In Who Dares Wins an anti-nuclear movement is plotting a bloody assault on British soil and, having already fatally lost their undercover operative at a violent protest, the secret services call on the aid of the SAS. Captain Peter Skellen (Collins) who risks his career, his family and his life to infiltrate the terrorist group before they can unleash an attack that will devastate the country…
Lewis Collins was well known and loved as the co-star of the UK TV series The Professionals and was being groomed to become a movie star, there was talk of him even becoming a new James Bond, but he started with this hard-edged thriller. Inspired by the Iranian Embassy siege in London in 1980 and the rescue by the SAS, the film is a dated and at times ham-fisted attempt by director Euan Lloyd, who had previously made The Wild Geese and The Sea Wolves, to make a hard-edged action drama.
The rest of the cast are all ok in their roles, veterans Richard Widmark and Edward Woodward are mostly wasted in smaller cameo appearances, Hammer horror star Ingrid Pitt also appears in the film as a fanatical German terrorist and the star Lewis Collins is sadly underused, especially towards the finale and a lot of his charm as an actor is not utilised enough.
The film was released a few years ago by Arrow Video and is now re-released by Fabulous Films. The first and most important thing to say about this release is that it is a cut version, it looks like an edited for TV print was used with much of the violence toned down. How the company can release such a version without realising it is edited is puzzling, plus it does not seem to be remastered at all and the picture quality is poor. Also, none of the extras from the Arrow release have been ported over, such as the audio commentary and a documentary on the life of the legendary producer Euan Lloyd, you only get a meagre trailer. I have contacted Fabulous Films to find out why a censored version was released and if they were going to do a recall of the product, but at the time of writing have yet to have a reply.
Thankfully the Arrow version is still available even if it is now out of print and I have to say to fans of the film to seek out that release and avoid this one.
FILM : 6 (1 for this cut version) PICTURE : 4 AUDIO : 6 EXTRAS : 1
