Farewell to the King is a 1989 American action adventure drama film written and directed by John Milius.

It stars Nick Nolte, Nigel Havers, Frank McRae, and Gerry Lopez and is loosely based on the 1969 novel Farewell to the King by Pierre Schoendoerffer.

During World War II, American deserter Learoyd escapes a Japanese firing squad.

Hiding in the wilds of Borneo, Learoyd is adopted by a head-hunting tribe of Dayaks, who consider him divine because of his blue eyes.

Tom Harrisson's stay with the Dayaks during the Second World War was the inspiration for much of what happened in the novel along with the allied drop behind Japanese lines known as Operation Semut.

[2][5] The film was originally going to be made in 1972, directed by Schoendoerffer and produced by Robert Dorfman, starring Donald Sutherland.

In 1976, he said: My greatest fantasy is to go off to some foreign land and become a legend of some sort, like The Man Who Would Be King or Heart of Darkness.

Judge Roy Bean is very similar to it: the idea of a man going off to a primitive culture and becoming a legend and a god.

"Learoyd is a character who could have come out of one of those barbershop magazines of the '50s: 'I fought the (Japanese) with the headhunters in Borneo where I was king.'

He's sitting on a throne with sloe-eyed beauties all around—a mai tai in one hand, a Thompson submachine gun in the other.

"[2] "You wouldn't call `Farewell to the King' a right-wing establishment movie, it's certainly not in favor of empire," said Milius.

He was a deserter, troublemaker, a '30s labor organizer, the sort of loveable guy that had great ideals, much more than Nigel Havers, [who plays the botanist], who has all the refinement of culture and empire.

"I'm a modern technology version of the Borneo tribal storyteller who squats near the fire in the long house and tells his tale.

"[8] Milius would have liked to have been able to exceed the two-hour running time limit by 10 minutes, and preferred his silent action sequences accompanied by Basil Poledouris music over the release print's realistic, percussive sound effects.

'"[8] He was also unhappy the edit removed how Learoyd managed to unify the Dyak tribes by getting the women to hold a sex strike.

The producers - Al Ruddy and Andre Morgan - who are friends of mine now - were lied to by Orion executives.

[14] Mike Medavoy, Milius' former agent who was head of Orion Pictures at the time, wrote in 2002 that: Many things stopped Farewell to the King from being successful.

Perhaps audiences weren't ready to see a white soldier become the king of an indigenous tribe in Borneo.

Ebert praised Nolte for his skill as an actor, and his ability to inhabit a role rather than merely visit.