The Agency is a 1980 Canadian dramatic

Drama

Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...

/thriller film. It was directed by George Kaczender

George Kaczender

George Kaczender is an Hungarian-born Canadian film director. He directed 26 films between 1963 and 2001.Kaczender left Hungary in 1956 as a political refugee after studying film and working as an Assistant Director at the Pannonina Film Studios in Budapest.Before coming to Los Angeles in the...

, with a screenplay

Screenplay

A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 by Noel Hynd.

Based on a novel by Paul Gottlieb, it is a political thriller

Political thriller

A political thriller is a thriller that is set against the backdrop of a political power struggle. They usually involve various extra-legal plots, designed to give political power to someone, while his opponents try to stop him. They can involve national or international political scenarios....

 involving advertising copywriter Philip Morgan (Lee Majors

Lee Majors

Lee Majors is an American television, film and voice actor, best known for his starring role as Colonel Steve Austin in The Six Million Dollar Man and as Colt Seavers in The Fall Guy ....

) who discovers the agency

Advertising agency

An advertising agency or ad agency is a service business dedicated to creating, planning and handling advertising for its clients. An ad agency is independent from the client and provides an outside point of view to the effort of selling the client's products or services...

 he works for, run by Ted Quinn (Robert Mitchum

Robert Mitchum

Robert Charles Durman Mitchum was an American film actor, author, composer and singer and is #23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male American screen legends of all time...

), is using subliminal advertising to manipulate a presidential election. It features appearances by Canadian actors Saul Rubinek

Saul Rubinek

Saul Rubinek is a Canadian actor, director, producer and playwright, known for his work in TV, film and the stage.-Early life:...

 as an audio technician (earning a "Best Supporting Actor" Genie

Genie Award

Genie Awards are given out to recognize the best of Canadian cinema by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television. From 1949-1979, the awards were named the Canadian Film Awards...

 nomination), Jonathan Welsh

Jonathan Welsh

Jonathan Welsh was a veteran Canadian actor of stage, television and film, best known for his principal roles in Canadian television series, notably the 1986–1989 adventure comedy Adderly and the 1989–1994 journalism drama E.N.G.On E.N.G., Welsh portrayed Eric "Mac" MacFarlane, one of the first...

 as a police detective, and familiar supporting players Michael Kirby and Gary Reineke as hitmen.

The film was shot on locations in Montréal

Montreal

Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...

 and rural Québec

Quebec

Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....

.

Sources

• Craddock , Jim, editor. VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever, p. 49, "The Agency". Detroit, Michigan: Thomson Gale, 2007. ISBN 0-7876-8980-7.
• "Agency" at imdb