"The Wild Geese" (1978) and Hitchcock's "Frenzy" (1972): Big Connections

I watched half of a streaming movie the other night that I first saw on release in 1978: The Wild Geese, a "Magnificent Four" men-on-a-mission movie with these four stars:

Richard Burton
Richard Harris
Roger Moore
Hardy Kruger

Funny...though Kruger certainly earned his billing(he's great in Flight of the Phoenix), he seems a little out of place with the other three guys, who each got some REAL stardom across the world and in important US markets.

So I'll linger on the fact that Burton plays a man hired by important British VIPS(more on them in a moment) and -- like Lee Marvin in The Professionals -- Burton won't do the job unless he can round up his old military buddies for the caper: Richard Harris(divorced, loving father who has "given up all this" for his kid) and Roger Moore(cigar smoking ladies man, of course -- but the film introduces him forcing a Mafia punk to eat strychnine heroin and die, drawing a Mafia hit.)

Seeing Burton and Harris and Moore side by side, one smiles a bit: yes, they WERE stars, for a time, and they DID have different types of charisma. Burton looks surprisingly good and tan; Harris is superthin with blonde white hair(kind of a "grandpa type") Moore is, well...Moore.

Their mission is in Africa; rescuing a heroic African leader from an evil African leader and yes -- the story gets pretty racial pretty fast, in Africa.

But before then, Richard Burton shows up to get his mission and two actors brief him:

Stewart Granger -- the handsome swashbuckler of Scaramouche in 1978 white-haired, a bit plump -- but still a looker(like late Cary Grant) and...

...Barry Foster.

Yep, good ol' Bob Rusk himself. Rusk being the psychotic rapist strangler known as "The Necktie Murderer" in Hitchcock's Frenzy (1972)..the second lead of the film. The leading role was "anti-hero" Richard Blaney, played by equally near unknown Jon Finch.

Watching "The Wild Geese," with Foster in his "rightful place" -- supporting Burton, Harris and Moore(mainly), just a "supporting guy under the title" one deflates a bit at the idea that he might ever have been a "star." I think Foster got a TV series (Van Der Velk), but in movies...he had to support Burton and Harris past their prime, and Roger Moore. (A year before Moonraker -- he was a star as Bond.)

I didn't watch the second half of "The Wild Geese," but if memory serves, Foster leaves the movie once it goes to Africa. Still, in the London part...he's around a lot. Stewart Granger tells Burton "you report only to him"(Foster) so Burton and Foster get some scenes together.

And then it hit me: Richard Burton turned down the role of Richard Blaney in Frenzy. So when we see Burton and Foster share the London streets together -- we are looking at "what m ight have been."

Except that Hitchcock said that if he cast a big star as Blaney OR Rusk, the other star "had to be as big." So Burton was intended to play opposite Michael Caine as Rusk. (I'm amazed that Caine isn't in The Wild Geese.)

When Hitchcock offered Blaney to Burton and was turned down -- Hitch next offered it to Richard Harris.

So when Burton and Harris share scenes together in "The Wild Goose" -- you are looking at the "two movie star Blaneys who never were."

Here's something weird for Frenzy buffs:

In "Frenzy" Barry Foster as Rusk leads Babs Miligan(Anna Massey) through a Covent Garden fruit warehouse and then down an open London street intending to kill her in his flat("You've got your whole life ahead of you," he reassures her about her life.) When Rusk and Babs reach the downstairs doorway, Rusk stops and says "here we are."

In "The Wild Geese" Barry Foster as "VIP Number Two" leads Richard Burton down a London street to a door to a cheap hotel. The shot(camera angle, size of shot, movement) matches Rusk and Bab's walk. Then Foster stops and says "here we are."

I was weirdly worried for Richard Burton at that point, but wrongly so...

BONUS:

Roger Ebert's 1978 review for "The Wild Geese" is a one-star diss. Two funny lines(from memory)

"Each of the three stars seems to be reading his bad lines trying to beat the other two in mocking them."

"Harris is father to the most goodie-goodie annoying child actor since Baby Leroy."

AND THIS: As he is being briefed by Stewart Granger and Bob Rusk(er, Barry Foster), Burton asks for a double scotch. He proceeds to hold it with both hands, ram it into his mouth and suck it all in in one quick gulp. Foster reacts.

Burton's line: "I'm dry when I work."

Helluva a moment. Evidently a bow to Burton's known alcoholism at the time. He is visibly drunk on screen in The Klansman (1974) - he keeps it together here.

"The Wild Geese" -- Roger Ebert hated it, but where else you gonna see Marc Antony, King Arthur, James Bond, Scaramouche, the guy who built the Phoenix, and Bob Rusk, in one movie?

Nowhere.