User reviews

The worst script I've ever seen in a Hitchcock film. The acting is mediocre at best. Most of the characters behave like robots on anti- depressants. Plot suffers from an overdose of predictability. Story based on stereotypes that would make even the hokiest hack writer blush. About as subtle as an elephant in heat. Probably financed by the John Birch Society. Great footage of NY in the 60s. Cinematography pretty good. Good for a laugh - although I don't think that was the intended reaction. It is hard to believe that Hitch would have bothered with such a project. There is not a speck of thrill in this dull thriller that numbs the sensibility of even the most hardcore Hitchcock fan.

I cannot help it. I appreciate the effort of trying to portray the Cuba crisis in a realistic way without one central character playing the super hero. Yes, I do appreciate it, and I liked having French people be the main heroes. I can appreciate all that, but I still found the film absolutely boring, boring beyond compare.

There are moments when something like suspense or excitement can be felt, but there is no suspense running through the whole movie, nothing holding the audience's interest for the entire story.

Similarly, there is one great, beautiful shot in the middle of the movie, but the rest of the thing is filmed in a bleak, normal style... If this is intended, if the realistic look is intended, then why add this one gorgeous shot at all? It doesn't fit in there at all, and strengthens my impression of Topaz being 'nothing'. An attempt at best. An attempt at making a realistic thriller about spies involved in the Cuba Crisis, a beyond the scenes showing several nationalities work together or against each other... An attempt that failed in every aspect: It didn't find a visual style; the main character could as well have been a cardboard cut-out for all the impression he makes; the script has never heard of the word "climax".

In fact, I half-missed the ending, because I was just making some sort of comment to a friend next to mine, and suddenly the film was over. I don't normally talk in important scenes, let alone during endings. I usually pick scenes that seem not-so-important to me, if I really do have something to point out, or ask, and cannot hold back... I guess that says it all: I didn't feel that the end was approaching. The film was just suddenly over, ending in a very, very unspectacular way. Everything it gave me was this emptiness.

It's too bad. This could certainly have been better. There were things that were somewhat interesting, like the resistance fighters in Cuba, whose inventive methods kept me entertained for a brief while. But like I said, the movie as a whole is just boring, even if episodes or instances strike me as nice. What a waste.

This film was made after the Cuban missile crisis and after the death of JFK. The world moved on as a result. Kennedy's killing in some senses blanked the details of the crisis that appears to have precipitated his assassination. Uris did a great job of telling the background and his book, on which the film is based, remains a solid work. Hitchcock's film is utterly pointless. The acting, withe the exception of John Vernon is wooden and at times so empty it is impossible to take the film seriously. I am not a fan of Hitchcock. I think all his films suffer from his plugging away at the suspense element and as a result, they lose credibility. I sat through Topaz with the same dull ache, hoping it would soon be over, that I sat with in all his last movies. And when this film was released we already had James Bond and a million other movie spies cashing in on the Cold War. This film is so bad it will haunt me forever.

Quite possibly the worst Hitchcock Movie made.

This movie would sux the chrome off a trailer hitch!

Man the plot drug, the dialogue drug, the scene transisitions were bad, the story continuity was missing.

A big disappointment from the Master of suspense.

Rated NO REELS!

Pass on this piece of cinematic tripe!

I love Hitchcock, almost everything he has done. Often clever, rarely just propaganda. But Topaz breaks this code most evidently and is pure propaganda nonsense for the Americans. It is also rubbish. Maybe he was instructed to make it by the studios and their governmental corporate bosses with a gun to his head. Maybe that's why his cameo in this film is one of himself being driven in a wheel chair like some ill-minded cripple. Best cinematic moment is watching Juanita de Cordoba's dress spread out like blood across a checkered floor.

Watch almost any other of his movies. Watch 'Saboteur', its far more current on recent American history.

Long live Hitchcock and free-minded creativity. Long live the revolution. Any revolution.