Excellent but underrated film

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Watching The Professionals now it comes across as a bit dated but I still find it fun.Collins and Shaw as Bodie and Doyle are great although sometimes their scenes together can appear a bit camp, especially the comic ones. They respect and trust each other as partners but there is sometimes an edge to their friendship as apparently there was in real life too.Jackson is good too as their tough boss who realises that he can rely totally on Bodie and Doyle although he sometimes has a hard time keeping them in line.I love the cars which get thrashed a lot. Particularly the Capri 3 litre S, Escort RS2000 and Granada 2.8 Ghia. Too many modern cars look the same and don't have the exciting looks that many cars had back then. The way they thrashed them must have meant they needed a lot of maintenance !.Overall a very enjoyable series, which although it looks dated now, still has enough action and excitement to be worth seeing.

I grew up with this show when I were a lad, and I totally loved it. It's still pretty cool...Anyhoo, the second car I ever bought was a Ford Escort RS2000, and it was because I had seen it in The Professionals! Couldn't afford a Capri RS3100 - pity really.And I just saw the funniest thing! I was watching an old episode of The New Avengers (Steed, Purdy & Gambit for those in the know), which was called 'Obsession' (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0659322/). Not the best of the series, but it did star Martin Shaw as the baddie! How cool. Then, all of a sudden, there was Lewis Collins as his trusty sidekick! Even cooler!! But the best of all was, towards the end of the episode, when the baddies have set their dastardly plan in place, Larry Doomer (Shaw) says to Kilner (Collins) "Thanks for all your help, I couldn't have done it without you." To which Kilner replies "We make a good team - maybe we should work together again..." Brilliant!!In case you're wondering why it was so brilliant - Obsession aired on 7 October 1977. Private Madness, Public Danger aired on 30 December, 1977.Gotta love it!

I was only born a year after this series started production, so I only know it by re-runs, thanks largely to my mother who loves the series.There are a great many TV series with the premise that you've got good guys running around trying to catch bad guys, and there are guns, cars and explosives thrown in for good measure. Some are good, some are not. The Professionals is a cut above the rest, not because of any trick or gimmick but simply because of superb writing, casting, directing and acting.Shaw (Doyle), Collins (Bodie) and Jackson (Cowley) excel in their roles and are really the glue of the whole series. The constant jibing between Doyle and Bodie is an absolute delight to watch, as is Bodie's unashamed love for fast-driving and shooting stuff.The action is very satisfying, with many shoot-outs, explosions and car chases. The plots are actually more varied and sophisticated than most people seem to remember, some of them require a very sharp mind to keep track of the wheeling and dealing. There's espionage, grand-theft, madmen with nerve-gas and more than a few personal vendettas. The characters, too, are deeper than most people seem to remember.My favourite episodes are: "Discovered in a Graveyard" - Doyle is shot and seriously wounded by an unknown assasin. While Bodie and Cowley hunt down the shooter, we are given an insight into the thoughts going through Doyle's comatose mind."Blind Run" - what starts as a simple escort run for Doyle and Bodie turns into an urban war as their charge turns out to be much more significant than they thought. This is one of the most action-packed episodes, featuring multiple shootouts and car-chases."Mixed Doubles" - Bodie and Doyle are assigned to organise protection for a very high-level foreign diplomat who is almost certain to be an assasination target. As we see our two heroes making preparations, we also see the two hired assasins making theirs and we get an incredible insight into just how similar the two doubles are, and how sad it is that only one pair of them can survive the day.

I loved watching the Professionals as a child, although I probably should not have been watching it at seven years of age! It is being re-run on U.K. Gold at the moment on Saturday mornings so I have managed to catch a few episodes recently. It has dated badly-especially Doyle's (Martin Shaw) bad perm and the clothes and cars-lots of bad MK. 2 Ford Escorts and Hillman Hunters! The Professionals cars were cool in their day, but most people realize that Ford Capri's were total heaps of junk! The show was violent and exciting, but watching it now it seems a bit dated and bad in some places. I do like watching it though, I suppose for sentimental reasons more than anything else. I do like every now and then to spend a few hours watching classic 70's and 80's American and British TV shows- they don't make shows like this anymore-which will probably please people who hated them to begin with! Not the most intelligent crime show ever-it's no Inspector Morse by a long shot, but it is harmless escapist fun if that is what you are after. It is also fun to see guest actors who later went on to other shows in the 80's and 90's. Where is Lewis Collins now?