The Saint – The Early
Years: Set Two (1963)
Picture: C+
Sound: C+ Extras: C- Episodes: B
The rollout of the original black and white episodes of
Roger Moore as Simon Templar in The Saint continues with The Early
Years: Set Two. The show begins to
pick up its tempo taking advantage of Moore’s wit and personality here. This new set includes 12 hour-long episodes,
in the original order of British broadcast, though one of our British lists
show some 1963 shows absent and a few from 1964 included to boot. Special actors of note follow certain shows’
titles:
1)
The Fellow Traveler (Dawn
Addams and Ray Austin)
2)
Starring The Saint (Jackie
Collins, Ivor Dean as David Brown and Wensley Pithey as Teal)
3)
Judith (Julie Christie)
4)
Teresa
5)
The Elusive Ellshaw
6)
Marcia
7)
The Work Of Art
8)
Iris
9)
The King Of The Beggars (Oliver
Reed & Warren Mitchell)
10)
The Rough
Diamonds
11)
The Saint
Plays With Fire (Robert Brown)
12)
The
Well-Meaning Mayor
13)
The
Sporting Chance
14)
The Bunco
Artists
15)
The
Benevolent Burglary
16)
The
Wonderful War
Peter Yates and John Moxey directed some of the shows,
along with the in-house regulars and with Moore having to pass on Dr. No
(1962) as Sean Connery’s James Bond took off; this show was in prime position
to be one of the first to capitalize on it.
The fact that some name people turned up before going on to big screen
success did not hurt either. I enjoyed
this set a bit more than the previous one, helped by the fact that the
condition of the prints and their soundtracks have survived as well as they
have is great. That Moore was so funny
even then is a bonus.
The full frame 1.33 X 1 image is looking good for its age,
though some fine detail is missing, but looks fine otherwise. This set is more than comparable with
monochrome action shows on DVD at the time like Danger Man and the 1965 Avengers
also from A&E, also reviewed elsewhere on this site. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo is an upgrade
of the original monophonic sound and despite some stridentness, is not
bad. The Edwin Astley score first
appeared in these shows that held up into the height of the Spy craze. The only extra offered here is a repeat of
the last set, including text on Moore and a history of the character previously
offered on the color shows. A few more
sets are due to follow and we’ll get to them as they arrive.
- Nicholas Sheffo
