Book review – “With some guts behind it: the Making of Zulu” by Sheldon Hall

Excellent book on the making of one of my favourite action movies. Incredibly thorough – Hall goes through bios of all the main players, the different drafts of the scripts, production, promotion, etc. I was surprised the film wasn’t more successful in the US – can only surmise it was due to lack of American friendly names (Michael Caine wasn’t Caine yet and Stanley Baker was never a big star). Perhaps a bit too much detail at times (eg interviews with small bit part actors) but much of it fascinating eg only 250 Zulu extras were used, the fact that the role of the reverend’s daughter was larger in the original cut and there’s a scene where she came back at the end (hinting at a romance with Baker)