The Worst Film Ever

I'll tell you why so serious

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

With the 50th anniversary of the James Bond 007 film series approaching, and being a big fan of the third actor to have played the role, I decided to familiarise myself with some of his other film and television work, and I knew about this film he made just after Live and Let Die, from director Peter Hunt (On Her Majesty's Secret Service). Basically at the Sonderditch mine in South Africa a tunnel has collapsed, and underground manager Rod Slater (Sir Roger Moore) and his best friend and chief miner Big King (Simon Sabela) go to rescue those injured, the two are friends despite some of the white miners disregarding the black workers. The collapse is identified as not being an accident, there is a plot by a criminal syndicate in London to destroy the mine to profit from the share dealing, with regards to the gold supply distributed, and the mine owner's son-in-law Manfred Steyner (Bradford Dillman) is involved with the plan to flood the mine drilling through the underground dike and releasing the water from the reservoir. Killed in the collapse was the mine's original general manager, and there is a vacancy to be the new one, and Steyner interviews Slater as he knows he has the best qualifications, but he has another candidate in mind, and during the meeting Slater meets Steyner's wife Terry (Superman's Susannah York), who does not return his attraction interests. Slater and Terry meet again so that she may influence the decision for the general manager position to mine owner and her grandfather Hurry Hirschfeld (Ray Milland), and as a result she and he start an affair, Steyner is not happy he becomes general manager, but Slater only continues drilling work after placing a new safety system in the mine, that will block the tunnel in case a flood does happen. Slater has no idea of the plot by the crime syndicate, and aware that his wife is having an affair with him Steyner decides to let this go ahead so that he will be distracted while the mine is collapsed, and soon enough the dike is destroyed and a flood breaks, trapping thousands of workers below. Luckilly though the story is reported on the radio news and Slater hears it while holidaying with Terry, and she is a pilot, so agrees to fly him immediately to the mine to defuse the situation, while Steyner is watching from a hill far and above the scene watching to see the disaster unfold according to plan. Going down the mine shaft and climbing through the flooding tunnels, Slater and Big King struggle against the raging waters and slowly falling rocks, the safety charge is connected and ready to blow and stop the flooding, but Big King sacrifices himself having to detonate the charge. Steyner is murdered by his accomplice Stephen Marais (Tony Beckley) after hearing on the radio that the mine disaster has been averted and their plan has failed, but he also ends up killing himself when the car he uses goes flying off the cliff and blows up, and the end sees a badly injured Slater taken away to hospital with Terry by his side. Also starring Sir John Gielgud as Farrell, Bernard Horsfall as Dave Kowalski, Marc Smith as Tex Kiernan, Norman Coombes as Lemmer, John Hussey as Plummer and a very young Patsy Kensit as Little Girl at Christmas Party. I admit that Moore is a bit wooden in this film, but I can't imagine anyone else in his role, and he assisted by a good cast of stars, even though they don't necessarily do as much, Dillman though is a great choice for the manipulative villain, the story has unnecessary scenes, but the mine scenes just about exciting, especially towards the end, and the title song by Jimmy Helms is catchy, it may look and feel old fashioned, and you don't see much gold, LOL, but it is an alright adventure. It was nominated the Oscar for Best Song for "Wherever Love Takes Me" , and it was nominated the BAFTA for Best Sound Track. Worth watching!

Shirt-shedding Roger Moore (as Rodney "Rod" Slater) works in a Johannesburg, South Africa mine. After a suspicious accident, Mr. Moore gets promoted to General Manager, by nasty non-smoking Bradford Dillman (as Manfred Steyner); then, he meets Mr. Dillman's unfulfilled blonde wife, Susannah York (as Terry). Ms. York is the granddaughter of cigar-chomping mine-owner Ray Milland (as Hurry "H.H." Hirschfeld). Eventually, Moore unbuttons his shirt, then York unbuttons hers. While his wife skinny dips with Moore, Dillman plots to flood Mr. Milland's mine, drive up the price of "Gold", and collect the cash.It's difficult to picture the suave, immaculate Moore spending years in the dirt - he sure cleans up well. But, the main problem with "Gold" lays with the boring romance - Moore and York look good together, but are saddled with a long, unexciting aboveground "who cares?" affair. The less seen Dillman and Milland are better without even kissing. And, frankly, the characters played by Tony Beckley (Stephen Marais) and Simon Sabela (John "Big King" Nkulu) seem more interesting. With at least six degrees of Oscar-connections, Maureen McGovern's non-hit "Wherever Love Takes Me" received "Academy Award" notice.***** Gold (9/5/74) Peter Hunt ~ Roger Moore, Susannah York, Bradford Dillman, Ray Milland

Roger Moore in a neat little thriller about the plot to manipulate the price of gold buy flooding a South African mine with an underground lake. Moore is the new troubleshooter brought in to run the mine unaware that Bradford Dillman has other plans. This film came out during the disaster craze back in the early 1970's. I remember seeing the TV commercials and wanting to see it because the scenes of the flooding mine made it look like another disaster film. I never saw the film and the film pretty much disappeared before it turned up on bargain DVD. Its a shame that the film isn't better known since its a super little thriller. To be certain the film suffers from the casting of Ray Milland and Dillman who seemed to be playing the exact same roles in everything at the time this was made, but other wise this is a tense little thriller with some good action sequences, good performances and a plot that keeps you watching. Its not the best film ever but it is is one that has been wrongly buried in the discount bin. Definitely worth picking up if you run across it.

'Gold' or the far more interesting title 'The Great Gold Conspiracy' is a supposed Action Adventure Thriller, I'm afraid to say It's not Thrilling and is decidedly lacking in both Action & Adventure, I haven't read the Wilbur Smith Novel on which this is based, but I have to believe it's better than this boring old tosh - there are far too many pointless scenes and the romantic subplot between Roger Moore & Susannah York is overdone to a large extent and with co stars such as Ray Milland & John Gieulgud, I expected better - they are far too good for this nonsense, the best thing about it is Elmer Bernstein's SoundtrackShould have been so much better considering the talent involved.3/10