MamaGravity good back-story, and good acting

Sharkflei Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

Salubfoto It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Aspen Orson There is definitely an excellent idea hidden in the background of the film. Unfortunately, it's difficult to find it.

bkoganbing A lot of the plot from the original Wild Geese movie is brought into Cod Name: Wild Geese. Like the original crew that Richard Burton put together they are betrayed by those they are working for. Like that film accounts are settled in a way Don Corleone would have approved.British action star Lewis Collins puts together the team this time and among others the indispensable Lee Van Cleef is one of them. He's indispensible because he's piloting the helicopter taking the team in. Their mission is to destroy a plant processing opium and Ernest Borgnine of the Drug Enforcement Agency is there, most unofficially. The plant they are destroying is in the heart of Southeast Asia ruled by a Fu Manchu type military dictator without Fu's style. A bit of the Bridge On The River Kwai is thrown in as an opium train is destroyed also.Lots of action, but also lots of silliness. A priest who runs a mission hospital helps some of the wounded Geese and gets crucified literally for his help. That was really laying it on a bit thick.Action fans should like it, but the film hasn't the flair of the original.

Leofwine_draca Here's yet another jungle adventure yarn from Antonio Margheriti, following on from his previous Warbeck quartet. While this movie lacks Warbeck, it makes up for his absence by having a great exploitation cast to die for. I thoroughly enjoyed this action-packed adventure yarn which may be cheesy, far-fetched and predictable, but is nonetheless violent, and showcases some top actors going through their motions as they struggle for survival in the jungle. Probably the main disappointment is the music, which, as the credits proudly proclaim, is produced on Yamaha keyboards! The film begins with a shoot-em-up in the dark scene. I don't know what relevance it bears to the rest of the film, but it starts the move in an action-packed way so I'll let it pass. We are initially introduced to the characters at a bigwig meeting presided over by the immortal Ernest Borgnine. Why immortal? Well, he always seems to keep on making films and never letting his age worry him! Borgnine here is the team leader, so his job is to fret behind a desk for the film's course. Sadly he doesn't engage in any of the action in the movie.Pretty soon, Margheriti's obsession with miniature effects comes into play during a car chase, in which cars fly up the walls of a tunnel. Hilariously these are matchbox models by the look of it, and are easily spotted due to the lack of people in the supposed vehicles! Pointless stuff, but it's fun anyway. Shortly afterwards, our hero Wesley (Lewis Collins) assembles his team and ventures into the jungle at night. The first action scene is an attack on a village, and contains a hilarious moment where a soldier jumps through the roof of a thatched hut and gets a huge spike through his arm! Surely the door would have been a better bet.The film gets better as it goes on, and the next action sequence is to steal a helicopter and is very well done. It isn't anything you won't have seen before, but there's lots of bloody death and incessant shots of guards tumbling out of guard towers. Oh yeah, and around a dozen bad guys get knives thrown into their chests for variety. The film climaxes at around the halfway mark with a successful attack on the enemy base which culminates in our heroes' helicopter being destroyed - big surprise.They then have to make their way on foot to another enemy base and destroy that as well. Along the way they stop briefly at a jungle church (!) run by none other than Margheriti's old friend Luciano Pigozzi as the priest. Pigozzi is just one of the familiar faces to reappear from Margheriti's previous movies. The native guy from TIGER JOE is also here. Keep your eyes peeled and you'll see the witch doctor from HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN COBRA as a prisoner in one brief shot. This goes to show that, like with Hammer Studios, Margheriti tended to employ the same actors again and again in his films.Well, the enemy shows up and Pigozzi gets attacked in the film's most horrific scene, enlivened by the quality acting. This is probaby one of Pigozzi's finest moments. Our heroes continue, their numble dwindling all the while, stopping briefly to blow up a (miniature) train and unsuccessfully negotiate a minefield. The excellent finale sees an all-out assault on the enemy base, and a surprise traitor attacking.Lewis Collins is rather bland as the film's hero, but not a total loss. He tries to be David Warbeck for a lot of the time but doesn't have the same laidback charm. Spaghetti western icon Lee Van Cleef pops up in one of his last appearances as an ex-con helicopter pilot and delivers a solid performance as usual. Borgnine's role is limited but he's there for name value alone. Former giallo star Mimsy Farmer is also around as an opium addict-turned-gunfighting hero. Finally, we have Klaus Kinski doing his patented psycho shtick, at one point drilling a corpse with his machine gun and going berserk! Good stuff, and a fine action/war film which is easy on the brain but looks good and has lots of shooting and explosions for those who like them. Personally, I found this to be a superior action flick and I recommend it to all.

Coventry If there's one thing I never understood about the "art" of European trash & exploitation film-making, it's the concept of dubbing actors that already speak English. Quite often I stumble upon obscure cult movies with great names in the cast, like Christopher Lee and Klaus Kinski, and yet for some incomprehensible reason their lines and dialogs are dubbed by atrociously articulating voices. I don't get it. It's a privilege to work with these actors, as far as I'm concerned, so the absolute last thing you do is alter their voices, right? Here in "Code Name: Wild Gees", the legendary infamous Klaus Kinski talks with the posh and eloquent voice of a seemingly elderly homosexual. The voices of the other international stars Lee Van Cleef and Ernest Borgnine luckily aren't dubbed. "Code Name: Wild Geese" is a typically early 80's European action movie from the hand of the versatile Italian director Antonio Margheriti. Basically this means it's a nonsensical but tremendously entertaining popcorn flick chock-full of explosions, testosterone-overloaded male characters, car & helicopter crashes and an ultra-thin storyline set somewhere in the jungle of a dubious problematic country. Margheriti shot three movies like this, together with the German producer Erwin C. Dietrich and largely the same casts. I have yet to see "The Commander", but "Commando Leopard" is equally good fun. Lewis Collins stars as the leader of a band of macho mercenaries known as the Wild Geese. They're kind of like The A-Team, except tougher of course and less inventive with artillery and vehicles. The team is hired by government man Ernest Borgnine to destroy an opium plantation in Burma. Commander Wesley takes the assignment rather personally, since his own since died from a drug overdose. Naturally, loads of infiltrations, double-crossing, collateral damage and violent shootouts ensue. There are plentiful of ridiculously entertaining moments in "Code Name: Wild Geese"; most notably a laughably fake chase sequence in which the cars drive sideways in a tunnel! It's really a stupid sight, especially since the scene ends with homosexually voiced Kinski saying "Isn't that funny?". There are also some very good action sequences and miniature set designs, including a freight train explosion and a helicopter blast. Lee Van Cleef stars as a hired pilot who's initially reluctant to join the battle and Margheriti regular Luciano Pigozzi (the Italian Peter Lorre) plays a priest who provides shelter to the fugitive mercenaries. He also has the, hands down, coolest sequence when his character is found creepily crucified following a retaliation strike by the opium producers. The dialogs are horribly and actually quite redundant, but I guess they needed as much screen time as possible for Ernest Borgnine and Klaus Kinski. Their conversations are truly abominable.

HaemovoreRex The plot - A group of highly trained mercenaries are hired to destroy an opium manufacturing plant somewhere in Burma. That's it! Oh well, sometimes simple is best I guess.Whilst far from Antonio Margheriti's best work this film nonetheless provides some cracking entertainment, not least of all due to the great assembled cast here. The Professionals Lewis Collins plays the groups leader and is backed up ably by the likes of genre stalwarts Lee Van Cleef, Ernest Borgnine, Luciano Pigozzi and that great mainstay of madness himself, Klaus Kinski!Plenty of gunfire and big explosions abound along with some of Margheriti's usual cool miniature model work, most notably in a great car chase scene towards the beginning of the movie.Fellow fans of Godfrey Ho ninja movies will delight to see an uncredited Bruce Baron in the cast here to as a laid back member of the group with a predilection for alcohol(!)For Margheriti fans and also those who like a bit of the old mercenary shenanigans you could do a lot worse than to check this one out.