Dark of the Sun/The Mercenaries (1967)

A tough colonial adventure, based on a Wilbur Smith novel and released in Britain as The Mercenaries, that follows Rod Taylor and former pro football player Jim Brown as they become entangled in the civil war in the Congo in 1960.

Mercenary soldier Bruce Curry (Taylor) is a man of no principle, until the script’s sermonising gets to him, while Brown, as his buddy Sergeant Ruffo, plays the US-educated Congolese native with a conscience.

Curry is charged with a dangerous mission to take a band of 40 soldiers on an armoured train to Port Reprieve to evacuate some white residents and prevent $50 million in diamonds from falling into the hands of advancing rebel forces.

Kenneth More has a brief role as a drunken doctor; Peter Carsten plays a bloodthirsty ex-Nazi officer; and Yvette Mimieux, a French refugee and Taylor’s love interest.

Directed on location by Jack Cardiff – ace cameraman on films such as The African Queen (1951) – the film’s schoolboy heroics sit awkwardly beside its political rhetoric, but action fans will enjoy the all-stops-out finale.

Captain Bruce Curry
Rod Taylor
Claire
Yvette Mimieux
Sergeant Ruffo
Jim Brown
Dr Wreid
Kenneth More
Henlein
Peter Carsten
Surrier
Olivier Despax
Bussier
André Morell
Delage
Guy Deghy
President Ubi
Calvin Lockhart
Corporal Kataki
Bloke Modisane

Director
Jack Cardiff

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