The Black Windmill movie storyline. Two schoolboys are playing with a model plane on an abandoned military base in the English countryside. They are approached by two RAF personnel who rebuke them for trespassing, and take them to see their commanding officer. It soon becomes apparent that they are not really in the military and the two boys are kidnapped.
In London a British intelligence officer, Major Tarrant, is engaged in an undercover operation to try to infiltrate a gang of arms smugglers – who are selling weapons to terrorists in Northern Ireland. He makes an initial approach with Celia Burrows, a member of the organisation. He arranges to come back the next week to meet her boss.
He then heads to a large country house, where the head of MI6 Sir Edward Julyan lives, and makes a report about his operation to Julyan and his direct superior, Cedric Harper. While he is there he receives a telephone call from his wife – who tells him their son David has been taken and she has received a strange phone call. Tarrant reacts calmly, revealing to his superiors only that he has a family problem, and is given permission to leave.
Tarrant goes to his wife’s home in time to receive a second call from a man identifying himself as Drabble. Drabble demonstrates he knows exactly who Tarrant is and what jobs he does. He instructs him to get Harper to answer the next phone call – making it clear he has Tarrant’s son David and is prepared to torture him. Tarrant goes to Harper, and informs him of the situation. Harper agrees to take the phone call and begins to put a surveillance operation into motion – to discover the identity of Drabble.
When Drabble gets in touch, he demands that Harper give him £500,000 in uncut diamonds and make a rendezvous in Paris. Harper had recently acquired that exact amount of diamonds to fund another operation he has planned. Harper deduces that Drabble must be acting with information supplied by a member of British intelligence. He immediately begins to suspect Tarrant of staging the kidnapping, and has him placed under observation. Tarrant, meanwhile, has to assign his arms-smuggling case to another officer.
The Drabble gang have placed incriminating evidence into Tarrant’s flat, which appears to show a relationship with Celia Burrows, and this is found by Scotland Yard officers conducting a search. This further fuels Harper’s belief that Tarrant has in fact arranged the entire kidnapping himself. Harper meets with Tarrant in his office and tells him that he cannot allow the ransom to be met, as the British government does not negotiate with terrorists.
Tarrant seemingly accepts this, but when Harper has departed, he breaks into his office and impersonates Harper on a secure telephone – arranging to have the diamonds made available. He then takes them to Paris to make the rendezvous – giving the slip to the tail Harper has placed on him. In Paris he is met by Celia Burrows at the rendezvous. She takes him to a building where it is claimed Tarrant’s son is being held.
The Black Windmill is a 1974 British spy thriller film directed by Don Siegel and starring Michael Caine, John Vernon, Janet Suzman and Donald Pleasence. It was produced by Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown.
The screenplay by Leigh Vance is based on Clive Egleton’s novel Seven Days to a Killing. The story involves a British secret service agent, John Tarrant (Caine), involved in the investigation of an international arms syndicate. Tarrant’s son is kidnapped and held to ransom, leading Tarrant to discover that he cannot even rely on the people on his own side.
The film was made, in part, on location at Clayton Windmills, south of Burgess Hill, in West Sussex, England. It also featured scenes filmed at Aldwych and Shepherd’s Bush tube stations. A section of the film was also shot at Pegwell Bay, Ramsgate Hoverport, where Tarrant makes his way across the channel and sneaks onto the back of a bus which is on board the hovercraft Sure.
The Black Windmill (1974)
Directed by: Don Siegel
Starring: Michael Caine, Donald Pleasence, Joseph O’Conor, John Vernon, Janet Suzman, Delphine Seyrig, Joss Ackland, Clive Revill, Catherine Schell, Joyce Carey, Molly Urquhart
Screenplay by: Clive Egleton (Seven Days to a Killing)
Production Design by: Eva Monley
Cinematography by: Ousama Rawi
Film Editing by: Antony Gibbs
Costume Design by: Anthony Mendleson
Art Direction by: Peter Murton
Makeup Department: Freddie Williamson
Music by: Roy Budd
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Universal Pictures
Release Date: May 17, 1974 (New York, July 18, 1974 (London)
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