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Topkapi (1964)
Topkapi is a sun‑drenched caper where Elizabeth Lipp (Melina Mercouri) swans about like a Greek Yootha Joyce, assembling a heist crew to steal a bejewelled dagger from a Turkish museum — and frankly, her entire oeuvre now needs to be mined for similar camp treasures! Arthur Simpson (Peter Ustinov) plays a fluttery little gay‑coded hustler — see him furtively reading Mr Universe magazine! — who gets dragged into the plot, plays off both sides of the law, and somehow wins Ustinov his second Oscar for being permanently overwhelmed. The gang’s heist prep includes a gloriously unnecessary set piece involving oily Turkish wrestlers in a giant stadium, filmed with such lingering enthusiasm that the queer coding stops being “subtext” and becomes “oh, they absolutely knew what they were doing.” And yes: this is the film that inspired the iconic dangling‑from‑the‑ceiling sequence in Mission Impossible (and, crucially, The Great Muppet Caper).
Topkapi is a sun‑drenched caper where Elizabeth Lipp (Melina Mercouri) swans about like a Greek Yootha Joyce, assembling a heist crew to steal a bejewelled dagger from a Turkish museum — and frankly, her entire oeuvre now needs to be mined for similar camp treasures! Arthur Simpson (Peter Ustinov) plays a fluttery little gay‑coded hustler — see him furtively reading Mr Universe magazine! — who gets dragged into the plot, plays off both sides of the law, and somehow wins Ustinov his second Oscar for being permanently overwhelmed. The gang’s heist prep includes a gloriously unnecessary set piece involving oily Turkish wrestlers in a giant stadium, filmed with such lingering enthusiasm that the queer coding stops being “subtext” and becomes “oh, they absolutely knew what they were doing.” And yes: this is the film that inspired the iconic dangling‑from‑the‑ceiling sequence in Mission Impossible (and, crucially, The Great Muppet Caper).
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