Shout at the Devil (1976)

You won't be disappointed!

Fantastic!

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Then watch "Shout at the Devil." There are other reasons, all good ones.Shot in 1976, thus with better quality film and presentation, "Shout at the Devil" isn't a remake of "African Queen". It has more of everything you want in a frontier war adventure; - more romance (between a British adventurer played by Roger Moore and the daughter of Lee Marvin's seamy ivory poacher, given complex, sympathetic life by Barbara Parkins) and - more explosions and pitched battles; more heart-wrenching tragedy and suspense; Only the finely balanced banter between Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart which made their earlier film still stand out as the definite classic compared with this later effort is missing. But it's still a very, very good film and rewards its viewer well.In this film, the work Humphrey Bogart did as both comic and romantic lead is split between Lee Marvin as the nearly completely unprincipled Col. Flynn O'Flynn (a self-commissioned Irish-American ivory poacher) and Roger Moore, as unfortunate British gentleman Sebastian Oldsmith.Oldsmith is Shanghaied by O'Flynn and his equally unscrupulous batman Mohammed into being everything from being a poorly paid "partner" to an aerial observer in a rickety 1914-model aircraft to reconnoiter over enemy territory, to finally become the central character in the movie's spine-tingling denouement.This film has everything for fans of high adventure - suspense, tragedy, moments of wild comedy, and characterizations that go beyond the standard formula fare. "Shout at the Devil" is better than average for a Lee Marvin feature; maybe not up to "Tell it to the Spartans" or "Cat Ballou," but definitely a worthy addition to an adventure movie fan's collection.

Shout at the Devil finds Lee Marvin in sub Sahara Africa in 1914 just before the start of World War I. He's a rollicking, live by your wits character named Flynn, very much similar to Humphrey Bogart's Charlie Allnut in The African Queen. Marvin takes up with an Englishman played by Roger Moore who's been stranded in Africa on his way to Australia.Marvin has a running rivalry with the local German governor played with Teutonic relish by Reinhard Kolldehoff. He's the Road Runner to Kolldehoff's Wily Coyote. During the first half of the film, it plays just like a road runner cartoon.When war is declared however, Kolldehoff crosses into British territory where Marvin has operated with sanctuary and exacts a terrible vengeance for being constantly made a fool of. On Marvin, on Moore, and on Barbara Parkins, Marvin's daughter who Moore has now married and had a child with.This is World War I so the Germans aren't behaving like the Nazis of the second World War. But Kolldehoff you can see a potential recruit for Hitler in the post war years. In fact I don't think it's an accident that Kolldehoff and his character Fleischer look very much like German Field Marshal Ludendorff who was sympathetic to the early Nazi party.Shout at the Devil is a broad comic adventure for the first half and turns serious in the second half. Moore and Marvin have a nice easy chemistry between them, Marvin is reaching back to his Cat Ballou days and the bag of scene stealing tricks he used to get an Oscar. Moore is hard pressed, but does keep up.And who doesn't like a live road runner cartoon.

Shout at the Devil is a bit of a mess these days. The region 2 DVD I watched had clearly fallen victim to some indifferent editor/censor's scissors, making what looks, to be fair, nothing more than a decidedly average film in the first place, perilously close to unwatchable at times. German officers who look like they were originally speaking English have been dubbed into German which, for the sake of authenticity isn't a bad thing I suppose, but whoever made this decision also decided that subtitles weren't necessary, so we have long stretches of dialogue that are completely incomprehensible to non-German speaking viewers. Strangely enough, it doesn't matter one bit with regards to understanding what is going on, and I still can't decide whether that's a good sign or bad.Saddled with such a shortcoming, a film like this, which can't decide whether it's a rollicking comedy or a rousing adventure, is left with a mountain to climb but never manages to move a couple of feet from the foothills. Roger Moore, after Gregory Peck the least talented of male actors to ever attain leading man status, is the biggest problem. Despite being a former James Bond, he really isn't much of an action hero, and is never really believable in a role that calls for someone about ten years younger. Lee Marvin mugs and overacts as if he has been guzzling on the gin so beloved of his character (which he may well have been doing), but at least he's entertaining to watch and provides most of the few highlights. Unfortunately, he and Moore develop little in the way of chemistry.The director makes some strange choices. While he most likely can't be blamed for the obviously bowdlerised action scenes, he can be held accountable for too often making the African landscape look like a quiet corner of Hampstead Heath, and for also choosing the wrong shot or angle on too many occasions.The storyline itself is straightforward enough, although it's a little on the ordinary side and a bit too episodic in the first half. When things turn darker midway through, the trauma suffered by Moore's wife, played by Barbara Parkin, isn't explored anywhere near thoroughly enough, and the problems it causes in their marriage are focused on and dealt with in one brief scene.Unless you're in the mood for bland and undemanding entertainment, and even then are in a very forgiving mood, I'd opt for James Bond film or Cat Ballou instead.

I decided to watch this FLICK on TV, because of the Historical Connection to WWI in the TV Guide Summary. The period history was weak, however I watched the entire film, because I wanted to know who the lead actress was, ie the Sandra Bullock of the 70's? The answer - Barbara Parkins. It's rather amusing that I'm smitten with her now after seeing this film and when I was a College Student in the 70's, I didn't have a clue about her. And the Movie wasn't bad either.