In honor of the 30th anniversary of the worst movie of the '70s if not ever, Irwin Allen's The Swarm, I put together a sampler of some of the highlights from the film that literally redefined the term "disaster movie." I've left out some of my favorite pieces of bad dialogue (like Ben Johnson saying "I am a retired master mechanic") and bad special effects (a nuclear power plant exploding due to a bee attack), but at least it gives an idea of what this movie is all about.
Update: A personal reminiscence of the film by one of the extra kids who got stung to death by bees. ("Director Irwin Allen (a Big Wig at the time) screamed constantly at the cast. I was scared shitless of the old guy.")
Update 2: Somebody else made a highlight reel from The Swarm, with a particular focus on Michael Caine's constant yelling. ("Take any children you see with you!")
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That was hilarious! Especially the 'bad' disaster effects like the people crashing through train windows (on purpose). The disclaimer at the end was bizarre. Was that to avoid hurting the feelings of our domestic all-American bees?
Oh sure, THE SWARM is bad, but it's enjoyably bad, and therefore can't truly be considered the worst movie of the seventies. SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND, on the other hand, is genuinely painful--how bad must a movie be when the song stylings of Donald Pleasance are a highlight?--and is surely the most awful thing committed to film in the seventies, and possibly ever.
I can't look at this without thinking of the SCTV sketch The Irwin Allen Show, in which Dave Thomas as Red Buttons gets eaten by giant bees.
They blowed up things real good in this movie, didn't they?
What is it about the passenger cars of a train that would make it explode like that? Were tey hauling some kind of fuel in the baggage compartment?
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