Who Dares Wins (film) - Production

Production

According to the DVD commentary the film was made with the help of 22 SAS Regiment at Hereford, although the then commanding officer Peter de la Billiere initially refused to help in a pre-production meeting with Euan Lloyd. The director Ian Sharp, who was hired due to Lloyd's liking of his direction in The Professionals, was invited to Stirling Lines where he met with some of the troop who assaulted the Iranian Embassy. With the co-operation of the SAS achieved, production moved ahead swiftly with the first scenes shot in Portobello Road market in January 1982. An SAS trainer was used to train the actors portraying SAS troopers, although Sharp says Collin's required no training and impressed the SAS instructor with his skills. When it came time to shoot the SAS assault on the U.S. Embassy the crew had prepared the helicopters and stuntmen only for the SAS to offer to do the scene. Sharp couldn't refuse as he thought the look they gave just couldn't be replicated by the crew. During one of his visits to Stirling Lines, Sharp had met with a Fijian trooper who'd had a mishap during the Iranian Embassy assault. The trooper told how had got caught up in his descent and his uniform caught fire due to the explosives used for their forced entry. Inspired by this Sharp had a similar scene inserted. Filming wrapped after 7 weeks and Lloyd started to organise the publicity campaign, but like his previous film The Wild Geese word had already started to spread that the film was a right-wing propaganda film attacking the peace protesting CND organisation. Nothing could be further from the truth but to no avail the film had gained a bad reputation before its release.