The most violent acts are committed in the name of war.

In the Hell of war there is only one pleasure left for man...


Long before Bo Derek, actor/director John Derek was playing Svengali with another movie-star wife, Ursula Andress. In Once Before I Die, Derek casts himself as a cavalry major and Andress as his mistress. Both captain and girl are marooned with a group of American marines in the Philippines. When the group is pinned down by Japanese aerial bombardment, Ursula is anxious to escape, and promises to service any man who helps her. The girl's machinations result in the death of practically every member of the group. The ads for Once Before I Die displayed a shot of a fetchingly underdressed Ursula Andress, lying invitingly on her back; alas, the only thing flat on its back was the film itself.

Once Before I Die is a 1966 war drama starring Ursula Andress and her husband John Derek, who also directed. The film was based on a 1945 novel Quit for the Next by Lieutenant Anthony March.[1]

In this film, a band of American soldiers and one woman get trapped behind enemy lines in the Philippines after the attack on Pearl Harbor. In harrowing circumstances, they struggle for courage and fight to stay alive.


Shortly after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese attack the Philippine islands. A group of polo-playing soldiers of the 26th Cavalry Regiment (United States) and their families are surprised far off in the countryside. Major Bailey (John Derek) leads them back to Manila, but the roads are jammed with fugitives.

On the trip, Bailey's fiancée Alex (Ursula Andress) talks with a young shy soldier (Rod Lauren) who tells her of his fears to die and admits that he has never been with a woman. Only once before he dies, he would like to have sex.


At a U. S. Cavalry station in the Philippines in 1941, Major Bailey and his Swiss fiancée, Alex, are caught in a surprise Japanese attack. After sending Alex ahead by car, Bailey and his men begin the long march through the jungles to Manila. After moving only a short distance, they overtake Alex, stalled in her car, and she joins the men on foot. During the journey that follows, Bailey is accidentally killed by an exploding hand grenade, Alex has sex with a virginal soldier before he dies, and the blood-thirsty Lieutenant Custer leads a senseless raid on an enemy stronghold. The horrified Alex watches the bloody massacre in which all of the Americans are killed. Left alone, she kills a young Japanese soldier and wanders down to a beach to await her fate.

Release Date: December 1966


Distrib: Seven Arts