'The Diadem': Emma Peel's Most Secret Mission?

The Diadem (1967? 1968? 1969?)
Starring: Diana Rigg

Director: Uwe Beetz

Rating: Six of Ten Stars

A woman of mystery (Rigg) engages in a deadly struggle with a group of murderous thugs over a secret recording, a piggy bank, and valuable jewelry.

 

Either shortly after she left "The Avengers", or during or shortly after she finished work on "In Her Majesty's Secret Service", Diana Rigg made a pair of made-for-home-viewing short films for a German production company. One of these, "The Diadem" was released both in color (the shorter version, which runs about 7 minutes) and black-and-white (the longer version, which runs about 12 minutes).

The information available about "The Diadem" is long on speculation and short of facts. There are no credits to speak of on the film, so the supporting cast, writer, and crew outside the director are anonymous... and since there only seems to be one source for the director's name, one has to wonder if even that is accurate.

To make matters more complicated, it seems like there are people who may be commenting in authoritative tones about this silent short film who seem to not even have seen it... since they reference events that don't seem to take place in it. (At least not in the version I watched. Maybe the color version isn't just a shortened release of the black-and-white one, but has a different scene or two?

One thing all sources seem to agree upon is that "The Diadem" was made while Rigg's star was shining very brightly during the late 1960s. There is no logical reason for her to star in this weird, ultra-low budget short film. so maybe she did as a favor to a friend? Maybe she had a spare weekend, and she thought it would be fun working with friends? Perhaps, someday, writers and historians more devoted to research and Truth than I will find the answers, but that day is not here.

As for what is actually in "The Diadem", it plays like something of a tribute to "The Avengers", the series where Diana Rigg played Mrs. Emma Peel, the role that catapulted her to fame. One can easily imagine this as a solo adventure for Mrs. Peel, either before, during, or after her gig as a "trouble-shooter" for the British government. Every minute of the film plays like an overly stylized attempt to capture the feel of action scenes from "The Avengers" and the character that Rigg portrays is Mrs. Peel in every way except by name. 

Although for all we know, perhaps we ARE to imagine that this is Emma Peel taking down bad guys and that the filmmakers meant for this to be an authorized sequel to her television adventures... something that hard-core fans could enjoy in their homes on their 8-mm film projectors. The music that plays during the version that watched is even slightly reminiscent of what you might hear on "The Avengers"... although I have no way of knowing if this is what heard when the film was first released.

I think that if you've enjoyed any episodes of "The Avengers", you'll find the "The Diadem" to be a lot of fun. What passes for the plot is a little disjointed and illogical, but the action and weird, artsy choices of camera angles make up for that. The Six Rating I am giving it is as high as it can be, and the only reason it's not a Seven is because the otherwise rapid pacing sputters a bit and is uneven at the halfway mark.

We began 2021 with a look at Emma Peel's first big adventure while she was still a teenager, and we're ending with what could be the last of her adult adventures... bringing The Year of the Avengers to a perfect close.

We hope you have fun watching "The Diadem", and we hope to share another 200-300 posts with you in 2022!