For me it has been and always will be a classic British war film. Wonderful cast, huge

amounts of top quality action, supervised by the legendary Bob Simmons. It stands the test

of time and the story of the action scenes deserves to be told.

A British businessman, Stewart Grainger, seeks to overthrow a vicious dictator in central

Africa. He hires a band of mercenaries in London and sends them in to save the virtuous

but imprisoned opposition leader who is also critically ill and due for execution. Just when

the team has performed a perfect rescue, Grainger does a deal with the vicious dictator

leaving the mercenary band to escape under their own steam and exact revenge.

Roger Moore plays Shawn Fynn a smooth, Irish mercenary….yes Roger Moore plays an

Irishman! I know… still moving on. He has just killed the local Mafia Godfathers nephew

and the biggest contract London has ever seen has been put out on him. He is hiding out

above a casino when the heavy mob arrives.

Quite a bunch they are too. Here we see five of the country’s top stuntmen. Left to Right:

Terry Richards, Eddie Eddon, George Leech, B.H.Barry and Tim Condren all looking down

because Richard Harris has just thrown a grenade onto the floor. It goes off killing two and

causing the rest to run from the establishment with their tails still between their legs.

As the song says “You will always find him in the kitchen at parties”, wearing his and hers

raincoats these two stuntmen discuss the mission ahead. On the left is Clive Curtis and he

is talking to Greg Powell on the right. Incidentally this proved to be a very interesting

picture for Clive who was the only black stuntman on the Equity Stunt Register at the time

of filming. As the movie goes on it becomes clear that black stunt performers will be in

high demand in this business.

Greg Powell & George Cooper on

the training ground in Tschepisi,

South Africa.

So the rescue is on and the troops take their place in the cargo plane ready for a night

time parachute jump. On the right of the picture is stuntman George Cooper, easily

recognisable with his distinctive moustache. Just behind him is Greg Powell. Also aboard is

Rocky Taylor who makes it down safely and prepares to regroup after landing. Seen here

in the middle of the shot.

So the first assault is on the perimeter fence and relies on a silent approach. Hardy Kruger

plays South African Pieter Coetze whose weapon of choice is the crossbow. This allows him

to take out the guards manning the watch towers without causing unnecessary alarm.

Clive Curtis performs the high part of the fall into a box rig after being picked off by the

crossbow. In order to allow the scene to work the actor playing the guard must now sell

the close up. Sadly he starts by standing in shot, showing the audience that he is going to

fall onto the ground from a standing position. At least Clive sold the high part of the fall

for him.

Clive Curtis, seen here on the left, as a guard attempting to prevent the opposition

leader, Julius Limbani, from leaving the prison wing of the camp. Martin Grace also takes

a brief cameo as an East German guard. His role is cut short by the very man he doubled

on a regular basis Roger Moore.

Martin has to negotiate the railing in order to make the landing area. Starting a gate vault,

Martin pushes against the railing in order to get as much clearance from the wall as he

can.

Stage 3 of Twickenham Studios becomes the interior for this next action set piece. Inside

the bar. Now as I mentioned earlier Clive Curtis was the only black stuntman on the Equity

register back in 1978 and this production called for many black actors and extras to be

used. This scene calls for 17 guards to be caught up in the middle of the attack, involving

a grenade and machine gun fire. Nine of these guards are extras the other eight are

stuntmen and only one is black.

Greg Powell can be seen wearing a heavy duty back pad as he is required to be hit by

flying furniture during this sequence.

Ironically George Cooper is then spotted in the doorway with the other mercenaries killing

himself! Funny old game the movie business isn’t it?

Rocky Taylor

Jazzer Jeyes Greg Powell Clive Curtis George Cooper

Martin Grace

Chris Webb Tim Condren

“That was LUDICROUS, sir. You're jumping from

an aeroplane, not a whorehouse window. Do it

again”.

Kit West, the special effects supervisor, started life in the film business under the

supervision of Les Bowie who was responsible for sfx on the Hammer films of the fifties

and sixties. One such invention of Les Bowies was the fire jacket. A suit jacket that had a

ring stitched into the lining. This ring could be lit for a stunt and allowed the stuntman to

have complete control over his performance.

Filming a fire sequence for The Wild Geese in Northern Transvaal (Limpopo province) on

the border of Zimbabwe, one of the driest regions in Africa would prove very demanding

for the stunt team, but it was one of the most memorable sequences in the film.

A plane fitted with high powered machine guns and a bomb heads towards the convoy of

military trucks. A mechanical fault has caused one to stop on the bridge making it an easy

target. The plane flies past and opens fire. George Cooper is in the thick of the action.

Then the plane makes another pass and drops its bomb. It scoots across the dry river bed

and explodes underneath the bridge.

Two soldiers are now set alight from this explosion. Greg Powell told me that the

conditions were not favourable for a fire ‘gag’. 108 degree heat and a limited water

supply were far from ideal. Greg and George Cooper were selected by Bob Simmons to

perform the stunt. One of them would have to fall from the bridge into a box rig

positioned out of camera shot. George Cooper performed the fall and was asked by

Simmons to get out of the landing rig as fast as possible….it might set alight too! Greg told

me that two buckets of water had been placed out of camera shot, one to extinguish

George and the other for him to stand in when he’d finished. The heat from the ground

coupled with that of the fire had caused the army issue boots to melt!

Note that the back of the camouflage jackets are ridged. The flammable ring is sewn into

the jacket and only the top half of George and the bottom half of Greg is a blaze.

Scenes in which someone is actually set on fire are among the most dangerous ever

filmed. The stuntman wears several layers of protective clothing, including fire-resistant

materials like asbestos. Special gloves and a hood cover the hands and head. In most burn

scenes, the hood is clearly evident, though its appearance can be minimized by good

editing. Inside the hood is a small breathing apparatus connected to a small oxygen tank.

The performer is then coated in a specially prepared flammable gel. All of these would

have been standard precautions taken when dealing with fire. On location for The Wild

Geese they had fire retardant gel to stop the stunt performer’s skin blistering, wet

blankets and buckets of water. Heath Robinson eat your heart out!

Greg Powell

George Cooper

After the initial screening the censor asked producers to remove to shots of burning

soldiers inside the bombed van. These soldiers were dummies, but still the scene was too

graphic for some audiences.

Now all of us who enjoy the action movie are very familiar with what happens when a

grenade is thrown into the path of a bunch of charging attackers. Firstly we see the

explosion, then we see one or two villains flying through the air with the fireball behind

them, then we see them hit the ground. Well none of this would have been possible

without Bob Simmons who is responsible for giving the audience this perspective. Much

more than just a coordinator, Bob saw action scenes as a fan and would craft his scenes to

give the maximum input to the paying public. The trampoline explosion is one such twist

on the action flick. A full size trampoline is positioned in the foreground and the stuntman

will make a series of bounces to get him to the right height without bouncing out of shot.

On ‘Action’ the special effects team will set off the explosion, in the background, and

time this to the stuntman’s bounce. If everything goes according to plan you get

something like the two shots above. Here we see Martin Grace being blown up. All the

trampoline explosion sequences for this film were shot in slow motion which allows a

beauty and grace to the whole thing.

Here in another selection of trampoline explosions from the film we see Jazzer Jeyes and

Rocky Taylor in the top three pictures and Martin Grace again in the bottom three.

Clive Curtis appears once again as a Simba soldier with a very nasty looking blade in his

hand about to give dear Witty a very permanent divorce. Good job he’d written a will.

Leaving everything to the dearest, kindest proctologist in the whole wide world.

In this next sequence we see Greg Powell doubling a Simba soldier being blown up. No

trampoline or mini tramp here. This is Greg launching himself into the undergrowth.

It would be right and fitting to give the last word to Bob Simmons who appears briefly in

the film as a pilot over powered by Roger Moore and his men. Bob also doubled for Richard

Burton during the scenes where Limbani is carried through the jungle. Martin Grace took

over doubling Burton and Hardy Kruger for these scenes when Bob was needed elsewhere.

Bob had worked on Paper Tiger for producer Euan Lloyd back in 1975 and they had agreed

over a few drinks and a hand or two of poker to continue working together regardless of

other commitments.

Bob said that working and doubling for Richard Burton was a great thrill and that visiting

all these exotic locations was far better than any real job. He was a man of great ambition

and style, but underneath it all just like you and me a real fan of movies and he made sure

that the viewer got every penny of the entrance fee in pure excitement.

Flight Of The Wild Geese

Sad are the eyes

Yet no tears

The flight of the wild geese

Brings a new hope

Rescued from all this

Old friends

And those newly found

What chance to make it last

When there's danger all

around

And reason just ups and

disappears

Time is running out

So much to be done

Tell me what more

What more

What more can we do.

There were promises made

Plans firmly laid

Now madness prevails

And lies fill the air.

What more, Oh

What more

What more can we do.

What chance to make it last

What more

What more can we do.

Dedicated to those stunt

performers no longer with us

George Cooper 1945 - 2006

Bob Simmons 1933 - 1987

Martin Grace 1942 - 2010

Eddie Eddon 1935 - 1999

Tim Condren 1927 - 2006

The Wild Geese

Stunt Arranger – Bob Simmons

Credited Stunts – Tim Condren, George Cooper, Clive Curtis, Eddie

Eddon, Martin Grace, Jazzer Jeyes, George Leech, Greg Powell and

Rocky Taylor

Uncredited Stunts – Chris Webb, Richard Graydon, B.H Barry and

Terry Richards

“Thirty men in the valley of the shadow, and he wants to take over

an entire country”!