Seconds (1966)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS TO ROCK)

[This Plot Buster resulted from a request to identify a film title, not because the plot was difficult to understand. The asker wanted the name of a black&white movie concerning some man who worked for either the CIA or the FBI, and who had plastic surgery in order to go deep undercover. The only other facts that the poster could recall were that there was a scene which showed various charts and diagrams of the agent's new face, and that there was a shocking ending when the agent revealed his new face in the mirror.

The question languished for several days without receiving any attention, until I wondered if the asker might have mis-remembered some aspects of the movie. I thought I recognised it. So the purpose of the Plot Buster was to give just enough information for the asker to recognise whether or not I had found the right title.]

Seconds (1966) is an American black & white film thriller directed by John Frankenheimer with a screenplay by Lewis John Carlino, based on a novel by David Ely. It was released by Paramount Pictures and starred Rock Hudson.

At the end of the movie Rock Husdon discovers that he is about to be murdered because of a deal he unwittingly signed up to.

Because he is suffering a mid-life crisis, Rock Hudson engages the services of a secret organisation that promises its customers the chance of a new life.

The way that the deal works is that both Hudson and an employee of the organisation undergo plastic surgery. Hudson is given a new face, while the employee is given Hudson's.

Hudson is then setup in his new life by the organisation, while the unfortunate employee is killed in what is made to look like a terrible accident, thus freeing Hudson from all the responsibilities of his old life.

Despite all the considerable trouble that the organisation goes to in order to provide Hudson with a fresh start, he soon realises that things aren't really working out the way he had hoped.

So he decides to take the organisation up on their offer of a second free transformation, if he wasn't entirely satisfied with the first one.

The terrible consequences of this deal only become apparent to Hudson at the very end of the movie, after he reveals his second new face in front of the mirror.

As he removes the bandages, he realises that he recognises the face in the mirror as that of the organisation's latest customer, a man he met only in passing as he arrived for his second round of surgery. The implications of this new face for his immediate future are instantly apparent to him.


The anonymous headquarters and secretive nature of the Seconds organisation would be easy to associate with some government agency. And their actions in setting Hudson up in a new life could easily be mistaken for some sort of undercover operation. So I think that there's a good chance that the movie that you're trying to recall is the one described.

It was an uncharacteristically serious role for Hudson, and was regarded as his best performance in movies, although his only ever Oscar nomination was for his earlier appearance in Giant (1956).

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seconds_%28film%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_Hudson