North Sea Hijack  ★★½

ACTION adventure North Sea Hijack (1980) is not what I expected.

The premise and promotional material suggest an elite military unit battling terrorists who have commandeered a remote oil platform and are demanding a king’s ransom to not destroy it.

The era of film-making would also suggest a conventional treatment, elevated by decent performances, an imposing set and interesting location.

We partly get that, but we mainly get an odd character study from Roger Moore, that dominates the film and ultimately provides the lasting impression.

Moore is in parts imposing, perplexing and hilarious in his depiction of Rufus Excalibur Ffolkes, the eccentric leader of the private mercenary group hired by the British Government to regain control of the facility through deadly force.

Ffolkes lives in a castle with a living area he shares with several pet cats. He hates women, mainly because he was forced to wear hand-me-down clothes by his five sisters, and slugs back whisky like there’s a looming shortage.

Resplendent in a Where’s Wally style beanie, he uses live grenades during training sessions to ensure his men are kept on their toes.

When quieter moments of precise anti-terrorism planning are required, he breaks out his cat-themed nedlework to help him concentrate.

While the story does progress to a reasonably satisfying dramatic conclusion on the beseiged platform, the constant focus on Moore’s character, while interesting and humorous in itself, detracts significantly from the build-up of suspense.

With Anthony Perkins surprisingly subdued as the terrorist leader, it’s an odd reversal of expectations that completely unbalances the film.

If you want to see similar and better stories produced during the same area seek out titles like 1974’s Juggernaut with Richard Harris , John Frankenheimer’s Black Sunday from 1977 or even Moore’s turns in The Wild Geese or Shout at the Devil.

In comparison, North Sea Highjack suffers badly from static, tele-visual direction complete with straight zooms, surprising consider the director Andrew V.McLaglen also made Wild Geese in 1978 and The Sea Wolves, also in 1980 and starring Moore.

So, a real oddity this one, but still worth watching out of passing interest or for Roger Moore completists interested in the periods between Bond films when he was trying to forge an alternate, more lasting screen persona.