Zulu (DVD)

Zulu has to be one of my favourite films of all time. It was released in 1964 through Paramount Pictures by Diamond Films - a company set up by the well established actor Stanley Baker, who was looking to move more into the directing field. The film was directed by Cy Endfield, and co-produced by both Baker and Endfield, each with strong links to the story-line. Endfield was born in South Africa, where the events covered by the film took place, and Baker was born in South Wales, from where a lot of the soldiers involved in the battle were from, being the 2nd Battalion, 24th Foot. I do not intend running through the story in depth but ...  Read the complete review

A true classic that needs little introduction,seeing as everyone on the planet has statistically seen it eight times.OK,that's a lie but as it's on most bank holidays few people can of missed at least a snippet of this historical masterpiece. Set on a remote outpost in Natal province in the 1870's the film tells the true story of the hundred or so soldiers who stood firm against an attack by 4000+ Zulus.The film opens with Richard Burton reading an army communique detailing the rout of a large British base with the loss of 1200 men.A Swedish missionary,played with vigour by Jack Hawkins,hears of the Zulu leader's plans for the Rourke's Drift ...  Read the complete review

If you are going to watch this film then make sure that you are sitting comfortably for at 138 minutes this is a very long movie. The film is a dramatisation of a true event that happened in January of 1879 in South Africa. The film depicts a battle between the Zulu warriors and a garrison of the Welsh Borderers who were defending the missionary station of Rorke’s Drift. The garrison of men is commanded by Lieutenant Bromhead who is magnificently acted by Michael Caine, however at the time of the battle Lieutenant Chard (Stanley Baker) an engineering officer is at the missionary station to build a bridge over the nearby river. As Chard is the more ...  Read the complete review

Zulu is one of those classic films that also helped launch the career of Michael Caine. Set in South Africa towards the end of the nineteenth centuary it tells the tory of a group of British soldies who were massively out numbered by a huge Zulu army yet they mounted a spirited defence of a small out pots called Rorke's Drift. The film was made in 1964 and directed by Cy Endfield. As an aside you also have to admire a film that has the tongue in cheek cunning to include within the cast lst one Private John Thomas played by Neil McCarthy. This is an all action film with the battle scene accounting for over a third of the total film time, Caine is ...  Read the complete review

This film in my opinion captures the essence of the experience of the common soldier in an action to which his training and character are put to the ultimate test. If you cannot save enough pennies to visit Rourkes Drift, then go to a glen, or canon near where you live - where you are surrounded by hills and stand looking up at them around you and then imagine hundreds of Zulu warriors bearing down on you from all sides, and try to feel the courage and faith in comrades, training, discipline, equipment and superior officers which made the men stand and fight and survive. Then walk to the foot of one of those hills and imagine the courage and discipline which it took for ...  Read the complete review