In 1904, Morocco is the source of conflict among the colonial powers of Germany, France, and the British Empire. Each nation is trying to establish a sphere of influence in that country. Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli is the leader of a band of Berber insurrectionists opposed to the young Sultan Abdelaziz and his uncle, the Bashaw of Tangier. Raisuli considers the Bashaw to be corrupt and beholden to the Europeans. He kidnaps the American Eden Pedecaris and her children, William and Jennifer, in a raid on their home. Sir Joshua Smith, a British friend of Eden's, is killed during the raid. Raisuli then issues an outrageous ransom demand, deliberately attempting to provoke an international incident in order to embarrass the Sultan and start a civil war.
In the United States, President Theodore Roosevelt is seeking re-election. He decides to use the kidnapping as both political propaganda (coining the phrase "Pedecaris alive or Raisuli dead!") and as an effort to demonstrate America's military strength as a new great power, despite the protests of his cautious Secretary of State, John Hay.
The American Consul to Tangier, Samuel Gummeré, is unable to negotiate a peaceful return of the hostages. In response, Roosevelt sends the South Atlantic Squadron, under the command of Admiral French Ensor Chadwick, to Tangier, either to retrieve Pedecaris or to force the Sultan to accede to Raisuli's demands. Roosevelt finds himself gaining more and more respect for Raisuli, thinking him an honorable man who just happens to be his enemy.
The Pedecarises are kept as hostages in the Rif, far from any potential rescuers. Though her children seem to admire Raisuli, Eden finds him "a brigand and a lout". The Pedecarises attempt an escape, helped by one of Raisuli's men, but they are betrayed and given to a gang of desert brigands. Luckily, Raisuli has tracked them and kills the kidnappers with a rifle and sword. He reveals that he does not have any intention of harming the Pedecarises and is merely bluffing. Eden and Raisuli come to develop a friendly relationship as Raisuli reveals his story, that he was once taken captive by his brother, the Bashaw, and kept in a dungeon for several years.
Gummeré, Chadwick, and his aide, Marine Captain Jerome, tired of the Sultan's perfidy and the meddling of the European powers. They decide to engage in "military intervention" to force a negotiation by seizing the actual seat of power, the Bashaw's palace in Tangier. Jerome's company of Marines, supported by a detachment of sailors, march through the streets of Tangier, much to the surprise of the European legations, whose forces are with the Sultan at distant Fez. They overwhelm the Bashaw's palace guard, taking the Bashaw hostage and forcing him to negotiate.
Under coercion, the Bashaw finally agrees to accede to the Raisuli's demands. But during a hostage exchange, Raisuli is betrayed and captured by German and Moroccan troops under the command of von Roerkel. Jerome and a small contingent of Marines are present to secure Pedecaris and her children. Raisuli's friend, the Sherif of Wazan, organizes the Berber tribe for an attack on the Europeans and Moroccans, while Eden suddenly attacks Jerome. She convinces him and his men at gunpoint to rescue Raisuli to uphold the word of President Roosevelt that Raisuli will be unharmed if the Pedecaris family are returned safely.
A three-way battle ensues, in which the Berbers and Americans team up to defeat the Germans and their Moroccan allies, rescuing Raisuli in the process. In the United States, Roosevelt is cheered for this great victory, and the Pedecarises arrive safely back in Tangier. Later, Roosevelt reads a letter he received from Raisuli, comparing the two men:
"To Theodore Roosevelt - You are like the wind and I like the lion. You form the tempest. The sand stings my eyes and the ground is parched. I roar in defiance but you do not hear. But between us there is a difference. I, like the lion, must remain in my place. While you, like the wind, will never know yours. - Mulay Hamid El Raisuli, Lord of the Rif, Sultan to the Berbers, Last of the Barbary Pirates."
Milius' inspiration had come from reading an article by Barbara W. Tuchman about the Perdicaris affair in American Heritage magazine,[4] and he found the story fascinating; he decided to adapt it into a screenplay once he figured how to make the story more cinematic, by making Ion Perdicaris a woman, Eden Pedecaris. Milius also researched Rosita Forbes's 1924 biography of Raisuli, The Sultan of the Mountains; much of the film's dialogue is appropriated almost word-for-word from Forbes's book. Walter Harris's 1921 book Morocco That Was inspired the depiction of Sultan Abdelaziz's court.[5] Milius took similar care in researching the scenes with Theodore Roosevelt.
Milius says he originally wanted Mrs. Pedecaris to be 55 or 60 and played by Katharine Hepburn with the children being her grandchildren, and the Berber would be a similar age. Milius:
"Her husband has died years ago, she's a stern, rich old woman, and she has a last romantic fling with this stern, rich old Berber, the Sultan of the mountains, who can't really do all the things he used to do but pulls it together one more time to save her from the Blue People. A very heroic character. And of course the children would look at such a character as being even greater than Sean Connery – this old man would be the greatest old thing they'd ever seen, and they'd have great admiration for their grandmother for standing up to him, the way old people can snipe at each other and love each other because they have the common bond of age. That was the purest form the movie ever had. Roosevelt was a very young, visceral presence, a vibrant man who represented a new world, who understood Raisuli's world very well but was forced to change it".[6]
Milius had to make the leading characters younger to get the film financed. "No one wanted to make a movie about Arabs and Teddy Roosevelt. So we had to make concessions: a more romantic male, a beautiful woman, much more box office that way. You make these concessions as you go along and perhaps, at a certain point in your career, you don't have to make them, and you make Barry Lyndon. Maybe it's better that you make concessions".[6]
Influences
Milius stated both in interviews and the DVD commentary that he was consciously echoing a number of classic adventure films and stories. He cites the famous British periodical Boy's Own, as well as the stories of Rudyard Kipling, as inspirations for the film.
Milius said the film was a "boy's adventure movie ... seen through children's eyes ... I'm sick of seeing children used as a point of view when they're sitting there blanching with terror".[7]
1930s adventure films like Gunga Din and The Four Feathers provided inspiration for the film's style and storytelling technique. The use of children as protagonists is also inspired by the book and the filmA High Wind in Jamaica, while the relationship between Raisuli and Eden is based on the 1921 film The Sheik. Raisuli's rescue of the Pedecarises on the beach is similar to another mounted sword-fighting scene in Akira Kurosawa's 1958 film The Hidden Fortress, and the scene of Jennifer Pedecaris being cornered by Aldo Sambrell's character and kidnapped is a reference to the 1956 film The Searchers.
Most noticeably, the film inherits a cavalier attitude towards imperialism, foreign policy, and military intervention, attitudes which were relatively unpopular[citation needed] in 1975 America at the end of the Vietnam War. Milius' apparent endorsement of imperialism was not attacked by critics, perhaps due to the film's subtle satiric manner and for the accurate recreation of the era in which its story is set.
"I think people should take home more understanding – or rather awareness – of what I think is the American character", said Milius. "It's very well put in the grizzly bear. I don't think Americans are necessarily civilised or too calm and rational about their approach to life. I rather like that. I really like grizzly bears too. I like grizzly bears a lot more than most people ... You can take the [film's] politics to be anyway you want, for or against the United States".[7]
Milius also had inspiration from more recent films while making the film. He based the film's cinematography, use of desert landscapes, and filming of battle scenes on David Lean's 1962 film Lawrence of Arabia, also using many of the same sets, including the "Aqaba" set which had been constructed for Lean's film, here serving as the setting for the final, three-way battle between the Berbers, the Europeans and their Moroccan allies, and the Americans. The Bashaw's palace was the Palace of the Americas in Seville, having appeared in both Lawrence of Arabia and Anthony Mann's 1961 film El Cid. Another major influence is the 1969 film The Wild Bunch, which inspired the final confrontation between the American and German troops and the earlier scene where the Sultan test-fires his Maxim gun.
Milius originally wanted Omar Sharif to play Raisuli and Faye Dunaway to play Eden Pedecaris,[8] but Sharif refused the part and Dunaway became ill due to exhaustion, having to be replaced at short notice by Bergen. Anthony Quinn was also considered for Raisuli. Milius said he wrote the part of Eden with Julie Christie in mind, although she may not have actually been approached for the role. Milius later said he did not particularly enjoy working with Candice Bergen or Sean Connery, particularly Connery because he was so "sour and dour". He greatly admired Connery's performance, whereas he felt Bergen's acting range was extremely limited, and she was only concerned with looking good.[1]
Several of the crew are cast, most notably the cinematographer Billy Williams (perhaps best known for Ken Russell's 1969 film Women in Love), who plays the gun-shooting, white-suited Englishman Sir Joshua Smith in the opening scenes of the attack at the Pedecaris villa and stunt supervisor Terry Leonard as Roosevelt's sparring partner. The special effects supervisor Alex Weldon appears as Roosevelt's Secretary of War, Elihu Root, and Milius himself cameos as the one-armed German officer who gives the Sultan his Maxim gun to test-fire ("Herr Sultan is displeased?").
Filming
Filming was done in Spain, with the towns of Seville, Granada, Almería and Madrid all doubling for Tangier and Fez, and the "Washington" scenes being filmed in and around Madrid. For the deserts of Morocco, Milius used many locations in Almonte[10]and the province of Almería, some of which had been previously used in historical epics such as Lawrence of Arabia and El Cid, as well as several Spaghetti Westerns; Milius claims to have discovered the beach where Raisuli rescues the Pedecaris family after their escape.
The Marines and sailors used in the Tangier attack scene were Spanish special forces troops, along with a handful of U. S. Marine Corps and United States Navy personnel from the naval base in Rota (Cádiz), who marched with precision through the streets of Seville and Almería en route to the Bashaw's palace. According to Milius (on the DVD commentary), the U. S. Marine Corps actually shows this scene to its advanced infantry classes for midshipmen at the U. S. Naval Academy.
According to Milius, virtually all of the film's stunts were performed by Terry Leonard. Leonard was the stunt coordinator and did some of the stunts and also has a minor part as Roosevelt's boxing opponent early in the film. Milius claims that only four American stunt men were used in the entire final battle scene; the number of Spanish stunt men was close to twenty throughout the filming. He and Leonard have defended the film against criticism for alleged "animal cruelty", claiming that not a single horse was seriously hurt during filming. While filming this scene, Antoine Saint-John revealed himself to be terrified of horses, and would often hide somewhere on the set when his sword fight with Sean Connery was to be filmed.
The Wind and the Lion debuted in New York during May 1975 and Britain in October. The film was a financial success, though Steven Spielberg's hit film Jaws distracted attention away from it.
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 63% based on reviews from 16 critics.[11] On Metacritic the film has a score of 69% based on reviews from 9 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[12]
Variety called it "Generally literate and very commercial period action drama, well written and better directed by John Milius."[13]
Shortly after its release, the film was screened for U.S. President Gerald Ford and his staff, who reportedly loved it.[14]
A novel, The Wind and the Lion by John Milius, based on Milius's film, was published by Award Books in January 1975. Based on the screenplay, the story is slightly different from the finished film, with several additional scenes (notably, Eden Pedecaris taking a bath at Raisuli's palace and Gummeré watching the Atlantic Squadron arrive in Tangier) included, and the story's chronology is slightly different. The first printing included a chapter about production events and brief biographies of the cast and crew.
It was released in 1991 on laserdisc from Warner Home Video in letterboxed format.
In Region 1, Warner Home Video released the film on DVD on January 6, 2004, featuring a brief production featurette, the theatrical trailer, and a commentary by Milius. Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has released a bare-bones DVD in Australia (R4) and in several European markets (Region 2), notably Germany,[18] though not yet in the United Kingdom (the Sony release is English-friendly though).
The First Moroccan Crisis or the Tangier Crisis was an international crisis between March 31, 1905, and April 7, 1906, over the status of Morocco. Germany wanted to challenge France's growing control over Morocco, aggravating France and Great Britain. The crisis was resolved by the Algeciras Conference of 1906, a conference of mostly European countries that affirmed French control; this worsened German relations with both France and Britain and helped enhance the new Anglo-French Entente.
Mohammed al-Khamis bin Yusef bin Hassan al-Alawi, better known simply Mohammed V, was the last Sultan of Morocco from 1927 to 1953 and from 1955 to 1957, and first King of Morocco from 1957 to 1961. A member of the 'Alawi dynasty, he played an instrumental role in securing the independence of Morocco from the French and Spanish Protectorates.
Tangier or Tangiers is a city in northwestern Morocco, on the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The city is the capital of the Tanger-Tetouan-Al Hoceima region, as well as the Tangier-Assilah Prefecture of Morocco.
John Frederick Milius is an American screenwriter and film director. He was a writer for the first two Dirty Harry films, received an Academy Award nomination as screenwriter of Apocalypse Now (1979), and wrote and directed The Wind and the Lion (1975), Conan the Barbarian (1982), and Red Dawn (1984). He later served as the co-creator of the Primetime Emmy Award-winning television series Rome (2005–2007).
Jerrald King Goldsmith was an American composer, with a career in film and television scoring that spanned nearly 50 years and over 200 productions, between 1954 and 2003. He was considered one of film music's most innovative and influential composers. He was nominated for eighteen Academy Awards, six Grammy Awards, five Primetime Emmy Awards, nine Golden Globe Awards, and four British Academy Film Awards.
MoulayAbd al-Aziz bin Hassan, born on 24 February 1881 in Marrakesh and died on 10 June 1943 in Tangier, was a sultan of Morocco from 9 June 1894 to 21 August 1908, as a ruler of the 'Alawi dynasty. He was proclaimed sultan at the age of sixteen after the death of his father Hassan I. Moulay Abdelaziz tried to strengthen the central government by implementing a new tax on agriculture and livestock, a measure which was strongly opposed by sections of the society. This in turn led Abdelaziz to mortgage the customs revenues and to borrow heavily from the French, which was met with widespread revolt and a revolution that deposed him in 1908 in favor of his brother Abd al-Hafid.
Rough Riders is a 1997 American television miniseries directed and co-written by John Milius about future President Theodore Roosevelt and the regiment known as the 1st US Volunteer Cavalry; a.k.a. the Rough Riders. The series prominently shows the bravery of the volunteers at the Battle of San Juan Hill, part of the Spanish–American War of 1898. It was released on DVD in 2006. The series originally aired on TNT with a four-hour running time, including commercials, over two consecutive nights during July 1997. It is, as of 2022, John Milius' last directorial credit for a film.
The Perdicaris affair, also known as the Perdicaris incident, refers to the kidnapping of Greek-American Ion Hanford Perdicaris (1840–1925) and his stepson, Cromwell Varley, a British subject, by Ahmed al-Raisuni and his bandits on 18 May 1904 in Tangier, Morocco. Raisuni, leader of several hill tribes, demanded a ransom of $70,000, safe conduct, and control of two of Morocco's wealthiest districts from the Sultan of Morocco Abd al-Aziz. During lengthy negotiations, he increased his demands to control of six districts. The historical importance of the affair lay not in the kidnapping itself but in the concentration of naval power in Tangier and what it meant for the politics of gunboat diplomacy.
Billy Williams OBE, BSC is a British cinematographer.
Mulai Ahmed er Raisuni was a Sharif, and a leader of the Jebala tribal confederacy in Morocco at the turn of the 20th century.
Samuel Rene Gummeré was an American lawyer and diplomat who served as US Consul-General in Tangier, Morocco from 1898–1905, and Ambassador to Morocco from 1905–09, and became well known for his roles in the Perdicaris incident of 1904 and the Algeciras Conference two years later.
John Twiggs Myers was a United States Marine Corps general who was most famous for his service as the American Legation Guard in Beijing during the Boxer Rebellion.
Deborah Baxter is an English actress who appeared in the films A High Wind in Jamaica and The Wind and the Lion.
Rosita Forbes, née Joan Rosita Torr, was an English travel writer, novelist and explorer. In 1920–1921 she was the first European woman to visit the Kufra Oasis in Libya, in a period when this was closed to Westerners.
Tangier has been the subject of many artistic works, including novels, films and music.
Josep Tapiró i Baró was a Spanish painter; best known for his watercolor portraits from Morocco.
Herman Hoffman Philip was an American diplomat and career foreign service officer.
Gregory Anthony Perdicaris was a Greek American statesman, lawyer, professor, author, and entrepreneur. Perdicaris raised awareness about Greece in the United States during the Greek War of Independence and was in Greece during the critical early years. He was the first Consul of the United States for Greece. He is known for incorporating dozens of companies in the United States. Perdicaris and partners built the municipal framework for gas and electric companies. He was associated with Dewing v. Perdicaries, 96 U.S. 193 (1877), the Supreme Court case dealing with Confederate Sequestration. He was a prominent resident of Trenton, New Jersey.
Ion Hanford Perdicaris was an author, professor, lawyer, painter, and playwright. He was a humanitarian and human rights activist. He fought for the rights of Moors, Arabs, and slaves. He was active in the anti-slave movement in the United States and abroad namely in Morocco. Ion fought to change the Protégé system in Morocco. Ion became an international celebrity because of the Perdicaris Incident.
↑ Gallagher, John (1989). Film Directors on Directing. ABC-Clio. pp.174–175.
↑ "All-Time Film Rental Champs", Variety, 7 January 1976, pg 48.
↑ "Perdicaris Alive or Raisuli Dead!", American Heritage August 1959; later republished in Tuchman's compilation book Practicing History: Selected Essays (1981), pp. 104-117
1 2 Thompson, Richard (July–August 1976). "STOKED". Film Comment 12.4. pp.10–21.
1 2 Sterritt (28 July 1975). "Wind and the Lion'--a look behind MGM epic: Comments from its 'superstars' and its writer-director Deliberate distortion? False image?first=David". The Christian Science Monitor. p.26.
↑ Murphy, Mary (Aug 2, 1974). "A 'Lollipop' for Valentine". Los Angeles Times. p.f13.
↑ Segaloff, Nat, "John Milius: The Good Fights", Backstory 4: Interviews with Screenwriters of the 1970s and 1980s, Ed. Patrick McGilligan, University of California 2006 p. 291-292
↑ David Sterritt (28 July 1975). "'Wind and the Lion'--a look behind MGM epic: Comments from its 'superstars' and its writer-director Deliberate distortion? False image?". The Christian Science Monitor. p.26.
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