In March 1943, in the World War II, the Germans use the neutral harbor of the Portuguese colony of Mormugoa to transmit information to a U-Boat about the allied ships to sink them in international waters. In Calcutta, the British Intelligence assigns Colonel Lewis Pugh (Gregory Peck) and Captain Gavin Stewart (Roger Moore) to spy in Goa and they discover that there are three German vessels anchored in the area and the famous spy Trompeta (Wolf Kahler) is based in Goa. They kidnap Trompeta to interrogate him but Lewis accidentally kills the spy after fighting with him in the runaway car. Meanwhile Gavin has one night stand with the gorgeous and elegant Mrs. Cromwell (Barbara Kellerman), who is the partner of Trompeta. They fail in their mission, but Lewis and Gavin convince their chief to use the veterans from Calcutta Light Horse led by the retired Colonel W.H. Grice (David Niven) to travel to Goa on board of the old ship Phoebe, pretending to be drunken businessmen on holiday. They prepare to destroy the Ehrenfels and the two other Nazi radio ships and get the German secret codes under the command of Lewis. Meanwhile Gavin on shore has a love affair Mrs. Cromwell and prepares the diversion to facilitate the mission of Lewis and his men.

"The Sea Wolves" is an entertaining adventure apparently based on a true but incredible story. The use of retired military in the operation in a neutral zone seems to be too fantastic and romantic to be true and does not make sense why risky the operation exposing old men and not real soldiers. Would it make any difference to England after the sinking of twelve allied vessels? The unknown Barbara Kellerman is really a pretty woman and tailored for the role of a seductive spy. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Espionagem em Goa" ("Spionage in Goa")

The story in "The Sea Wolves" is based on a real and rather strange episode in World War II history. Not wanting to provoke an international incident with neutral Portugal, the British decide to attack a German ship docked in Goa (an Indian city controlled at the time by the Portuguese) using civilians....elderly non-coms at that! They need to destroy or capture the boat because the ship is being used against Allied shipping. And, the film starred a lot of older stars--the likes of Gregory Peck, David Niven, Roger Moore and Trevor Howard! This really sounds like an interesting story, right? Well, oddly, it wasn't. In fact, after a while I was just looking forward to the film ending. Why? Well, I think the problem is mostly because none of the characters were very interesting. They had a nice idea but the writer simply didn't instill enough in the characters to make them the least bit endearing or realistic. Sad. As a result, it's a film that you could watch if you have nothing better to do or you could just skip it. My vote? Flip a coin.

While it is a long way from a terrible film, 'The Sea Wolves' was a disappointment considering the talented cast and that the story could have been a really good one if executed well.

Starting with the good things about it, the best asset of 'The Sea Wolves' is the climax, which is sheer rousing excitement and the most riveting 'The Sea Wolves' gets. The locations also are quite nice and evoke a sense of atmosphere, the most professional the film looks by quite some margin. The direction has occasional verve, particularly towards in the climax and the build up to it.

A couple of the performances are good. Best of the bunch is David Niven, who brings understated dignity to his role, while Patrick MacNee has fun with his and Barbara Kellerman is a gorgeously sensual but appropriately dangerous femme fatale.

On the other hand, Gregory Peck (so brilliant in the likes of 'Roman Holiday' and 'To Kill a Mockingbird') is robotic and sleepwalks through his role. Roger Moore both over-compensates and slums it, trying too hard to be suave and such but coming over as cheesy and Trevor Howard's screen time is too short with a character that's severely underwritten and the dialogue awkward (a waste).

Visually, only the locations impress. The photography, like most of the direction, is pedestrian and routine, and also looking like it would be out of date even in the late 70s-early 80s. The costumes, hairstyles and make-up mostly look cheap and noticeably anachronistic to the period.

Can't say any better news about the music. The score doesn't fit at all and always at odds tonally, often setting a completely different mood to the storytelling with constant crying out for a darker edge. Even Matt Monro's marvellous singing can't stop the song (not a particularly good song to begin with) feeling so out of place and similarly ill-suited to the mood and the subject of the story.

Dialogue is long-winded and stilted and the story only comes to life in the climax. The rest is dull and severely lacking in thrills or suspense, not helped by the unnecessary spy subplots which drags the film down and convolutes it as well.

Overall, while the climax excites, the locations are nice and a few performances are good, the rest of 'The Sea Wolves' just didn't engage me. 4/10 Bethany Cox