The Fourth Protocol (1987) on Netflix
MI5 officer John Preston is punished for a raid that exposed NATO files in a government official's home. KGB officer Major Valeri Petrofsky arrives in Britain on a mission.
- Netflix3.3/5
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- Rotten Tomatoes67%
Trailer
Plot summary
A 1968 East-West agreement intended to halt nuclear proliferation contains a clause, the Fourth Protocol, that forbids delivering a nuclear weapon to a target by unconventional means. John Preston, an MI5 officer, enters the home of government official George Berenson on New Year's Eve without authorization and finds classified NATO documents; he takes them to Sir Nigel Irvine, a senior Secret Service official. The raid embarrasses Brian Harcourt-Smith, the acting director of MI5, who punishes Preston by assigning him to airports and ports. Elsewhere, General Borisov tells General Karpov that his espionage department has lost resources and personnel, among them Major Valeri Petrofsky. Karpov looks into the matter and learns that Petrofsky has been sent to Britain to set off an atomic device at an American base so that it looks like an accident.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Fourth Protocol (1987)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Michael Caine read Frederick Forsyth's draft manuscript and suggested they make a film together. They hired George Axelrod to write the script and John Frankenheimer to direct, but could not raise the finance; both left and Forsyth wrote the script himself.
- Although Frederick Forsyth's novel The Fourth Protocol had sold over seven million copies, he spent an estimated 18 months raising the money to make the film.
- Author Frederick Forsyth and star Michael Caine put their own fees into the production, an investment estimated at £1 million.
- The late car chase, set in Ipswich, was actually shot in Chelmsford on the A1016 Chelmer Valley bypass, which had only just been built at the time.
