In TOTS the heroes being US soldiers are not allowed any of the flaws associated with Curry, Heinlein and Co , which is to its detriment of course , but the basic story of soldiers being sent into a African civil war with its bloody tribal retribution to retrieve foreigners persons is the same .
Well it's far from remake. They should've set it in the same period in Congo and with the same/similar storyline and roles.
shareI believe I read somewhere it was Mr. Bruce Willis who insisted for the "Tears fo the Sun" title, the original title for the movie was supposed to be different. So I don't think the producers had "Dark of the Sun" in mind.
shareNot exactly, and-grigorescu, Bruce Willis didn't campaign for the TOTS title for that movie because of a DOTS connection, but he had read a previous script for Die Hard 4 (some time after With a Vengeance, who knows if it was in essence the same script that became Live Free or Die Hard) and he agreed to do a Die Hard sequel if he could use the title for another project...
shareI dont think you can equate tears of the sun to dark of the sun,if only in the last word of the title only.
Nigeria civil war US soldiers
Dark of the sun - Congo civil war mercenaries working under the UN after people and diamonds
the intro footage of TOTS comes from cry freetown and shows the actual ransacking of the city in sierra leone when the rebels invade.
see blood diamond for more info on sierra leone or look up on the web
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I believe this one's closer in many respects to "Blood Diamond," a film I liked very much, although "Dark Of The Sun" leaves it in the dust. Can you imagine how much better and cooler Blood Diamond would have been with Rod Taylor playing DiCaprio's ex-mercenary role? And how much weaker Dark Of The Sun would have been with someone like DiCaprio instead of Taylor?
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And I always thought 'Three Kings' was a more violent & modernized version of "Kelly's Heroes";
Since when does a remake have to be set in the same exact place?
As I stated originally the TOTS heroes have none of the flaws of the mercenaries in DOTS but as Bruce Willis vehicle they would not be allowed to have any flaws, but there are numerous similarities eg the mission\hospital being ransacked, the "african american" second in command\friend of the Rod Taylor\Bruce Willis lead who is torn by the tribal genocide taking place in Africa etc.
As an action film I have no problem with TOTS and have watched it often but it isn't the drama that DOTS is.
The minute I watch TOTS I automatically made the connection with DOTS. Its essentially the same story involving the rescue of missionaries (okay, that wasn't their primary objective, but it does end up being) from a warring tribe of Africans.
Given a few changes from DOTS, the premise is the same.
The mercenaries were working for the Katanganese secession government, not the UN, with backing from Belgian mining interests. The UN was trying to force a peace between Katanga and the central government. Usually, the UN and the mercenaries were at odds, as seen in the opening scenes, when Taylor shoves his orders into the face of the UN peacekeeping soldier. The film actually mixed two different time periods of the Congo, as the Katanga secession took place a couple of years before the Simba Revolt. By that point the UN peacekeeping soldiers were mostly out of the picture.
"Fortunately, Ah keep mah feathers numbered for just such an emergency!"
In TOTS the heroes being US soldiers are not allowed any of the flaws associated with Curry, Heinlein and Co