“The Quiller Memorandum,” filmed in 1966, is part of a unique genre of British spy movies of that era, realistic and gritty, set in London and Germany, with understated violence and unremarkable agents.  The protagonists are anti-heroes–spies like Alec Leamas in “The Spy Who Came in from the Cold,” Harry Palmer in “The Ipcress File,” and Quiller in “The Quiller Memorandum.”  They are bureaucrats who follow their own, somewhat irreverent, instincts, and who surprisingly to both sides, succeed in their missions.  Their enemies are East Germans, Russians, or neo-Nazis.  Their bosses are not much better than their enemies.  Our anti-hero spies are cynical about the world which forces them to play by the bad guys’ rules.

These movies are generally gray, nostalgic, and slow paced.  The Quiller Memorandum is typical, opening with a dark, empty suburban Berlin street at night, with a lit phone booth at the end.  Harold Pinter did the screenplay.  In other scenes, however, the Berlin weather is cool and clear, with blue skies, a typical Central European late summer.  People are wearing suits,  or perhaps light sweaters.   These movies are about the Cold War and modern Germany, but they also involve unrealized, potential love, in this case, Quiller, the British agent (George Segal), and Inge, a German school teacher and perhaps neo-Nazi (Senta Berger).

The plot is simple.  Quiller is a special agent, sent in by British intelligence to find the base of a neo-Nazi ring operating in Berlin.  Two British agents have been killed in this effort.   Quiller operates independently, coordinating loosely with the British intelligence station in Berlin.  He has but one lead to go on, a newspaper clipping about a neo-Nazi recently convicted in Berlin.  Using  this lead, and himself as bait, Quiller sets out contacting the co-workers of the convicted Nazi.   Inge is one of these, a teacher from the same school who admits to having neo-Nazi contacts but also negative feelings about Hilter’s Germany.  Quiller plays a naive American journalist, asking questions for a story he is doing, lying about his lack of German language ability, playing ignorant, and testing German nationalism  (boasting about American boxers and the fact that Joe Lewis beat Max Schmelling)  to observe reactions.  A romance starts to develop with Inge, and she eventually leads him to the headquarters of the neo-Nazis.  But, it is never certain whose side she is on.  In the end, he wraps up the case, arresting the ring, and, in the final scene, goes back to her school to say goodbye.  She asks if he got them all, and he replies that yes, we got them all, then adds, looking at her, “well, perhaps not all.”  As he leaves, he asks if she ever met a man named Jones (his predecessor who was killed).   As he walks away from the school, Inge is gathering her students in lines, clapping her hands in the old German way, to instill discipline.  We are left with a bit of ambiguity about her role.  You feel she was one of them, but may have cared for and protected him.

The movie has a cool elegance, set in beautiful locations, a pre-war bathhouse, the 1936 Olympic Stadium, and Europa Center downtown.   I miss the style of the era:  the red classic Porsche Quiller drives, his medium gray suit and hopsack sports coat, white button down oxford shirts with narrow tie, and  polished brogues.  What I really like about Quiller, however, is his method, his American, almost Columbo-like, clever openness.  He banters and naively raises what others don’t talk about.   Who can he talk to about neo-Nazis.  He is smiling and polite, but there is an edge to Quiller as well, a seriousness.  He is a bit too intense, his questions a bit too direct.  He is also like a boxer, fearless.  Like Somerset Maugham’s Asheden, the World War I British agent, Quiller relies on his intelligence and instincts rather than technology, weapons, and tradecraft.  He is hanging out there alone.