Encouraged by his success with the rollicking action romp The Wild Geese, intrepid producer Euan Lloyd came thundering out of the same paddock with this maritime Second World War version. Starring a trio of venerable old sea dogs, the exploits are headed up by Gregory Peck, quite unaccountably attempting a most ill-advised English accent, which is especially disturbing when pitched, literally, alongside Roger Moore and David Niven, with whom he once stormed the cliffs at Navarone. Amazingly, this tosh was written, as was its predecessor, by the distinguished screenwriter Reginald Rose (12 Angry Men) and directed with some verve by Andrew V McLaglen, but there's little point in pretending this has any real merit. It's not boring, though, for all sorts of strange reasons.

A German spy is passing on information about the location of Allied ships in the neutral harbor of Goa, India, with catastrophic results. Unable to undertake a full military operation in the Portuguese stronghold, English intelligence brings out of retirement a crew of geriatric ex-soldiers, veterans from World War I, using their age as cover. These old soldiers are asked to take to the seas and pull off an unlikely undercover mission.