Muerte o victoria

WILD WIND is one of a handful of Yugoslavian WW2 films made during the 1980s. In these would-be epics, a handful of partisans invariably fight back against Nazi oppression and end up winning the day.

Sadly, these films are also marked by a lack of decent framing, staging, and budgeting, and they come across as cheap and slapdash more than anything else. The story of a planned attack on a fortified Nazi train should never be boring, but it is here, thanks to a general humdrum feel and some battle scenes which feel like stock footage.

As is the case with these productions, a couple of American stars are brought in to prop things up (including old-timers George Montgomery and former child actor Jay North) while the rest of the cast is populated by local actors.

This is one of those films you see for sale for 2 bucks or something cheap like that, boy I regret handing over that 2 bucks!

I'll start this review by pointing out all the bad features of this film, and there are a few! First of all it looks like it was made on NO budget, the editing is poor, the direction is poor, the acting is poor, the sound effects dodgy and all the actors get around in seventies style hair cuts!

The plot(which confused me at times)centers around a group a Yugoslavian partisans whose objective is to destroy a vital bridge which would effectively cut of oil supplies to the German Army. Thrown into this clap trap is a greedy bounty hunter (complete with mullet and pork chop sideburns!),a traitor and an old man who won't do it to his wife anymore! Oh and before I forget there's an OSS agent or two kicking around but I can't remember them doing anything in particular.

Now to the good points, well apart from one alright looking battle scene involving an armoured train and partisans on horse back, this film has nothing good going for it! If you value your life don't waste 90 minutes of it by watching this.

In summary I want my 2 dollars back! Avoid this stinker like the plague!

The most boring move about WW2 on the Balkans. The story plot is terribly boring, thanks to the movie director for that.

By the way, the casting crew was chosen good. Several of them are great Serbian actors with impressive acting career. I sow the names before I watched the movie, I would be delighted with the list. However, there beautiful voices were remove, and synchronized with some cheap English speaking individuals, which definitely spoiled their acting.

The story plot was the worst part of the move, so I give a zero for it. The costumes were also chosen bed, including the Ante Pavelic picture in the Train Station.

Finally, the worst of all was the move director. I give him an absolute zero for his work.

Please note, the move was recorded in 1985, but I watched it in 2023 for the first time. I never heard that such move had been recorded.

And probably the only one. The point being that although quite an important piece of WW2 history, a film written by and with cast mainly of Yugoslavs told from the point of views of Yugoslavs is a rarity. Historical films are not just entertainment but also educational. Reviewers here judge it just on its entertainment value - and it is admittedly not well made. With a $10,000 budget it was not exactly cheap - it mainly appears to have been spent on military vehicles and trains. It stimulated me to learn something of the history.

Forget the other reviews. This has more authenticity than many other films about world war II, not least the actual locations and the soundtrack (muted partisan numbers) and the slightly spaghetti western feel of the whole thing. And in 1985, this was only 6 years before Yugoslavia was plunged into an appalling civil war.