I taped this off UK Channel 4 in the '80's - the adverts I unfortunately included are more dated than the film itself now. Britain's colonial past is paraded before us - it's worth remembering however that Egypt only finally ditched British and French masters as late as 1956, from then on preferring American masters instead.
The title cashes in on the first "Biggles" book by W.E. Johns published a year or so before - but of course the film bears hardly any comparison to the book, but is OK in its own right. Jack, working for the British-Egyptian air force, has to stop dope smuggling across the desert, organised by an American (Hartley Power) controlling a band of singing Riff robbers. On the way he meets ever smiling Anna Lee and they fall instantly in love. This makes it the odder that he ends up singing his famous song "Who's been polishing the Sun" to a squatting dopey tribesman! This is the only song in the film and it was not the version that was commercially available.
Without ads my copy runs 70 minutes, so maybe the PC censor had already done some chopping by 1989. Some nice primitive aerial footage of the pyramids etc, some nice olde style charming gags make TCAC a pleasant, if not very enlightening experience.
The title cashes in on the first "Biggles" book by W.E. Johns published a year or so before - but of course the film bears hardly any comparison to the book, but is OK in its own right. Jack, working for the British-Egyptian air force, has to stop dope smuggling across the desert, organised by an American (Hartley Power) controlling a band of singing Riff robbers. On the way he meets ever smiling Anna Lee and they fall instantly in love. This makes it the odder that he ends up singing his famous song "Who's been polishing the Sun" to a squatting dopey tribesman! This is the only song in the film and it was not the version that was commercially available.
Without ads my copy runs 70 minutes, so maybe the PC censor had already done some chopping by 1989. Some nice primitive aerial footage of the pyramids etc, some nice olde style charming gags make TCAC a pleasant, if not very enlightening experience.