Universal Soldier (1972)

Interesting facts

Universal Soldier is a 1971 film directed by Cy Endfield and starring George Lazenby. It was the final film of Endfield, who also has an acting role in it. The title came from the 1964 song of the same name by Buffy Sainte-Marie.

Production

The film was based on an original idea by Cy Endfield and some associates in the 1960s. It was originally envisioned as a straight action-adventure movie about a mercenary who buys arms in London. Endfield became distracted on other projects until he re-connected with George Lazenby.

Lazenby had just achieved international fame playing James Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service but decided not to repeat the role. He spent over a year deciding what film to make next when he ran into Endfield. The two men had worked with each other previously - it was Endfield who had directed Lazenby in the advertisement for Big Fry chocolate that helped the actor be cast as James Bond. Lazenby:

I told him I wanted to make the kind of film I could believe in. He came back two days later with a conventional script about gun-runners – just a joke to both of us. But with his 28 years' experience in the business he knew we had to have that kind of script to raise the backing.

Lazenby and Endfield took the project to Frederick Schwartz of Appaloosa Productions, who raised the finance. His co producer was Donald Factor, of the Factor family, who had left the family business six years earlier to work in filmmaking; his credits included That Cold Day in the Park. Half the budget of £300,000 was raised from a bank with the rest coming from the cast and crew agreeing to deferred payment.

The movie was announced in November 1970. Lazenby described the movie at the time as "anti-guns and anti-Bond... a [comedy] with no plot. It is really just a series of happenings which keep the audience entertained. This is the kind of film which is coming out in Europe now."

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