Dark of the Sun movie storyline. British commando Captain Curry (Rod Taylor), is hired by President Ubi of war-torn Congo, to steal $50 million in uncut diamonds from a time-locked vault before the separatist Simba army that’s fighting Ubi’s forces and the UN peacekeepers overruns the remote town where the bank that holds the vault is located. Curry teams up with his friend Ruffo, Doctor Wreid, who’s an alcoholic, and Henlein, a sadistic Nazi who left Germany after WWII to work as a mercenary.
The mercenaries reach the town by Ubi’s train after surviving an attack from the UN peacekeepers, only to find a number of terrified Westerners who were driven out from their homes by force, including torture, rape and murder, by the Simba rebels. They agree to help them leave town and befriend one of them, a pretty widow called Claire (Yvette Mimieux) whose husband was murdered by the rebels. As their mission nears completion everything suddenly goes horribly wrong and the story culminates in an orgy of sadistic graphic violence as Henlein betrays the group and the rebels arrive to brutalize and slaughter the whites. However, Curry still plans to complete his mission no matter what.
Dark of the Sun (also known as The Mercenaries in the UK) is a 1968 adventure war film starring Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, Jim Brown, and Peter Carsten. The film, which was directed by Jack Cardiff, is based on Wilbur Smith’s 1965 novel, The Dark of the Sun. The story about a band of mercenaries sent on a dangerous mission during the Congo Crisis was adapted into a screenplay by Ranald MacDougall. Critics condemned the film on its original release for its graphic scenes of violence and torture.
Filming started 16 January 1967. Most of the film was shot on location in Jamaica using the country’s railway system, taking advantage of a working steam train as well as safety and cost-effectiveness. Interiors were completed at MGM British Studios, Borehamwood near London. At the same time, MGM was filming Graham Greene’s The Comedians (1967) in Africa, though the original took place in the Caribbean.
In the German version, Curry was renamed Willy Krüger and was portrayed as a former Wehrmacht officer who had already clashed with Henlein during World War II because of the latter’s fanatical Nazism. The German version also cuts the scene where Henlein murders two Congolese children and is misleadingly entitled Katanga, implying the film takes place during the first Congo emergency in 1961–64, when mercenaries like Müller and ‘Mad’ Mike Hoare were involved. The movie was released in France as Last Train from Katanga (French: Le Dernier Train du Katanga).
Dark of the Sun (1968)
Directed by: Jack Cardiff
Starring: Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, Peter Carsten, Jim Brown, Kenneth More, André Morell, Olivier Despax, Guy Deghy, Bloke Modisane, Calvin Lockhart, Alan Gifford, David Bauer
Screenplay by: Ranald MacDougall, Adrien Spies
Production Design by: John Palmer
Cinematography by: Edward Scaife
Film Editing by: Ernest Walter
Art Direction by: Bill Welch, Reg Bream
Music by: Jacques Loussier
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release Date: July 3, 1968
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