{"id":4955,"date":"2024-10-08T04:15:43","date_gmt":"2024-10-08T04:15:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=4955"},"modified":"2024-10-12T21:35:26","modified_gmt":"2024-10-12T21:35:26","slug":"the-wild-geese","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/10\/08\/the-wild-geese\/","title":{"rendered":"The Wild Geese"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Wild Geese <\/strong>(1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Allied Artists\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 134 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (strong violence, language, drugs)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Andrew V. McLaglen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Reginald Rose\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Roy Budd\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Jack Hildyard\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 11, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Roger Moore, Hardy Kruger, Stewart Granger, Winston Ntshona, John Kani, Jack Watson, Frank Finlay, Kenneth Griffith, Barry Foster, Ronald Fraser, Ian Yule, Patrick Allen, Rosalind Lloyd, David Ladd, Paul Spurrier, Jeff Corey, Brook Williams, Percy Herbert, Glyn Baker, Sydney Chama, Ken Gampu, Jane Hylton.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0Who remembers when they made movies for men? I\u2019m talking about violent action movies with predominantly male casts. I\u2019m talking about movies like The Guns of Navarone, The Great Escape, The Dirty Dozen, The Devil\u2019s Brigade, Where Eagles Dare and The Wild Bunch to name just a few. The Wild Geese<\/strong> would also be on that list. It\u2019s every bit a guy\u2019s movie as Steel Magnolias is a chick flick.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It stars Richard Burton (The Spy Who Came in from the Cold) as Faulkner, a mercenary-for-hire summoned to London by merchant banker Sir Edward Matheson (Granger, King Solomon\u2019s Mines) for a meeting. He wants to hire Faulkner to lead an operation into Africa to rescue imprisoned President Limbani (Ntshona, The Dogs of War) from execution at a remote facility and bring him to safety. The plan is to overthrow the current government and return the former leader to power. Faulkner accepts the job on the condition he gets to choose his own men starting with longtime associates Shawn Flynn (Moore, The Spy Who Loved Me) and Rafer Janders (Harris, The Molly Maguires).<\/p>\n

\u00a0Flynn, a former RAF pilot capable of flying ANY type of plan, has a price on his head for killing the nephew of a powerful mob boss. In exchange for his services, Matheson arranges to have the hit called off (at the last minute). Janders, a skilled tactician familiar with the territory, initially declines the offer. He\u2019s retired and just wants to spend time with his young son. Of course, Faulkner talks him into it. They recruit 50 soldiers including retired (but still tough as nails) Sgt. Major Sandy Young (Watson, The Devil\u2019s Brigade) and former South African Special Forces soldier Pieter Coetzee (Kruger, The Flight of the Phoenix).<\/p>\n

\u00a0After a period of intensive training under Young, an unexpected development causes Matheson to move up the date of the operation. With only a day\u2019s notice, the men parachute into Zembala to carry out their mission. Naturally, they get screwed over by their employer and are forced to make their own way to safety through hostile territory. Don\u2019t tell me you didn\u2019t expect that. Everybody knows rich British bankers can\u2019t be trusted.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed by Andrew V. McLaglen (The Devil\u2019s Brigade), The Wild Geese<\/strong> is a solid B-level actioner that doesn\u2019t overwhelm the viewer with a lot of noise and frenetic action scenes rendered incomprehensible by wild overediting. There\u2019s a lot to be said for action movies made before the rise of CGI. There\u2019s something inherently thrilling about stunts performed without the aid of green screen and gun battles that look believable. I feel the same about narratives that take the time to introduce characters and set up the plot before getting into the action. It wasn\u2019t always about instant gratification. That\u2019s not to say The Wild Geese<\/strong> moves slowly. It doesn\u2019t. It just doesn\u2019t move at the breakneck speed modern audiences have grown accustomed to.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It helps that The Wild Geese<\/strong> has a great cast. Let\u2019s be clear about one thing. It\u2019s not the type of movie where you praise the performances of the actors. We\u2019re not talking Shakespeare here. What\u2019s needed is a bunch of actors that come off as believable tough guys. Burton, Moore and Harris fit the bill perfectly. One of them plays James Bond, for Pete\u2019s sake! They\u2019re good in The Wild Geese<\/strong>. I\u2019d also like to commend Kruger for adding dimension to his character with his pro-apartheid views. He\u2019s a racist forced to carry a wounded Limbani across rough African terrain. They have a few discussions that cause him to rethink his views. Granger is also good as the two-faced Sir Edward.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Although The Wild Geese<\/strong> touches on the volatile political and social climates in Africa at the time, McLaglen wisely chooses to focus on the action instead. There\u2019s plenty of it. Fists, bullets and hand grenades fly. Stuff gets blown up. Characters good and bad die without the shedding of a single tear by others. Remember, this is a man\u2019s movie and manly men don\u2019t cry. The only females in sight are a few minor characters who have nothing to do with the plot. There are no goopy romantic scenes or tearful goodbyes. The only real drama derives from the relationship between Janders and his son Emile (Spurrier), a boarding school lad looking forward to a Christmas break ski trip with Dad. That is, until duty calls.<\/p>\n

\u00a0One thing I find really interesting about The Wild Geese<\/strong> is how it doesn\u2019t exalt or vilify mercenaries. For Faulkner and the others, it\u2019s a job for which they get paid handsomely. It doesn\u2019t make them bad people. Flynn, for example, appears to have a strong moral code. He has a good reason for killing the young mobster, a drug dealer who makes the fatal mistake of deceiving Flynn into delivering heroin to a dying young addict. The Wild Geese<\/strong> doesn\u2019t get into the psychology behind the profession. For that, you need to check out The Dogs of War.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I think The Wild Geese<\/strong> is a good movie. It\u2019s not great or outstanding. Its biggest problem is shallow characterizations of the supporting players like the black guy and gay guy that join Faulkner\u2019s army. I\u2019d have liked to know a bit more about them. It doesn\u2019t ruin the movie though. It\u2019s enjoyable on the level of a Saturday night action flick with the guys. It\u2019s a shame they don\u2019t make them like this anymore.<\/p>\n

TRIVIA TIDBIT: There\u2019s a sequel, 1985\u2019s Wild Geese II, I\u2019m planning to review soon. There’s also a cheap, low-budget Italian-made movie called Code Name: Wild Geese that has nothing to do with either movie. I reviewed it last year. Feel free to look it up on the website.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Wild Geese (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Allied Artists\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 134 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (strong violence, language, drugs)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Andrew V. McLaglen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Reginald Rose\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Roy Budd\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Jack Hildyard\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 11, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Roger Moore, Hardy Kruger, Stewart Granger, Winston Ntshona, John Kani, Jack Watson, Frank Finlay, Kenneth Griffith, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5603,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kick-ass-actioners"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/The-Wild-Geese-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4955"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5604,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4955\/revisions\/5604"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}