Der tödliche Schwarm

"The Swarm" has its share of flaws, no doubt about that: it's overlong, it's filled with genre cliches (many veterans cast in pointless supporting roles, indifferent romances) and it's occasionally overacted, especially by Michael Caine, who has a role far below his abilities. However, those who are calling it "terrible" and "campy" are REALLY overdoing it. The special effects are actually FIRST-RATE and most of the attack sequences are utterly convincing. Don't judge the film on the basis of its bad reputation; watch it for yourself and you'll discover that, while it's not an "art" film, it's an agreeable way to kill two hours.

The subject line says it all: this is a B-Movie about, well, bees. Sorry about the pun! Despite the big budget and big cast, this essentially is an old 1950's style B-Movie, and in that way it works very well as a guilty pleasure. Mixing together the cliched concepts of both a creature feature with a 70's disaster epic, what The Swarm ends up as is not quite exactly either one, but certainly a good part of both. The effects are good but not great, some of the performances are pretty good (Richard Widmark I thought played Slater very well), and it kept my interest for its entire (extended) running time. This one is worth checking out if you are a fan of Irwin Allen, bug movies, or 70s-style monster movies.

Others have written much better synopses than I can. I'd rather give some historical context to this movie.

There was a shift in cinematography in the 1970s as a response to the loss of the Vietnam War, the distrust of government following Water Gate, and repeated environmental disasters like the Cuyahoga River Fire. This movie, albeit cliché and contrived, exemplifies this: the bees are an environmental mutation, the military just wants to nuke the bees, but the scientists refuse, and the protagonists shouts down the general stating that the bees annually pollinate billions of dollars worth of crops and people would starve. The nuclear power plant manager ignores the scientists' advice creating a nuclear explosion.

The miltary is heavy handed and incompetent. The population is under threat because of the environmental disaster of migratory and mutated bees. Nuclear power is dangerous - even if just used for electricity generation. The towns people themselves are oblivious and helpless to what is happening to them. Even the end has an ominous warning: "if we use our time wisely, the world just might survive."

If one wants to watch this from an analyticals perspective regarding subliminal take on popular culture's turn against the Cold War dominating the United States for the last 3 decades, have a gander. Or, if you like cheesy monster movies, give it a spin.

But otherwise, it's overripe with a flimsy, cheesy, and predicatable plot, generic dialogue, and a laughable premise. As such, I'd tell most people to pass on it.

In the 1970s, Irwin Allen had a string of hits using the same formula. He'd hire a bunch of A-list actors to appear in his films as 'guest stars' and then put them in the middle of some disaster such as an earthquake, shipwreck or a giant fire. While these films were pretty mindless and silly, they made lots of money...until "The Swarm". In contrast to his previous films, "The Swarm" kept the public away in (dare I say) swarms. It lost many millions--so much that Allen stopped making these mega-budgeted movies*. Frankly, this wasn't such a bad thing as the noted producer/director had simply gone to the well one time too many and the public was sick of these sort of pictures. Still, you have to wonder if despite all this, is "The Swarm" a decent film? Read on....

When the film begins, a variety of bee-induced accidents occur. When a top beeologist (or whatever you call them) tries to help, Dr. Crane (Michael Caine) is treated like dirt by the military, particularly General Slater (Richard Widmark). Grudgingly, they allow him to help but what can they do with some seriously nastified Africanized bees?! Not much--at least for much of the film, as you see tons of folks being attacked by these nasty bugs. Time and again, folks writhe about with bees or stunt bees buzzing about them.

Technically speaking, this film really isn't much different from other Allen mega-pictures. The characters are shallow and underdeveloped and writing is certainly NOT a strong point in the film. What sets this one apart is the bee attacks. While Allen and his staff tried hard to make it look realistic, watching famous and respected actors writhing about and thrashing as they're supposedly being killed by bees is unintentionally hilarious! Seeing someone burned to death in "The Towering Inferno" or drowning in "The Poseidon Adventure" isn't funny and really couldn't be. That is the main difference between "The Swarm" and previous Allen epics. Seeing Olivia de Havilland (one of my favorite actresses) moaning is funny! How often can you see super- famous Oscar-winning actress embarrass herself like this?! And don't just blame her...lots of other very respected actors appear in this silly film. However, the funniest acting is by the extras--as folks being attacked by bees invariably drive into walls (and explode), run about screaming as they're engulfed in flames and generally just run amok!!

"The Official Razzie Movie Guide" listed this film in their book of biggest mistakes in Hollywood history. Given that their list is heavy on the films of the last 40 years and how much money the film lost, I think it's a reasonable inclusion. But this does not mean its a horrible film--far worse have been made over the years. But few lost as much money as this one did and made bigger fools of a bunch of famous actors.

*Allen did make "Beyond the Poseidon Adventure" a few years after this film but with many more B-listers in the film and a budget a tiny fraction of "The Swarm".

Michael Caine should have got his Oscar for uttering that line.

I was actually scared by this movie on TV when I was young because of the scene of the children being "swarmed" at recess. Yet a quarter of a century later, I had to get the DVD because this is one movie guaranteed to cheer me up. It's all been said in other comments - cheese, camp, so bad it's good. Ed Wood would be proud.

The scenes between Caine's scientist and Widmark's general are all classics. The icing on the cake is the two scenes with Slim Pickens. And the debate between Caine and Chamberlain over whether the bees should be called African or Brazilian. By the way, why does Richard Chamberlain look like he's on a break from a touring company of Victor/Victoria?

One plus of the DVD version is a half hour behind the scenes feature: "Inside the Swarm". You get to see several of the actors talk with utmost sincerity (and straight faces!) about the "real" dangers of killer bees.

The folks who wrote "Airplane!" couldn't even make a parody of this -- it's already hysterical.