Hornet's Nest (1970)

Studio: MGM
Theatrical Release: Sept. 9th, 1970
DVD-R Release: March 27th, 2012
Rating: Unrated!
Directed by Phil Karlson
Review by Craig Sorensen





Going into this, I was really expecting a sickly sweet rip-off of the Dirty Dozen.  I had never heard of the film before and didn’t really do any research before picking it out.  All I knew at the time was that it was a World War 2 film and Rock Hudson was in it.  OK, fine, I’ll take it.  Maybe it’ll be a decent rainy Saturday afternoon kind of film.  Then I read a plot description.  Hudson was leading a band of Italian children against the Nazis.  Well, shit, this could either be an awful, overly sentimental comedy or a really awful broad comedy (what I was kind of hoping for honestly).  I was certainly not expecting what I got.

Hornet’s Nest begins with a Nazi platoon gathering together the residents of a small Italian village.  All the men, the women (one woman breastfeeding a small child), elderly, small children and a priest.  They gather them all together and gun them down.  Seems someone was hiding a group of resistance fighters and wouldn’t give up their hiding space.  Now I’m no W.W. II expert but as far as I know the Italians and the Germans were on the same side.  I guess that’s beside the point.  Anyway, the Germans gun down all these innocent civilians (including the priest and breastfeeding woman of course, that’s how you know the Nazis are bad guys) right in front of a group of boys from the village who happen to be hiding in a field.  This naturally pisses off Aldo (Mark Colleano from The Zoo Gang), self appointed leader of the group.

Rock Hudson (Pretty Maids All In A Row) plays an American soldier (with an awesome handlebar mustache and ‘70s hairdo) sent in to blow up a Nazi dam.  As his platoon parachutes in they are ambushed (along with that rebel group hinted at above) by the Nazis and gunned out of the sky.  Rock Hudson is the only one to survive, of course, but is knocked unconscious.  He is saved by the now ridiculously filthy Italian kids and dragged to their cave hideout.  The kids then kidnap a sexy German nurse (Sylva Koscina of Lisa and the Devil, The Italian Connection, The Manipulator & Homo Eroticus) to treat his wounds.  After regaining consciousness, the kids promise to lead Hudson to the dam for a price.  He must teach them how to fight.

So right off the bat you know you aren’t going to get a typical kids movie.  Hornet’s Nest has a nice mean streak running through it and it certainly doesn’t shy away from the violence inherent in the (crazy) plot.  There are numerous scenes of kids with machine guns gunning down Nazi soldiers.  The kids are not played as happy-go-lucky scamps.  You can see the war taking it’s toll, both physically and mentally.  Certainly not what I was expecting.  I guess I shouldn’t have expected light hearted comedy considering this was directed by Phil Karlson, underrated cult director of such manly films as Kansas City Confidential, Ben, Framed and um, The Silencers.  Karlson also directed one of the most manly films ever made, Walking Tall.  If you just pictured Dwayne Johnson, fuck you.  So Karlson is no slouch when it comes to action.  I also really liked Rock Hudson in this.  He plays the character Turner as a complete son-of-a-bitch.  He does some really reprehensible shit in this and for a lot of actors it would be impossible to be able to come back from those places and still garner some sympathy (and suspense for the character and mission).  Hudson is able to pull it off, for the most part.  Also, he has an awesome mustache.  Almost all of the characters in this (save for the very small children) are living in a sort of grey area.  The good guys aren’t all that sympathetic and the main bad guys aren’t all evil.  Sylva Koscina starts out as a Nazi sympathizer but eventually begins to soften to the kids plight.  Even main Nazi Von Hecht (Sergio Fantoni of Von Ryan’s Express) has some sympathetic qualities.  Sure, the film isn’t above a few cartoony stereotypes (like that opening scene), but for the most part it tries to give you a story that doesn’t break down so easily to black & white issues.

MGM’s new DVD-R of Hornet’s Nest looks very good.  Color seems very consistent and solid with good looking flesh tones.  The image looks very sharp for the most part, betraying it’s age.  There is hardly any print damage that I can see and the image doesn’t seem overly compressed (which can be an issue with these DVD-Rs I’ve noticed).  Everything looks very nice.  The only audio option is the original mono English track.  It sounds fine, not fantastic but it works.  Ennio Morricone’s score sounds good and you can understand the dialog.  The only extra here is the original trailer, which is great.