Les mercenaires

The plot outline sounded much better than the execution of it, but this largely forgotten on-the-cheap drive-in 70s adventure heist joint is worthwhile just for the cast alone and that it was directed by Val Guest. The setting is unique, a South African diamond mine located deep in the desert is targeted for a daring hit (Hugh O'Brian, Christopher Lee and a smirking O.J Simpson) and Telly Savalas in menacingly oozing form plays the company's security chief trying to prevent it. A cynically scruffy Peter Fonda is a field security officer who gets caught up in it all, when he agrees to go undercover; stealing a diamond and escaping capture to get the attention of an insider who they believe is smuggling diamonds/and who is also helping prepare a heist. However no-one else knows about this job, including his girlfriend (the radiant Maud Adams) and the security chief.

The knotty, if absurd plot offers a neat array of dangerous twists and unrelenting turns, which keeps the rhythmic story moving and constantly interesting. It really does pick up things in the back-end, as the plans are set in motion and the rough nature breaks out. The character interactions remain dynamic, especially the scenes when Fonda's character meets the heist group. Mechanically directed, but it consists of fun biting dialogues, all-out no-bull violence, well-shot locations and many big egos trying to mug every shot they're in. Backing this up is a titillatingly groovy soundtrack which simply makes you want to boogie. It does.

Watching Killer Force makes me think that the folks who security at South African diamond mines ought to be the ones running our Homeland Security. As typified by Telly Savalas they are a ruthless but shrewd lot. It wouldn't say much for our civil liberties though, but would we ever be secure from terrorists.

Peter Fonda plays one of the security men at a diamond mine in the Kalahari desert who's given an assignment to go undercover and find some folks who are rumored to be planning a big heist. To do so he has to be caught stealing himself which he is. But when the guy giving the assignment is killed and his ever so lovely handler Marina Christelis is killed Fonda is out on a limb. Time to reassess the situation.

Once the situation is reassessed the heist is on and the last 40 minutes or so is non-stop action. Other members of the heist team are Hugh O'Brian, Christopher Lee, and O.J. Simpson. Most don't make it, but they go oh so spectacularly.

Killer Force is not bad entertainment, but everyone in the cast has done better.

The only thing more pathetic than Peter Fonda's fake beard is that director Val Guest had almost no career after making some of Hammer Films' best work, from horror to science-fiction to (like this) crime thrillers...

And while KILLER FORCE is no Hammer there's Dracula himself, Christopher Lee, within a group of DIAMOND MERCENARIES in a South African desert where the beautiful-vastness of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA meets the jeep-leaping potential of THE RAT PATROL, and, either indoors or out, Lee's the most cold-blooded villain (killing perfectly good hooker Marina Christelis for no apparent reason) in a movie all about villains...

Meanwhile, buried lead Peter Fonda works for Telly Savalas, an uncompromising, office-set security chief (whose scenes were probably shot in a few days between KOJAK episodes) for an impenetrable diamond-mine outpost...

And soon the morally ambiguous Fonda's hired to go undercover into Christopher Lee's gang actually led by square-jawed Hugh O'Brian alongside Lee's 007 moll Maud Adams (as Fonda's girl) and O. J. Simpson, turning in his most natural non-performance since some genuine athletic abilities are used during the busy second and third acts...

That's when the rudimentary semi-complicated heist premise becomes more popcorn mainstream and thus, outright entertaining, and even suspenseful... the latter most likely thanks to director Val Guest...

The underrated British auteur (from QUATERMASS to HELL IS A CITY) does a nifty job with a standard script and meager budget that could have been forgettable without the professional veteran behind everyone, and everything.

Hasn't turned up too often on television but was good. Nice casting, with Peter Fonda the lead but not actually leading the robbery. That was left to Hugh O'Brien, Christopher Lee and O.J.Simpson. Maud Adams always good to look at on the screen and Telly Savalas as a security officer who had a dark side to him. Nice soundtrak, might still be available if you look hard enough.

KILLER FORCE is one of the many action movies of the 70s on a "bad guy" perspective and a low budget, with a sand dune setting and lots of funky disco which made these great. It stands out best for its intrigue. Don't expect much from top-billed Telly Savalas (who rips the dress off of Maud Adams!), but do follow Peter Fonda's point of view as he joins an army of force attempting to rob the valuables from a diamond mine. This is a chance to see O.J. Simpson in his glory days as one of the heist members going out to seize an electric fuse, a plot that leads the men into the facility. The action sequences look mild but they remain exciting to this day as with other Italian-made productions. Try not to think but understand that KILLER FORCE was made on European soil with an American cast (other than Christopher Lee) driving auto vehicles on the passenger side. Definitely worth a find if you crave for late-night intrigue. Nice color.