Buckman Jim Hutton as Greg Parker Vera Miles as Madelyn Buckman Jay C. Flippen as Jack Lomax Bruce Cabot as Joe Horn Barbara Stuart as Irene Foster Edward Faulkner as George Harris Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez as Hernando (Houseboy) (uncredited) Cactus Pryor as Chance's Doctor Edmund Hashim as Colonel Valdez Alberto Morin as General Lopez Howard Finch as Ed 'Cal' Calhoun Valentin de Vargas as Amal Bokru Frances Fong as Madame Loo Laraine Stephens as Helen Meadows Alan Caillou as Harry York John Alderson as Jim Hatch Big John Hamilton as Lipman Production Red Adair had been fighting fires since 1946. He was well known in the industry but became more generally known in 1962 after extinguishing the Devil's Cigarette Lighter Sahara Desert gas well fire. Clair Huffaker wrote an original script which was bought by Universal in February 1967. Robert Arthur was assigned to produce. John Wayne agreed to star in November 1967. Wayne made the film after The Green Berets. It reteamed him with Andrew McLaglen, with whom Wayne had made McLintock! (1963), and Jim Hutton, who had been in The Green Berets. This was the first film for which Wayne was paid $1 million. Unlike many of Wayne's films around this time, it was not made for his own company. Much of the filming took place on the Snodgrass Ranch just outside of Casper, Wyoming. During filming, a catering truck crashed into Wayne's trailer while the star was inside. However, he was not injured. Critical reception Hellfighters received mostly negative reviews, garnering a 13% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times described the film as a "slow moving, talkative, badly plotted bore". A. H. Weiler of The New York Times wrote that John Wayne made "actionful, if not stirringly meaningful, child's play of exotic disasters" and remarked that "the unrestrained cast and director maintain a welcome sense of humor". See also List of American films of 1968 John Wayne filmography List of firefighting films Notes External links Article in Popular Science on the making of the movie 1968 films 1960s action drama films 1968 adventure films 1960s romance films American adventure films American action drama films American romantic drama films 1960s English-language films Films about firefighting Universal Pictures films Films scored by Leonard Rosenman Films set in Houston Films shot in Houston Films set in Venezuela Films directed by Andrew McLaglen Works about petroleum 1968