"The Swarm" (1978)

Last Wednesday (January 8, 2020) I tuned into the OTA channel Movies!-TV specifically to have a repeat viewing of the Irwin Allen (director) movie of the attack of killer African bees called "THE SWARM" from 1978.

Being a lover of disaster movies, I had seen this movie when it showed in theaters and remembered bits and pieces and wanted to see if it was as hilariously bad as I remembered. IT WAS.

Opening scenes starred Bradford Dillman (who I always liked) and Richard Widmark (love him) investigating the strange incursion and deaths at a missile base, before the mysterious entry of the (just make sure the check clears) Michael Caine. Shortly thereafter, Katharine Ross joins the group.

As the movie progressed, I began counting the Oscar winners who appeared... Michael Caine, Ben Johnson, Olivia de Havilland, Lee Grant, Patty Duke and Henry Fonda with Jose Ferrer as the last in my count. Added to the the Oscar recipients, the cast included Dillman and Widmark, together with Richard Chamberlain, Fred MacMurray, Cameron Mitchell, Slim Pickens, Alejandro Rey.

On the chance that some of you movie fans might enjoy the experience, I am linking to the Movies! TV Page showing the scheduled repeats for the next 10 days. NOTE: Times are Central Time Zone.

Enjoy.

Thank you for reminding me of this movie, OP. As a gayling, I had a huge crush on Bradford Dillman, and, looking back, I'm not ashamed of it. He was a very handsome man and had an intelligent, masculine-but-refined presence onscreen that's rare nowadays.

Richard Widmark was sexy in his day, too, but he was well past his prime by 1978.

Anyway, The Swarm is available on Amazon Prime. It's 2h 35m long, so it's definitely one for a long evening at home.

This should make DL very happy:

Only one cast member, Olivia de Havilland, was stung during the production.

For me, unfortunately, this one isn't entertainingly bad, but just bad.

Except for that one scene with Olivia reacting to the dead children.

That is CLASSIC!

I DVRed it, and I think they're showing the expanded version of the movie that was on TV back in the day (which runs about 40 minutes longer).

Is this the one that had a shirtless John Saxon in bed?

I liked the ant movie with Norman Fell and Suzanne Somers.

And I like the spider movie with William Shatner - made for TV from 1977 - "Kingdom of the Spiders".

What an ending!

How can anyone forget Olivia’s infamous “scream moan”?

I liked Pirannah from 1978

Then you should learn how to spell it.

r12, Pirannah is girl r11 knew in 1978.

Empire of the Ants with Joan Collins is hilariously cheesy.

We Dl'ers know ODH always gave a LEADING ACTRESS performance even in an ALL STAR ensemble cast.

The scene where Ben Johnson, Fred MacMurray and Olivia De Havilland are on the train that crashes after the conductor is attacked by bees, is cut out of the tv version. Irwin Allen must have had a weird fetish for watching people die in a horrific manner, but hey he was successful I guess.

What about the TV movies Killer Bees (1974) The Savage Bees (1976) and the sequel Terror Out of the Sky (1978)?

R16, the train crash IS in the version I saw this week (on Movies!-TV) which will be repeated.

Lee Grant laughed through takes for some of her scenes. She knew it was ridiculous.

Even we passed it up for [italic]Hot Lead and Cold Feet[/italic].

R10 I don't remember that music. It seems incongruent with the tone of the scene.

It’s as if Irwin Allen made a Roger Corman film.

R8

That is "Ants" from 1977.

It's on Youtube. Starring Robert Foxworth and Lynda Day George.

Not to be confused with "Empire of the Ants" , also from 1977 and featuring Joan Collins.

BTW "Ants" aka "It Happened at Lakewood Manor " also starred Myrna Loy and Suzanne Somers---can you imagine those two on the same set.

[quote]Did she die?

[quote]In the movie, she does.

So stung.

Empire of the Ants is delightfully ridiculous in its plotting, settings, special effects and acting.

But the most enjoyable part is seeing a pre-Dynasty Joan Collins who obviously did her own hair and makeup. She had the same styling four years later in her first season on Dynasty, until the professionals got ahold of her and modernized and upscaled her look.