Blindfold

Blindfold is a 1966 American romantic comedy (with espionage overtones) film co-written and directed by Philip Dunne that was his last feature film. It starred Rock Hudson in his 50th film and the first for his own film production company, Gibraltar Productions. It co-starred Claudia Cardinale, Jack Warden and Guy Stockwell. The film was distributed by Universal Pictures. It was based on Lucille Fletcher's 1960 novel of the same name. Sequences were filmed in Central Park in New York City and in Silver Springs, Florida.
==Plot==
General Pratt, a national security chief, and his aides approach Dr. Bartholomew Snow, a successful psychiatrist, to assist the U.S. government in secrecy. A patient once psychoanalyzed by Dr. Snow is a government scientist who has had a mental breakdown. General Pratt hides the patient, Arthur Vincenti, in a remote place known only as "Base X", forcing Dr. Snow to wear a blindfold whenever he is taken there by airplane and car.
Enemy agents and an organization who kidnap and sell scientists to the highest bidder want to know what Vincenti knows, so he is in danger. The patient's sister, beautiful Vicky Vincenti, mistakenly believes that Dr. Snow is the one who abducted him. When she has the doctor arrested, Snow, in order to keep the Vincenti affair secret, tells both the authorities and the press that he and Vicky are engaged to be married and are actually having a lovers' quarrel. Snow, a man with seven failed engagements, sees nothing wrong with fabricating a false engagement to keep Vicky quiet. All are satisfied with the explanation except a suspicious NYPD detective named Harrigan.
A stuttering man named Fitzpatrick turns up for a session with Dr. Snow and shows CIA credentials. Fitzpatrick claims to Dr. Snow that it is actually General Pratt who is the enemy agent. That makes sense to Dr. Snow as he could not understand why Vincenti would not have been placed in a military hospital. Unable to find the general, and with the authorities unwilling to reveal whether General Pratt or Fitzpatrick work for the government, Dr. Snow tries to recreate sounds he heard while blindfolded to trace his way back to Base X. He does so, only to find that Fitzpatrick has taken both Vincenti and Pratt captive. But soldiers arrive in airboats and place Fitzpatrick under arrest, leaving Vicky to consider whether she would like her make-believe engagement to Dr. Snow to be real.
==Cast==
* Rock Hudson as Dr. Bartholomew Snow
* Claudia Cardinale as Vicky Vincenti
* Jack Warden as General Pratt
* Guy Stockwell as James Fitzpatrick
* Brad Dexter as Detective Harrigan
* Anne Seymour as Smitty
* Alejandro Rey as Arthur Vincenti
* Hari Rhodes as Captain Davis
* Vito Scotti as Michaelangelo Vincenti
* Angela Clarke as Lavinia Vincenti
* John Megna as Mario Vincenti
* Paul Comi as Barker
* Ned Glass as Lippy
* Mort Mills as Hombrug
* Jack De Mave as Hombrug
* Robert F. Simon as Police Lieutenant (as Robert Simon)
==Reception==
The film earned an estimated $2 million in rentals in North America."Big Rental Pictures of 1966", Variety, January 4, 1967, p. 8
==Influence==
The sequences in which Hudson's character of Dr. Snow finds the secret base using only sounds that he heard on the journey were used in Joe Smith, American and its remake The Big Operator, and were borrowed for an almost identical scene in the 1992 film Sneakers.
==References==
== External links ==
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Category:1966 films
Category:1966 romantic comedy films
Category:Films based on American novels
Category:Universal Pictures films
Category:Films directed by Philip Dunne
Category:Films with screenplays by Philip Dunne
Category:Films scored by Lalo Schifrin
Category:Films about psychiatry
Category:American spy films
Category:Cold War spy films
Category:Films shot in Florida
Category:Films shot in New York City
Category:1960s English-language films
Category:1960s American films
Category:English-language romantic comedy films