The Sweeney

[Rondadoronron]

Originally Posted by platostotal

When those silly bicycles stop pottering around France I hope ITV4 goes back to showing The Sweeney in the afternoon (inappropriate time slot alert)

Saw Sweeney 2 in the cinema, so have fond memories of it, but Ron is pretty much spot on, the series is where the real fun is to be had, Guv.

[Rondadoronron]

S1, Ep1
2 Jan. 1975
Ringer
After Regan's car is stolen with invaluable surveillance photos from a stakeout, the thief gives a heads-up to Sweeney's target.

The first episode (Regan being the pilot) gets of to a flying start (teehee),it does'nt even feel like a first episode,the characters an action feel like old friends.Sporting a damn fine cast to,considering its eaely doors, Ian Hendry,Brian Blessed,Jill Townsend,Colin Douglas and good old Alan Lake not to mention a young looking June Brown.It has everything we have come to luv about The Sweeney,cool dialogue-
Det. Insp. Jack Regan: We're the Sweeney, son, and we haven't had any dinner - you've kept us waiting. So unless you want a kicking, you tell us where those photographs are.
Cooler clothes and shooters aplenty.The chemistry between Thaw and Waterman is there from the off and i don't think much changed character wise thru the entire series.There's no rose tinted glasses here,this series was good then and still is now.
Also luving Lake's Jason King moustache,pure class.

[platostotal]

What a cast, Lake, Blessed and Hendry. Really don't make stuff like that anymore, imagine 1975 grannies settling down with a cuppa to watch John Thaw and co. and this baby unfolded.

[Rondadoronron]

The Sweeney The Movie

[Vampix]

Originally Posted by Rondadoronron

Didn't the bloke with the double barrel shotgun play one of the villains in Peckinpah's Straw Dogs?

[Inspector Abberline]

good old Ken Hutchison probably appeared in every sort of drama on telly since the 1970's,and not adverse to a bit of buggery with Susan George,in the film of course.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Inspector Abberline

good old Ken Hutchison probably appeared in every sort of drama on telly since the 1970's,and not adverse to a bit of buggery with Susan George,in the film of course.

I remember him from Murphy's Mob.

[Inspector Abberline]

While the first Sweeney film was a welcome cinema outing for the great British 1970's cop show, it did slightly miss the mark a little, instead of dealing with all the petty criminal's and blaggers which scatter the Sweeney's manner.Instead, it dealt with political intrigue and a conspiracy and blackmail of a British politician, not really the usual bread and butter criminals we had become accustomed to in the television series and seemed a little bit out of the Flying Squad's remit.Although it did retain a smattering of what made the series great, a topless Lynda Bellingham being one of them.The second film called Sweeney 2 (1978) (there's a surprise) is much more like it, incorporating everything that was good about the series and adding a smattering of gory violence and some bad language and a little bit of T and A as well.Basically, Inspector Jack Regan and his loyal sidekick Sergeant George Carter and the rest of the team of the Flying Squad are on the trail of a bunch of dangerous and violent armed robbers who are spectacularly robbing banks and leaving a trail of death and destruction in their wake. Sweeney 2 is certainly a lot more faster paced than the previous outing, with plenty of car crashes and tooled up hard men.There is no doubt that they sexed it up a little knowing that they had stiff competition from the likes of Starsky and Hutch and American cop movies like Magnum Force.But there is no doubt were are on British soil, except when the boys fly out to Mediterranean to confront the robbers in their idyllic homes abroad.And like the television series, there are so many familiar faces of that period from good old Denholm Elliott as a corrupt police chief to a young looking Nigel Hawthorne as a new Police chief.Strange that originally this was only given a AA certificate yet it feels more violent, I think this is mainly down to the gritty feel of the film, it makes no apologies for what it is, and gives the fans of the show what it wants.

[Demoncrat]

Originally Posted by Rondadoronron

The Sweeney The Movie

That's Lynda Bellingham as the dead tart innit? Fought so...

[Susan Foreman]

Originally Posted by Inspector Abberline

Sweeney 2

I saw that at the cinema

It was second on the bill to 'Monty Python And The Holy Grail' of all films!