Aka The Terrorists. Men like you merely play a game. Attempting to secure the release of political prisoners, a terrorist group, led by the fierce Ray Petrie (Ian McShane), takes over a British aeroplane on the tarmac at an airport in the capital city of Scandinavia. Tough law and order security chief Nils Tahlvik (Sean Connery) is sent in to deal with the armed men and free the aircraft’s passengers. Unfortunately for Tahlvik, the terrorists prove to be quite formidable and the constant news coverage isn’t helping. Meanwhile, another unit of the same extremist organisation led by Martin Shepherd (John Quentin) is holding the British ambassador Palmer (Robert Harris) hostage, which further complicates matters particularly when his wife (Isabel Dean) becomes irate and Petrie demands he be put in contact with Shepherd. Tahlvik suspects all is not as it at first appears as the gang attempts to extract money from not one but two governments both of which insist the terrorists’ demands be met … The next one you send will die. In what is probably Connery’s worst film (at least the first half) there is little to sustain suspense despite the urgent premise of this hostage thriller. Despite the presence of ace cinematographer Sven Nykvist, the snowy Norwegian landscapes and the general sense of international moviemaking the cast suggests, this has the air of a TVM that’s been quickly made with little attention to style or narrative drive – that race against time means little. There was probably as much drama offscreen when the contracted airline Mey-Air defaulted on their payments to Boeing which led to the plane being repossessed and the shots never being completed. Connery shines when he is being humiliated by Mrs Palmer who describes her husband’s suffering in wartime Yugoslavia as Connery stupidly claims the gun is being held to his head. Otherwise the script gives him little to do except as a bogey man with a reputation to live up to among all the double-talking diplomats. It’s a relief when he swings into proper action in the latter stages of the drama and sets the cat among the pigeons by entering the aeroplane when he figures out the identity of the gang. That poster is the most colourful thing about the whole shebang. Written by Paul Wheeler. Directed by Finnish filmmaker Caspar Wrede. Don’t you understand there are orders you must not obey?
mondomovies 