1961 British film directed by Ken Annakin
The Hellions is a 1961 British adventure film directed by Ken Annakin[1] starring Richard Todd, Anne Aubrey, Lionel Jeffries, Ronald Fraser and Colin Blakely that was set and filmed in South Africa.[2]
Plot
A lone law enforcement officer, Sam Hargis (Richard Todd), battles criminals in South Africa when the Billings family of Luke Billings (Lionel Jeffries) and his four sons ride into town to get revenge on Hargis for a previous clash, when he ran Luke Billings out of town.
At first, the locals leave all of the fighting to Hargis, saying that it is his sole responsibility. However, after the Billings kill two innocent residents, some of them arm themselves and shoot dead all the Billings except Luke who, during a fist fight with Hargis, falls from a roof and is killed.
Production
The film was offered by Warwick Productions to Ken Annakin, who agreed to direct as he had fond memories of South Africa from another film, Nor the Moon by Midnight.[3]
Filming took place in Brits, a small town north of Pretoria. Annakin decided to make the film " as a spoof of the normal American Western. With many laughs and broad gags — such as were used so successfully years later in Cat Ballou. We proceeded to shoot the film this way."[4] Annakin fell so ill with polio during the shoot he was unable to make it on set so Harold Huth and his assistant Clive Reed took over and directed under Annakin's instructions from the hospital bed. It took Annakin months to recover.[5]
Reception
The New York Times called it "High Noon on the veldt... wide screen drivel."[6]
Annakin later wrote " Most of the critics panned the film for being uneven — which was not surprising since I had directed big portions of the scenes tongue-in-cheek while Harold Huth and Clive Reed, God bless them, had loyally tried to complete them but somehow had allowed everything to be played straight"[7]
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