The Pink Panther Strikes Again

The Pink Panther Strikes Again is the fifth film in The Pink Panther series and picks up where The Return of the Pink Panther leaves off. Released in 1976, Strikes Again is the third entry to include the words "Pink Panther" in its title, despite the fact the story does not involve the Pink Panther diamond.
Unused footage from the film was later included in Trail of the Pink Panther.
== Plot ==
At a psychiatric hospital, former Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus (Herbert Lom) is largely recovered from his obsession to kill the new Chief Inspector Jacques Clouseau (Peter Sellers) and is about to be released when Clouseau, arriving to speak on Dreyfus' behalf, drives Dreyfus insane again. Dreyfus promptly escapes from the asylum and once again tries to kill Clouseau by planting a bomb while the Inspector (by periodic arrangement) duels with his manservant Cato (Burt Kwouk). The bomb destroys Clouseau's apartment and injures Cato, but Clouseau himself is unharmed, being lifted from the room by an inflatable disguise. Determining a more elabourate plan is needed, Dreyfus enlists an army of criminals to his cause and kidnaps nuclear physicist Professor Hugo Fassbender (Richard Vernon) and the Professor's daughter Margo (Briony McRoberts), forcing the professor to build a "doomsday weapon" in return for his daughter's freedom.
Clouseau travels to England to investigate Fassbender's disappearance, where he wrecks their family home and ineptly interrogates Jarvis (Michael Robbins), Fassbender's cross-dressing butler. Although Jarvis is killed by the kidnappers, to whom he had become a dangerous witness, Clouseau discovers a clue that leads him to the Oktoberfest in Germany. Meanwhile, Dreyfus, using Fassbender's invention, dissolves the United Nations headquarters in New York City and blackmails the leaders of the world, including the President of the United States (a thinly-veiled impersonation of Gerald Ford, advised by a poorly-camouflaged Henry Kissinger), into assassinating Clouseau. However, many of the nations instruct their assassins to kill the other assassins to gain Dreyfus's favor and possibly the Doomsday Machine. As a result of their orders and Clouseau's habitual clumsiness, the assassins all end up killing each other until only the operatives of Egypt and Russia remain.
The Egyptian assassin (an uncredited cameo by Omar Sharif) shoots one of Dreyfus' henchmen, mistaking him for Clouseau, but is seduced by the Russian operative Olga Bariosova (Lesley-Anne Down), who makes the same mistake. When the real Clouseau arrives, he is perplexed by Olga's affections but learns from her Dreyfus's location at a castle in Bavaria. Dreyfus is elated at Clouseau's apparent demise, but suffers toothache; Clouseau, his entry frustrated by the castle's drawbridge, infiltrates Dreyfus's castle disguised as a dentist, intoxicates Dreyfus (and himself) with nitrous oxide and pulls one of Dreyfus's healthy teeth instead. Realising the deception, Dreyfus orders Clouseau killed, who again avoids Dreyfus' henchmen with his usual ineptitude. Enraged, Dreyfus prepares to dissolve England, but Clouseau unwittingly foils him by being catapulted onto Dreyfus's doomsday machine; the machine promptly malfunctions and begins disintegrating the castle walls. As the remaining henchmen, Fassbender and his daughter, and eventually Clouseau himself escape the dissolving castle, Dreyfus plays "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" on the castle's pipe organ, while himself disintegrating, until he and the castle vanish.
Returning to Paris, Clouseau is finally reunited with Olga. However, their tryst is interrupted first by Clouseau's apparent inability to remove his clothes without a struggle, and then by Cato, whereupon all three are hurled by the reclining bed into the Seine. Immediately thereafter, a cartoon image of Clouseau begins swimming, unaware that a gigantic version of the Pink Panther character is waiting below him (a reference to the film Jaws, made obvious by the thematic music as the movie ends).
== Cast ==
* Peter Sellers as Inspector Jacques Clouseau
* Lesley-Anne Down as Olga Bariosova
* Leonard Rossiter as Superintendent Quinlan
* Herbert Lom as Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus
* Colin Blakely as Inspector Alec Drummond
* Richard Vernon as Professor Hugo Fassbender
* Briony McRoberts as Margo Fassbender
* Burt Kwouk as Cato Fong
* André Maranne as Francois
* Gordon Rollings as Inmate
* Michael Robbins as Ainsley Jarvis
* Dudley Sutton as Inspector McClaren
* John Sullivan as Jean Tournier
* Terry Richards as Bruce
* Dinny Powell as Marty
* Bill Cummings as Harry
* Omar Sharif as an Egyptian Assassin
=== Cast notes ===
* Owing to Peter Sellers's heart condition, whenever possible he would have his stunt double Joe Dunne stand in for him. Because of the often physical nature of the comedy, this would occur quite frequently.
* Julie Andrews provided the singing voice for the female-impersonator "Ainsley Jarvis". The scene in the night club when Jarvis sings are in many ways similar to scenes in Edwards's later film Victor/Victoria, in which Andrews plays a woman pretending to be a man who is a female impersonator.
* Graham Stark, longtime friend of Sellers, once again makes an appearance in the series, albeit in a small cameo role as the owner of a small German motel. Since his role as Hercule LaJoy in A Shot in the Dark, he has since appeared in small roles in every Pink Panther sequel except Inspector Clouseau, in which Sellers did not play Clouseau.
* Omar Sharif appears, uncredited, as the Egyptian assassin.
* Tom Jones sang the Oscar-nominated song "Come To Me".
* The role of Olga Bariosova was originally played by Maud Adams, who was replaced after filming a few scenes. Blake Edwards then intended to cast Nicola Pagett after seeing her in Upstairs, Downstairs, but instead ended up casting Pagett's fellow TV star Lesley-Anne Down in the role.
* Edwards made a cameo appearance in the background of the night club scene.
Category:Pink Panther
Category:United Artists films
Category:Slapstick films
Category:Crime
Category:Police detective films
Category:Films with opening credits
Category:Films
Category:1970s films