Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Really Surprised!

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Why is this movie not better known,on the very rare occasions it's on British TV it's tucked away in the middle of the night and is dismissed in a few indifferent clichés by TV reviewers.I admit it's not the easiest movie to follow,the characters' names come from a bewildering variety of cultures,it's far from clear what part of the world the fictitious country is located (the Canadian locations could,at a pinch,pass for the Balkans/Eastern Europe) and the pace drags a little at times.However,these minor flaws are of little importance when you consider the excellent line-up of A-list stars who form the cast,the tense and most unusual subject matter and the absolutely savage twist,the scene with Hemmings and O'Toole in the recently-vacated Presidential palace is,or certainly should be,an all-time classic.There is a lesson there for anyone who thinks they have a simple answer to an intolerable situation,and overall the movie is thought-provoking and challenging as well as being great viewing.

I find this movie quite interesting, I saw this movie in the Philippines during the height of the 1986 revolution in the Phil. I liked the way Peter O Toole played the character of a cunning officer. The treachery of the power grabbers was for real. Other cast and characters of the movie are good to their respective roles. I could not believe the setting was in Canada. I thought it was in Latin America. I recommend this movie to all countries with unstable political system. There's a lot of lesson you could learn from this movie. Its a warning to military adventurism and to those who wants to grab power unconstitutionally. I want to own a DVD copy of this movie. Where could I find it?

This almost unknown movie remains one of my favourites. David Hemmings plays Colonel Narriman, a charismatic infantry colonel in a small viciously repressive country. For years he's tried to keep out of "politics" and ignore the horrors around him but finally he can't take it any more and is pursuaded to lead a military coup. To ensure success he reluctantly accepts the help of the officer in charge of the country's tanks, Colonel Zellar (played by Peter O'Toole). Their main enemy is the head of the secret police, a character with the hilarious name of BLAIR, played brilliantly by Donald Pleasence. I love the way this movie explores Narriman's mental anguish as conscience gradually overtakes duty and it racks up the tension wonderfully as the coup is planned and eventually carried out. I'm not giving the 'twist' away but rest assured the scene where Narriman finally realises he's been used is as good as you'll ever see. This is a genuinely scary film and perfectly portrays life in a country where the law is whatever the president says it is. Don't miss it!

'Political thriller' mish-mash of the bargain-basement package-tour-for-the-cast variety, with enough intrigue, insurrection and military corruption to keep its small banana republic going for the next 25 revolutions, but none of it remotely interesting or even watchable. If it were a European co-production farrago then at least maybe there'd be a wry smile or two raised by incompetent dubbing, but it's impossible to mask the embarrassment of the English-speaking "stars" in their native tongue, or gloss over the unease of the 'international' cast members. On top of that, this TV print looks like it had been salvaged from a Third World sanitation ditch, and it seems the director must have been shot by terrorists before he had a chance to shoot any of his own movie.