The Swarm (1978)

This movie begins with a small squad of armed airmen clothed in chemical protective gear cautiously entering a small Air Force substation near the town of Marysville, Texas. Upon their initial investigation they find several dead bodies and an unauthorized civilian named "Brad Crane" (Michael Caine) on the premises. It soon turns out that Brad Crane is a world famous etymologist who believes that billions of mutant African killer bees are responsible for the deaths of these airmen. Not long afterward the search party subsequently finds a medical doctor by the name of "Captain Helena Anderson" (Katherine Ross) who was hiding in a sealed room and she reports that there are a handful of wounded airmen with her in need of serious medical treatment due to bee stings. This report validates what Brad Crane has told them and as more reports come in about deaths related to these swarms of African killer bees. In no time the military turns over all of the resources they have to him but even with the excellent team of scientists that Brad Crane manages to obtain the situation soon becomes even more perilous. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie I will just say that this was much better than a similar film by the name of "The Bees" which was made during the same year. For starters, the director (Irwin Allen) made good use of the CGI technology available at the time which certainly helped to some degree. Likewise, he also managed to assemble an all-star cast as well. Additionally, unlike the previously mentioned film of the same year, the ending wasn't nearly as ridiculous. In short, although this movie has its faults and certainly won't appeal to everyone, I found it somewhat entertaining and I have rated it accordingly. Average.

Fmovies: The subject line says it all: this is a B-Movie about, well, bees. Sorry about the pun! Despite the big budget and big cast, this essentially is an old 1950's style B-Movie, and in that way it works very well as a guilty pleasure. Mixing together the cliched concepts of both a creature feature with a 70's disaster epic, what The Swarm ends up as is not quite exactly either one, but certainly a good part of both. The effects are good but not great, some of the performances are pretty good (Richard Widmark I thought played Slater very well), and it kept my interest for its entire (extended) running time. This one is worth checking out if you are a fan of Irwin Allen, bug movies, or 70s-style monster movies.

As a point of reference, I don't rate every other movie I see a 1/10. Of the 1,005 movies I've bothered to rate over the past few years, I've only given 20 of them a 1/10. It takes a "special" movie can join the ranks of Prime Evil, The Creeping Terror, and Curse of the Swamp Creature. The Swarm is one of those "special" movies. Watching The Swarm is something of an endurance test. At one point, I felt like I had been sitting and watching for days. I checked the counter and discovered I had only seen 76 minutes - I still had another 80 minutes left to go.

So what went wrong? In a word - everything. As I've already indicated, The Swarm is dull and tedious. If I'm ever forced to watch this movie again, I can only hope it's the 116 minute version and not the 156 minute director's cut. In addition, the characters do and say the most unrealistic things. Take the movies supposed hero played by Michael Caine and the General played by Richard Widmark. Every conversation these two have is full of absolute nonsense and done in volumes usually reserved for football games. The fact that these two NEVER attempt to work together to accomplish anything is ridiculous. Or, take the fact that Caine's character, who has been appointed by the White House to head up the operation, spends more time tracking down a 10 year-old runaway than he does finding a solution to the bee problem. Unrealistic. The Swarm also features a couple of the most inane love story subplots I've seen. The first features Caine and Katharine Ross who never seem to get beyond admitting they "like" each other. How old are these people? 12? The second is the senior citizen love triangle that goes nowhere and has no real purpose. It's like watching a bad episode of "The Love Boat". Finally, some of the acting is downright atrocious. Caine and Ross are good actors when given decent material. But in The Swarm, Caine appears to be in it solely for the paycheck and Ross acts as if she realizes how bad it is and just wants out.

Picking the negatives out of The Swarm is like shooting fish in a barrel - it's impossible to miss. And I haven't even discussed the plot - killer African bees threaten the Southwest. Not a bad idea, but the execution in The Swarm is the worst.

The Swarm fmovies. Lousy catastrophe movie by usual Irwin Allen with ordinary big actors and embarrassing filmmaking. Michael Caine plays a scientist fends off a swarm along with Katharine Ross . It is a swarm of killer bees causing death, destruction and wreak havoc. While the military high staff : Richard Widmark, Bradford Dillman, Cameron Mitchell attempt to take extreme measures. Later on, the feared swarm attacking Houston . Monsters by the millions - and they're all for real! This is more than a movie. It's a prediction! The most terrifying thing about THE SWARM is that it is based on Fact: It exists. Fact: It has awesome destructive power. Fact: We don't know how to stop it. It is more than speculation... it is a prediction! ...is here!

Low-brow insect movie with absurd script, primitive effects and average acting. This is a failed and boring catastrophe movie that even a wasted all-star cast cannot save .Disastrous catastrophe movie in which lacks characterization , being an immense bore . Silly screenplay by the prestigious Stirling Silliphant who was presumably well paid . Ridiculous and absurd FX, in fact the bees are really just black spots painted on the movie . This formula intrigue movie belongs to catastrophe genre of the 70s , being the undisputed king , ¨The towering inferno¨ along with ¨Earthquake¨ , ¨Two minutes warning¨ and many others ; this formula disaster movie was widely developed by Irwin Allen , previously winner of numerous Oscars for ¨Poseidon¨ until the failures as ¨Beyond Poseidon¨, ¨Swarm¨ and ¨When the time ran out¨ , retitled ¨Earth's final fury¨ . Filmed at the height of the disaster genre from the 7os , this entry in the spectacular series profits of an all-star though really wasted and a suspenseful final that takes place at the ocean . It is really a B movie on bees, but it is still better than "The Bees" film. However, the main and support cast are very good but extremely wasted, giving mediocre performances such as : Michael Caine Richard Widmark, Richard Chamberlain, Henry Fonda, Ben Johnson, Olivia De Havilland, Fred McMurray , Patty Duke Astin , Slim Pickens , Bradford Dillman , Alejandro Rey , Don 'Red' Barry and many others.

Atmospheric photography in Panavision by Fred J. Koenekamp . Intriguing and thrilling score by Jerry Goldsmith in his usual style . This big-budgeted disaster movie was badly directed by Irwin Allen ; this was his big flop . It was the ¨Swam Sing¨ by Irwin Allen, a great producer and director that financed several disaster movies . Rating : 3.5/10 . Inferior disaster movie and bottom of barrel.

Irwin Allen's first two disaster movies, "The Poseidon Adventure" and "The Towering Inferno" worked as above average productions because there always seemed to be one foot in the ground of pseudo-reality that made you feel compelled by what you saw. But more importantly, Allen had competent directors like Ronald Neame and John Guillermin handling the actors and the end-result usually produced good performances, considering the material (especially Steve McQueen in "Inferno.") Unfortunately, with "The Swarm" Allen went to the well once too much and served up a more outlandish kind of disaster story, and to complicate matters further he took over the director's chores himself and boy does it show. There is literally no coherent story structure at all in this film, and the all-star cast is uniformly bad from top to bottom. What was Allen thinking with that pointless love-triangle plot involving the over-the-hill gang of Fred MacMurray, Ben Johnson and Olivia de Havilland? Did he really expect people to take seriously lines like "The bees have always been our friends!" or "Attention, a swarm of killer bees is coming this way!" This is the kind of movie that might have worked as a short, low-budget B/W flick in the 50s (okay, a "B" movie, no pun intended) but as a follow-up to solid efforts like "The Poseidon Adventure" and "The Towering Inferno" this film is only good from a silly camp standpoint.

"The Swarm" has its share of flaws, no doubt about that: it's overlong, it's filled with genre cliches (many veterans cast in pointless supporting roles, indifferent romances) and it's occasionally overacted, especially by Michael Caine, who has a role far below his abilities. However, those who are calling it "terrible" and "campy" are REALLY overdoing it. The special effects are actually FIRST-RATE and most of the attack sequences are utterly convincing. Don't judge the film on the basis of its bad reputation; watch it for yourself and you'll discover that, while it's not an "art" film, it's an agreeable way to kill two hours.