Anachronistic strict Regimental Sergeant Major Lauderdale (Sir Richard Attenborough), on a remote colonial African army caught in a local coup d'etat, must use his experience to defend those... Read allAnachronistic strict Regimental Sergeant Major Lauderdale (Sir Richard Attenborough), on a remote colonial African army caught in a local coup d'etat, must use his experience to defend those in his care.Anachronistic strict Regimental Sergeant Major Lauderdale (Sir Richard Attenborough), on a remote colonial African army caught in a local coup d'etat, must use his experience to defend those in his care.
- Won 1 BAFTA Award
- 2 wins & 2 nominations total
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaBritt Ekland had been cast as Karen Eriksson but pulled out three weeks into production. She had just married Peter Sellers who apparently was so jealous of her casting alongside John Leyton that he asked his actor friends David Lodge and Graham Stark who were also in the cast, to secretly spy on her. After being frequently quizzed on the telephone by Sellers about the shooting and who she acted with, Ekland left the Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire, and joined Sellers in Los Angeles. 20th Century-Fox sued Ekland for $1.5 million; Sellers counter-sued for $4 million claiming the Fox suit caused him "mental distress and injury to his health".
- GoofsThe personal weapon used by the British is the Sterling sub machine gun which replaced the Sten in the British Army in 1953. This weapon is held with the left hand on the barrel and never the magazine or housing. Holding the magazine is a throwback to its predecessor, the Sten. The experienced senior members of the Mess are holding it incorrectly whilst the most inexperienced among them (Private Wilkes) holds it correctly and naturally.
- Quotes
RSM Lauderdale: Will you stick a boomerang in that great Aussie cakehole of yours until I've finished?
- ConnectionsFeatured in Film Review: Richard Attenborough (1968)
Featured review
Excellent military suspense drama
I'd never even heard of Guns at Batasi before but I was amazed to find that it's a superlative film. I was expecting standard British stiff-upper-lip fare that the British did so well in the 1950s and '60s, but what I wasn't expecting is that a film I'd never even heard of rivals and even exceeds top-notch British dramas like Sidney Lumet's 'The Hill'.
The film stands squarely on Richard Attenborough's pitch-perfect performance as a Regimental Sergeant Major - the performance of a lifetime, especially when you consider that Attenborough is the complete opposite of the character he plays in this film - in reality he's soft-spoken and unassuming, yet the character he's playing is not at all those things. To say that this role was a stretch somehow doesn't do the performance justice - Attenborough literally becomes the RSM, and every moment he's on screen is incredible. Some reviewers assume that his performance is over-the-top, but I can assure everyone that British NCOs do act like this - or at least they did in the 1960s - I had the honour of knowing one of them.
Not that Attenborough is doing it all alone - the other performances are perfect too, as is the direction. The fact that the film was made in a studio in England makes you realise what a great job a truly great crew can do for a film - there's no way you'd think this movie wasn't made in Africa.
Altogether a fantastic movie - probably the best new film (new to me anyway) I've seen in the last two years. This blows everything else out of the water.
Oh, and for those worried that it's a war film - definitely not. It's a drama set in a military barracks, but psychological drama is what we have here, and unlike a lot of those kinds of films this one has a heart and a sense of humour. Don't miss this one!
The film stands squarely on Richard Attenborough's pitch-perfect performance as a Regimental Sergeant Major - the performance of a lifetime, especially when you consider that Attenborough is the complete opposite of the character he plays in this film - in reality he's soft-spoken and unassuming, yet the character he's playing is not at all those things. To say that this role was a stretch somehow doesn't do the performance justice - Attenborough literally becomes the RSM, and every moment he's on screen is incredible. Some reviewers assume that his performance is over-the-top, but I can assure everyone that British NCOs do act like this - or at least they did in the 1960s - I had the honour of knowing one of them.
Not that Attenborough is doing it all alone - the other performances are perfect too, as is the direction. The fact that the film was made in a studio in England makes you realise what a great job a truly great crew can do for a film - there's no way you'd think this movie wasn't made in Africa.
Altogether a fantastic movie - probably the best new film (new to me anyway) I've seen in the last two years. This blows everything else out of the water.
Oh, and for those worried that it's a war film - definitely not. It's a drama set in a military barracks, but psychological drama is what we have here, and unlike a lot of those kinds of films this one has a heart and a sense of humour. Don't miss this one!
helpful•352
- beeryusa
- Nov 9, 2008
- How long is Guns at Batasi?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Runtime1 hour 43 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 2.39 : 1
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