The Swarm...

BIG paycheck.

Martin Scorsese IS the best

I saw it recently for the first time in over 35 years. It's awful and silly but in the 1970s those big disaster films were very popular. He chose that role but he didn't choose the director and producers.

Yeah, that's it. B movie disaster films were all the rage in the 1970s. Caine thought it would be a big hit - and came only a few years after Jaws(which was another B movie featuring animals).