Miguel García
Frank Desmet
Trino Trives
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Carmen Carrión

Also Known As:

Columbian Connection (International: English title)
Dark Mission (Les fleurs du mal) (France)
Dark Mission (Operación cocaína) (France) (video title)
Dark Mission: Evil Flowers (USA)
Flowers of Evil (USA) (video title)
Randevou stin Kolasi (Greece) [el]
Trudna misja (Poland) [pl]
Vaarallinen tehtävä: Dark Mission (Finland) [fi]

Runtime:

85 min

Country:

Spain | France

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

USA:PG-13 | Spain:13

Filming Locations:

Alicante, Comunidad Valenciana, Spain

Company:

Eurociné

Jess, you let me down!

Nothing says cult more than a film directed by Jess Franco starring Christopher Lee, Chris Mitchum, Brigette Lahaie and Richard Harrison. Only Jess Franco could mess up an all-star cast like that. CIA agent Derrick Carpenter (Mitchum) heads to an unnamed Latin American country to take on big time drug dealer and former Castro buddy Luis Morel (Lee). Along the way, he unwittingly falls in love with Morel's naive daughter (Cristina Higueras) and keeps running into the wife (Lahaie) of his recently killed partner. All this mixes to create a movie that isn't too exciting.

Richard Harrison does his one minute at the beginning and 2 minutes at the end bit. He gets the best line though at the beginning. He is the head of the CIA and says to Mitchum's character, "I don't like you. You are a drunk and a womanizer. But we need you. You are the only one here who knows Spanish." There are a other few funny bits like when Mitchum and his girl head to a hospital to check out drug addicts. They wheel one body past the girl and she says, "Oh God! It is my best friend Maria!" (a character never mentioned before this point). Perhaps the funniest bit is a dinner scene that Franco decided to do with synch sound. No problem there except someone locked some dogs in adjacent room and they bark at all the wrong (right) moments. Hilarious. There is one big action scene at the end (relying heavily on stock footage) and it appears to have been edited by a blind man. But at least we get to see Christopher Lee get blow'd up (that should make Peter Jackson happy).