There's an international money counterfeiting gang in town, and Interpol agent 009, Chen Tianhong (Tang Ching) is sent to investigate.
Like Lo Wei's Golden Buddha from 1966, Interpol attempts to bring a Chinese James Bond to the screen, although the two films are otherwise unrelated.
Agent 009 has much in common with his more famous counterpart he's a suave womaniser, heavy drinker (although he prefers brandy to a vodka martini) and is deadly with any form of weapon you can to give him. He's also got an arsenal of gadgets to get him out of scrapes, such as a watch with several uses (including a listening device), a lighter that can turn into a smoke bomb and chewing gum that can open locked doors. However, that's pretty much where the similarities end, as Chen Tianhong has the charisma of a housebrick. Perhaps sensing this, he is given a sidekick in the shape of Huang Mao (Lee Kwan best known for his appearance as Ah Kun in Bruce Lee's The Big Boss) who runs around Hong Kong in a Beatle suit and provides comic relief.
Chen Tianhong (who proclaims, and I swear to God this is true: "Danger? That's my middle name") woos the ladies despite some stinky chat up lines (he even comes out with "do you come here often?" to one lady). This is perhaps the sauciest Chinese film from the 60's I've seen as Agent 009 canoodles with just about every lady he comes into contact with and there's even a bare bottom at one point. This is a far cry from the previous year's Golden Buddha, which is extremely coy in comparison.
The story concerns a money counterfeiting gang headed by a beautiful mysterious lady (the tragic Margaret Tu Chuan, who would commit suicide before the decade came to an end at the age of 27) and it's here that another problem becomes apparent the villains are all a bit pedestrian and the locations are very domestic, with the action all taking place in Hong Kong. Part of the appeal of the Bond movies is the exotic locations and the overblown villains, and this film is a letdown on both points.
There is some enjoyment to be had from the film, despite its drawbacks. However, I'm not sure all the fun is intentional. There's a scene where the bad guys are beating up some guy, who manages to get away in an unguarded car. He gets away and then drives his car straight off the nearest quay and into the water. One of the perusing villains just mutters "silly man" and shakes his head which I found hilariously funny. The final reel mercifully turns up the action a couple of notches, and another Bond device comes into play the age-old ploy of the bad guys tying up the hero (with sidekick in this case), planning a grisly fate for them and then scooting off and assuming the hero gets splattered across a large area. In this case, the villains leave 009 to stew until the bomb they've planted goes off and turns Chen Tianhong into a disgusting red mess.
So how long do the villains give Chen Tianhong to ponder his fate while they make a speedy getaway? Two minutes? Five minutes? Surely no more than ten minutes? Actually, they give him two hours. In that time, Bond would have got out, killed an army of henchmen, downed a couple of vodka martinis, bedded the villainess, killed her and quipped about it to his leading lady while making a witty quip over the radio to an exasperated M. Chen Tianhong barely gets out with his skin intact, and this sums up the film in a nutshell.
Interpol is just too dull most of the time to be enjoyable and suffers from some plot logicalities to boot. It's not a complete write-off, and the 60's fashions and sensibilities are always fun to watch, but this is not even on par with the more cringeworthy Roger Moore-era Bonds.
