Richard Attenborough was never a movie star like James Garner, Steve McQueen, or even Charles Bronson, but he absolutely steals the show in this movie.
I love it when stars from other countries can steal every scene they're in from the Hollywood elites lol. As if to say "Show them what real acting is, not the Hollywood hype....."
TBR That British officer wearing white trench coat was Richard Attenborough aka John Hammond, founder of Jurassic Park (1993), 30 years apart between two iconic movies.
Fact is that Attenborough served in WWII in RAF (1940 to 1945) During his pilot training, Attenborough joined newly RAF Film Production Unit at Pinewood Studios. Main function of the unit was to film several operations over in Europe.
Three of the actors, Steve McQueen, James Coburn, and Charles Bronson, are in the western The Magnificent Seven. One of the greatest westerns ever made. It's directed by John Sturges who directed this film. It also has music by the same composer for this film, Elmer Bernstein. Definitely one you should watch.
As a child, Charles Bronson worked in a coal mine. He developed claustrophobia. Making this film was very hard on him. In those tunnels, when his character struggles, he was not acting.
Rip David McCallum. I do believe he was one of the last surviving cast of this masterpiece. They are all having a cuppa in heaven with the real escapers. God bless all those guys. Heroes all
German officers who have yellow color tabs like the commandant of the camp were from flying units. The guards usually have red tabs which indicate they are ground units.
I might have the numbers slightly wrong, but if I remember correctly - in real life 76 escaped, 73 were recaptured and 50 were summarily murdered on Hitler's personal order. One of the fifty murdered was my grandfather on my mom's side, Flight Lieutenant Patrick Langford. R.I.P. grandpa.
@@SPEEDPAINTER1 not so much for me, but I wish my mom could have gotten to know her own father. He enlisted in the royal Canadian air force in Dec. of '39 when mum was 4 years old.
One of the parts of the movie that bothers me is the almost total lack of representation of the Canadian involvement in the escape and misrepresentation of the American involvement. Canadians played a big part and were nowhere to be seen in the movie aside from one small mention at the beginning. Wally Floody (who acted as a consultant for the movie) was in charge of the tunnels. He was recommended as the consultant by the book's author Paul Brickhill who was unable to do it. Brickhill was also a prisoner there.
Three of the main actors in this movie, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, and Lee Marvin, all got their big break staring in the 1960 movie "The Magnificent Seven" with Yul Brenner and Eli Wallach.
At the beginning of the movie Donald Pleasance- Collins, the guy who went blind- made a few suggestions, and the director told him to just do his acting job and keep his suggestions to himself. Then it was revealed that he had actually been in a German POW camp during WWII.
"Colin" is the character's first name, like Colin Firth or Colin Kaepernick. His last name is "Blythe". And yes, Donald Pleasance is always amazing. Did you ever see his episode of "The Twilight Zone"?
Feels similar to how Sir Christopher Lee corrected Peter Jackson on the LotR set where he told people exactly what sound people make when they stabbed, because he was a liaison officer for SOE in WWII and knew the sound.
@@davidekstrand8544 Ohhh, I forgot that. I love the film (and the book), I forgot Pleasance was in it. Thanks. It would be great if they did that one, too.
Both his and Ashley-Pitt's characters were created because out of the 23 who were recaptured, seventeen were sent back to Stalug Luft III and six were sent to death camps, but two of the six's fates were left unknown.
My Grandfather was in a POW camp in Zell Am See in Austria, he escaped by hiding under a train for 1000 miles to Girona, Spain. He never talked about the war, but after he passed away we found a diary from that period. Unfortunately, he wasn't exactly Hunter S Thompson, so even though a crazy story, I don't think with entries like "it was cold and wet today" and "ate a raw potatoe for lunch" he'll ever get his own movie.
Might not have been a wordsmith, but he was a brave man and a hero! Should think of letting someone fill in the blanks and write his story. Hell I'd be tempted to have a go at it. Either way, your grandfather was a hero
fact is rarely as exciting as fiction. Even the most historically accurate films are still 100x more exciting than the real thing due to Academy Award winning screenplay writers and the dialogue.
In WW2, each country had prisoners segregated by branch of service and guarded by their counterpart service, so navy prisoners were in camps run by the german Kriegsmarine, air force prisoners in camps run by the Luftwaffe, and army prisoners in camps run by the Heer. This is a Luftstalag, so all of the prisoners are British, Canadian, or American air force personnel. German Uniforms are easiest to distinguish by looking at the rank insignia on their collars. The camp guards have between 1 and 4 wings on each collar, the commandant has wings inside a wreath, etc. These are Luftwaffe personnel. The collar patches are different colors to denote different areas of training: Yellow for flight personnel and paratroopers, red for Air defense. The SS and Waffen SS have different patches: one side is 2x Old Norse "sig" runes (letter "S"), and the other side is a series of pips or oak leaves and pips.
Henley was James Garner, one of the most likeable human beings in Hollywood - I've never heard anybody say anything but what a great guy he was. Of all the movies he was in, Garner's personal favorite was The Americanization of Emily with Julie Andrews, but he was in other highly rated movies as well. He also had a major TV career - he first became a star in a 1950s western series called Maverick, and later starred in a very successful detective series called The Rockford Files (1970s). The Rockford Files ran during the years I was in high school and was my absolute favorite show at the time - still worth checking out.
He could handle a racecar too. Apparently the pro racecar drivers who were consultants and did some stunts in the racing movie "Grand Prix" were hugely impressed by Garner's natural talent as a driver. Garner did all his own driving for that movie. I used to watch The Rockford Files, one of my favorites. What a guy!
This flic is - like "Das Boot" - one of the greatest movies of all time! It was shot at the same location / studios like "Das Boot": Bavaria Studios at Geiselgasteig/Munich. Shots in the 3rd act were taken in southeren Germany (Würthemberg + Bavaria) It is a movie that is absolutely timeless!
This film is fairly accurate to what happened. Though there was one major difference that was a huge plot point which was the season. The prisoners escaped during winter. It was rather a harsh winter and a lot of them turned themselves in as they were scattered out in the wild and snow freezing to death. Though Hitler wanted them all executed, someone convinced him to only execute 50. One of the escapees did indeed get caught when when a German officer said "Good Luck" to him.
Also the characters were fictionalized although based on true characters, some amalgamations of different people and their roles. There was only one American involved in the escape (and even he was a British citizen before the war and in the British army) and no exciting motorcycle chase, though it made for fantastic action. The ironically named Wally Floody, a Canadian, was in charge of engineering the tunnels and was a tunnel king, serving as a consultant for the film so the techniques used in the escape were accurate. The three men who did go all the way were a Dutchman and 2 Norwegians and they blended in better, being from occupied countries. Despite the historical nitpicks, it still is one of my favorite movies of all time.
Hey guys! I wanted to add a bit of history that hopefully no one else has mentioned. The reason the relationship between the prisoners and guards was because they were all pilots so there was mutual respect between the German Luftwaffe officers and British, American and polish airmen.
Another thing that is interesting to me Is the surprisingly atypical portrayal of the German camp kommandant, who wasn't a fan of Hitler. The Luftwaffe was the least nazified of germany's armed forces.
And they were adhering the the Geneva Conventions, which affords POWs who are officers special privileges that enlisted men didn't get (besides Russians), a major one being no forced labor (which would be a major plot point in another amazing, classic WW2 movie Bridge on the River Kwai. But there was also this old fashioned "gentlemen mutual respect" between pilots of opposing armies that carried over from WW1. Crazy times.
@@chimpymcmonkey5402 This was true to life. The real commandant was so horrified about the executions he allowed the prisoners to build a memorial to the Fifty that still exists in Poland. The prisoners later testified in his defense at Nuremberg.
@@chimpymcmonkey5402 In real life, when rumors of the Allies mistreating German prisoners led to calls for reprisals in the form of executing Allied prisoners, the real life commandant, Col. Von Lindeiner, held a confidential meeting with his deputy commandant, Maj. Simoleit, to discuss what to do if they received orders to kill prisoners as reprisal. Simoleit said "If I should receive such a dreadful order I would refuse to obey. I prefer to be executed for military insubordination and would not try to save my miserable life by obeying." Von Lindeiner shook Simoleit's hand and told him "We both know what we have to do." Von Lindeiner donated to building a memorial for the 50 escapees who were killed by the Gestapo. After surrendering to the British, he testified in the Allies' investigation of the killings. Von Lindeiner's former prisoners actually came forward to testify in his defense, saying that he adhered to the Geneva Conventions in his treatment of POWs and that he had earned the respect of the prisoners. He was repatriated in 1947 and died at the age of 82 just months before the theatrical release of "The Great Escape."
Henley was james garner (the Rockford files)Donald pleasance was a james bond Vilan. Richard attenbrough was in jurassic Park and David McCallum was in the man from uncle
Fun Fact: Steve McQueen (The Cooler King) was also a stunt man and an excellent motorcyclist. During his big chase scene, he's actually one of the German soldiers chasing HIM. Fun Fact #2: "Big X" is played by Richard Attenborough, the guy who says the iconic line..."Welcome to Jurassic ParK." Fun Fact #3: Danny, "Tunnel King" is played by Charles Bronson, later known for films such as "Death Wish" (Another film you should react to :) Fun Fact #4: "The Forger" is played by Donald Pleasance, known for his role as Dr. Loomis in the original "Halloween"
Some might also recognise Ducky from NCIS playing Ashley-Pitt, James Garner from the Rockford Files as The Scrounger. James Coburn (the Manufacturer) and James Garner appeared together in the 1994 Maverick film with Mel Gibson.
“That Henley actor guy” is James Garner. If you get the chance, you should check out two of the classic series he starred in, “Maverick” and “The Rockford Files.” You won’t be sorry. He was also a major movie star, something was rare at the time for a TV actor. The guy had it all: charm, believability and the ability to play drama and comedy.
"You must be the dumbest lookin ape I ever seen. I didn't think anybody would be ridicules enough to try and follow me in a big red Cadillac convertible. But there you where chrome rims and all."
In the reality, as in the film, the commandant of the camp was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to the eastern front. He survived the war and in the 1960s he was invited to England by the veteran club for the survivors of the camp to a traditional gathering. The former POWs celebrated the former Commandant as a very decent officer and a gentleman.
Steve McQueen, James Garner, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, Richard Attenborough ("Jurassic Park") are all veterans. Donald Pleasence was a German POW. Charles Bronson was claustrophobic, having spent several years as a coal miner.
Stephen King loved this movie so much, he made a tribute to it in Shawshank by making Andy dispose of his wall the same way they disposed of the dirt in the Great Escape.
but thats the part which detroys the movie. you have around 60.000kg of dirt per tunnel. Thats 3 Truckloads of dirt. and they had to 60000 times empty their trouthers. And that only per tunnel. I dont know how they didi it in reality. But try to dump 150 t somwhere withou anybody noticeing it.
@@eve-llblyat2576 they had a bunch of ways they hid the dirt. But the trouser thing was absolutely one of the ways they did it so I'm not sure why that "destroys the movie"
Fun Great Escape Movie Fact: Steve McQueen performed many of the motorbike stunts himself, sometimes dressed as a German soldier, so at one point during the film, McQueen is actually chasing himself, during the motorbike chase. :)
Donald Pleasance (Colin) was an actual POW in WWII, he was a wireless operator in the RAF and flew in over 60 missions before his Lancaster bomber was shot down in 1944. He said that the set was a very accurate depiction of a German POW camp. Charles Bronson (Danny) was a coal miner before becoming an actor, and advised the production on the actualities of digging underground. Similarly to his character in the film, Bronson developed claustrophobia from his experiences as a coal miner. Unlike his character though, Bronson was fluent in Russian having spoken it as his first language from childhood. James Garner (Hendley) based his "scrounger" character on his own experiences as a "self confessed scrounger" during his military service in the Korea War.
Henley, James Garner, is in a real good movie with Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, and Donald Southerland called Space Cowboys. They're all much older, but it's a really good movie.
This is a movie that should be passed down and shared through generations. I saw this when it came out in 1963 at our little hometown theatre when I was just a kid. When my sons were around 9 or 10 I shared this movie with them. They loved it and spent the next couple of weeks whistling the theme song. My oldest son told me he shared the movie with his children...my grandchildren. Now he and his son are whistling the theme song while doing their chores. I loved hearing that! It's sad that some of these great movies will be forgotten if they are not shared.
It warms my heart to see so many people recommending Stalag 17. It's been an all-time favorite of mine forever but I haven't met that many people that have seen it.
ye gotta do 'a bridge too far', unbelievable cast (Hopkins, Caan, Redford, O'Neal, Olivier, Hackman, Bogarde, Fox, Caine, Schell, Kruger, Connery) and largely true ww2 story too, one of the best war films ever made in the west... and directed by Big X himself, Richard Attenborough!
Same with my sister. She was working at a golf club/hotel where he was staying and he called her "honey" when he made some reservations on the phone. She told that story for years.
At the time of filming, some things were still classified. Among those was the amount of smuggling that happened with Red Cross Packages. Things like special made cardboard, when you take the multiple layers apart, you'll find maps or documents. Magnetized needles (for compassess) hidden inside the edges of the boxes etc.
The Camp Commandant was not killed. The Gestapo investigated the escape and, whilst this uncovered no significant new information, von Lindeiner was removed and threatened with court martial. He feigned mental illness to avoid imprisonment. In February 1945, he was wounded by Russian troops advancing towards Berlin while acting as second in command of an infantry unit defending Sagan. He later surrendered to advancing British forces as the war ended. Von Lindener was imprisoned for two years at the British prisoner of war camp known as the "London Cage". He testified during the British SIB investigation concerning the Stalag Luft III murders. Allied former prisoners at Stalag Luft III testified that he had followed the Geneva Conventions concerning the treatment of POWs and had won the respect of the senior prisoners. He died in 1963.
I highly recommend the 1968 action crime thriller BULLITT, where Steve McQueen plays a San Francisco Police Detective who gets ahold of a mob witness/corruption case and won't let go. It has the most realistic car chase in film history. It won the Oscar for Best Film Editing.
German actor Hannes Messemer plays Colonel von Luger (the camp commandant). He's based on the real life Colonel Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau (the commandant of Stalag Luft III during the actual great escape). Like the fictional von Luger, the real Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau was anti-Nazi, and a number of former British POWs testified in his favor during an investigation concerning the murder of the escapees. They noted that the colonel was respectful of them and followed the Geneva Conventions regarding the treatment of POWs.
A lot of the actors during those times were actual WWII veterans. Charles Bronson grew up so poor he had to wear his sisters dresses to school and started working in coal mines when he was 10. He is claustrophobic in real life and said in an interview he would never again step into a mine or tunnel.
When James Garner (Hendley) starred in the TV series "The Rockford Files," there was an article about him in TV Guide that started with the line "James Garner is like Sara Lee. Nobody doesn't like him" (referencing the Sara Lee dessert company's popular commercial jingle "Everybody doesn't like something, but nobody doesn't like Sara Lee"). He was always known for that likable, "regular guy" persona.
My mom bought that TV Guide when we were grocery shopping. She saw his picture on the cover and thought it looked so much like my dad that she had to get it (she never bought magazines). She kept it for years 🙂
Yet one of the most infamous pieces of footage of him is that moment in that racing film where he lost the rag with someone. And yes i know from reading about him he was well liked and popular but imagine once in your life having an off day and it gets captured for posterity.....
One day, the police in the German town where this movie was shot set up a speed trap near the set. Several members of the cast and crew were caught, including Steve McQueen. The Chief of Police told McQueen "Herr McQueen, we have caught several of your comrades today, but you have won the prize (for the highest speeding)." McQueen was arrested and briefly jailed.
Another Steve McQueen movie you really need to watch is THE TOWERING INFERNO, where a San Francisco fire chief and an architect, (Paul Newman), try to save his girlfriend, (Faye Dunaway), and others,(William Holden, Fred Astaire, Richard Chamberlain, Robert Wagner, Susan Blakely, Jennifer Jones, OJ Simpson and Robert Vaughn,) stuck in a burning high rise.
Based on the book, a true story, and very true to the book's narrative. Some great actors and acting. One of Charles Bronson's rare movies without a mustache, and i think you've seen James Garner previously in Maverick i think. I always liked that the Aussie (James Coburn) escaped.
One of those films that get better and better the more you watch it. Its a broad comedy but still has little comic touches sprinkled throughout the film that it takes multiple viewings to get them all.
Perhaps one of my favorite WWII movies of the 60s. If you want to know more about the true story based on this film, you'll need to read the book by Paul Brickhill ( who died in 1991 and was born in Australia in 1916)"The Great Escape." Best known for writing several historical books on WW2 subjects, the most famous being "The Great Escape" filmed in 1963 (The Great Escape (1963)) with Steve McQueen. Brickhill himself was a prisoner of the camp in question, Stalag Luft III, and participated in what was to be the most famous prison break in World War II. James Garner who played Hendley has been in many great movies. As a kid I grew up warching him in the TV show "Maverick" (1957-1962) but he is best known for the TV detective/police show "The Rockford Files" (1974-1980). The best movies I have of him him in that's in my collection, along with "The Great Escape," are "The Children's Hour" (1961) with Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine and Veronica Cartwright, "Murphy's Romance" (1985) with Sally Fields, "Fire in the Sky," (1993) with D.B. Sweenet and Henry Thomas, and "The Notebook" (2004) with Gena Rollands and Ryan Gosling. Hope you get to see these when you get the chance.
As a Scot this one is even more exciting because of all the Celts in the cast: James Donald (Ramsay - the SBO), David McCallum (Askley-Pitt - Disperal), Gordon Jackson (MacDonald - Intelligence) and Angus Lennie (Ives- the Mole). Though nobody would ever know the first two were Scottish.
Donald Plesance, who played Colin, was actually in the RAF in WWII as a radio operator on a Lancaster bomber. He was shot down over Germany in 1944. Captured, he was a POW at Luft Stalag I for the remainder of the war. Plesance acted and entertained his fellow POWs while imprisoned. He was discharged in 1946 after being liberated.
If you want to check out other great Steve McQueen movies, I highly suggest "Sand Pebbles," (1966), inspired by true events, and "Papillon" (1973) also based on the account of an actual prisoner on Devil's Island, French Guyana. Both films have some all-too-realistic, gut-wrenching moments, but also outstanding performances by McQueen. Some have said that Sand Pebbles was McQueen's only shot at an Oscar.
For the record, there was no American involvement in the real escape, but they feared that an all British escape would not appeal to an American movie audience, hence the addition of McQueen and some other American actors to play non British roles.
You can't beat a classic. No green screen was harmed in the making of this movie. Also check out The Flight of The Phoenix (1965). Just stay clear of the 2004 remake.
Stalag 17 never impressed me. Yes, Holden is good, but much of the movie seems more like the play from which it was derived. Billy Wilder made some great films, but Stalag 17 is not one of them, IMO.
Donald Pleasance the actor playing the "Forger" flew over 60 missions in bombers in WW2 and was shot down and was imprisoned in the same sort of camp. Sweden was one of two neutral counties in Europe in WW2 and they were escaping in a ship sailing there. That really did happen.
Stalag.17 comedy? Two pies shot dead right away, fear of a spy within the POW's, one prisoner only caring about himself. It's a lot more like king rat.
Interesting fact: the guy who created “Hogan’s Heroes” was the same guy who produced and got “The Godfather” made. A fantastic series was made of the story of the making of The Godfather called “The Offer”, which you can see on Paramount+
Yes, William Holden was in Stalag 17 (I believe he won an Oscar). And, because it’s directed by the legendary Billy Wilder, there are moments of levity with Richard Strauss and Harvey Lembeck. William Holden is an early cinematic “anti-hero.” I’ll say no more, except watch this movie!
FUN FACT: The actor who plays Ashley-Pitt (The guy with the sand dispersal technique with the trousers) played by David McCallum, also had a musical career. His song called "The Edge" was sampled by Snoop Dogg for the song "The next episode"
James Donald, who played the British senior officer, seemed to be in virtually every other British war film made from 1940 to 1964, including “The Bridge on the River Kwai.”
I honestly think Colin saying "thank you for getting me out .." to James Garners character as he draws his last breath and dies is one of the saddest moments I've ever seen in any film.
@@Madbandit77 Haha I saw what you did there. But seriously it was a good show. It's also how we got Stuart Margolin in The Rockford Files. Though by 72' he was doing Love, American Style.
@@brucechmiel7964Margolin, who passed away last year, earned two guest Emmys as squirrel-brain con man Evelyn "Angel" Martin on "Rockford". The execs at NBC at the time didn't like him, but Garner fought for him.
The thing I find curious, is the amount of wood they are trying to scrounge and then when they shut down the other two and focus all their efforts on Tom including the wood, and then Tom gets discovered. CLEARLY they can’t get back into Tom. Otherwise they would’ve continued it and as such, they can’t go salvage that wood so all of that wood is wasted so now that they have to abandon Tom and open up Harry where the heck do they get the wood for that tunnel since they put everything in Tom
A little gossip… David McCallum’s wife, Jill Ireland, was staying on the set. She developed a romance with Charles Bronson, who she later married. The screenplay was written by James Clavell who had been a POW of the Japanese. He wrote King Rat about his experiences, along with major best sellers. Many commenters ignore the role Bud Elkins, a great stuntman, played in the motorcycle chase and jumps.
Starting some time around 1970, this was shown on British tv every Christmas (I know) for about 20 years, it became part of our holiday tradition and every iconic scene and phrase was absorbed into our consciousness. glad you liked it too - 'Good luck'. 👍
British actor Donald Pleasence, who plays the forger who goes blind, was also a technical advisor for the film. He was the only man in the film team who had experience as a POW during the war - he served as a navigator onboard an RAF bomber when he was shot down over Germany. Pleasence made several attempts to escape, in the same way as portrayed in the film. He was also tortured by the Gestapo.
The James Garner movie I'd recommend is "The Americanization of Emily" (1964), which is one of the best antiwar films ever made. Good acting, unforgetable dialogue, and a message that'll make you rethink a lot of societal norms.
YES!!! One of the greatest true stories ever made! Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Donald Pleasance, James Donald, Charles Bronson, Angus Lennie, David McCallum, Gordon Jackson, John Leyton, and James Coburn star in this WWII epic.
True story , but movie is highly inaccurate , by last survivor of the escape team ,Jack Lyon , died in 2019 at age 101 , shots were fired before he could get in to the tunnel. 76 escaped , 73 were recaptured , 50 were executed by order from Adolf himself , only 3 men were able to get away , Per Bergsland , Norwegian RAF pilot , Jens Müller, Norwegian RAF pilot and Bram van der Stok , Dutch RAF pilot ... Per and Jens did go to Sweden and Bram , via France to Spain , so that part was accurate . Also the whole camp hold nearly 11 000 POWs , in 10´ x 12´ huts , in movie its tiny camp with bigger barracks .
These people are legends. Im not sure they can understand who is Charles Bronson, James Garner, James Coburn.... These guys are bigger stars than any movie actors today.
one of my favourite classics BUT sadly all new releases on bluray, as vod and on uhd are cropped as hell :-( only the original mgm-dvd shows the amazing wide cinemascope picture with the wonderful picture composition.
Another war film you should watch is the 1953 film STALAG 17, where POW'S begin to learn that one of their own might be a Nazi spy, but which one? William Holden stars.
It’s amazing how many not only recognizable, but famous actors appear throughout this entire film. A good approximate depiction of what really happened in WWII, and great filmmaking. Thanks for watching it. I haven’t finished the reaction, yet, but it takes a great director to make you wish a film as long as this one wasn’t over when it finishes. Thanks, guys.
My father-in-law, a B-17 co-pilot, was forced to jump out of his plane over Hungary and captured. He was sent to Stalag Luft III, approximately three to four weeks after the Great Escape. As Paul Brickhill's book details, the Russians liberated the POWs of Stalag Luft III in January 1945. BTW, there were 10.949 inmates, so 250 escapees was not "all of them" by a long shot. The actual escape took place in March and it was cold and snowy. The two who boarded the Stockholm weren't in Sweden, but they had reached a major harbor and boarded a freighter headed for Sweden, which was officially neutral in the war. When my wife and her brother watched this movie with their father during the CBS Thursday and Friday Nights at the Movies back in the late 60s/early 70s, they knew better than to turn around and ask him about his POW experience. Men rarely discussed such things back then, and the only stories he told about being a POW at Stalag Luft III were short funny ones. A quick footnote: When my dad saw this movie with my sister and I at the same time, he noted that he had friends on the railroad in Port Arthur TX who remembered the teenaged Steve McQueen riding his motorcycle the same way he does in this movie, when he worked in some unsavory places on the Gulf waterfront.
One of my favorite James Garner movie is The Americanization of Emily. He plays another scrounger who works for an Admiral right before D-Day. Also stars Julie Andrews, and James Coburn (who plays the Australian Sedgwick in this movie). Both Garner and Andrews considered it their favorite movies that they made.
In a documentary, they interviewed one of the escapees. He said he sailed through checkpoint after checkpoint, his papers passing inspection each time. He said he was getting confident that he would make it, but then a German guard examined his papers and immediately arrested him. He asked the German (who spoke some english) how he knew they were forgeries. "No one walks around in the exact same clothing that they're wearing in their passport." 😲 The Red Cross was used to smuggle in ridiculous amount of contraband into POW camps. The OSS had an entire department dedicated to hiding anything and everything in those care packages. Maps, compass', money (to bribe guards), even radios. Anything that could help an escape. Oh, and the POWs who didn't have any escape related skills, they still helped. Their job was to keep everything as normal as possible to keep the guards from getting suspicious.... and help dispose of all that dirt. It really was a team effort.
Richard Attenborough was never a movie star like James Garner, Steve McQueen, or even Charles Bronson, but he absolutely steals the show in this movie.
He was a well known and respected actor in Britain.
@@MsAppassionata Perhaps I should have said "Hollywood movie star."
I love it when stars from other countries can steal every scene they're in from the Hollywood elites lol. As if to say "Show them what real acting is, not the Hollywood hype....."
The screenwriter, James Clavell, was a POW in the war, held by the Japanese. He would later write the best selling series Shogun.
His Asia Saga books are incredible.
'Where Eagle's Dare' . . . 'The Dirty Dozen' . . . . 'Kelly's Heroes' - should be next on the list.
"Von Ryan's Express" with Frank Sinatra. Great WWII action/escape movie.
David McCallum (Eric) sadly passed away this week.
Another good 1960s "guys banding together to survive" movie is "The Flight of the Phoenix" (1965).
TBR
That British officer wearing white trench coat was Richard Attenborough aka John Hammond, founder of Jurassic Park (1993), 30 years apart between two iconic movies.
Fact is that Attenborough served in WWII in RAF (1940 to 1945) During his pilot training, Attenborough joined newly RAF Film Production Unit at Pinewood Studios. Main function of the unit was to film several operations over in Europe.
Three of the actors, Steve McQueen, James Coburn, and Charles Bronson, are in the western The Magnificent Seven. One of the greatest westerns ever made. It's directed by John Sturges who directed this film. It also has music by the same composer for this film, Elmer Bernstein. Definitely one you should watch.
Seven samurai
@@S_047 Also the basis for Battle Beyond the Stars. At least The Magnificent Seven mentions Seven Samurai in the credits.
Must watch
I wholeheartedly agree. The magnificent seven is a great movie! The great Escape and the magnificent Seven are 2 of my favorite movies.
Oh yes! The one from 1960. 🤠
As a child, Charles Bronson worked in a coal mine. He developed claustrophobia. Making this film was very hard on him. In those tunnels, when his character struggles, he was not acting.
Rip David McCallum. I do believe he was one of the last surviving cast of this masterpiece. They are all having a cuppa in heaven with the real escapers. God bless all those guys. Heroes all
John Leyton(Willie) I believe is the only one left
German officers who have yellow color tabs like the commandant of the camp were from flying units. The guards usually have red tabs which indicate they are ground units.
I might have the numbers slightly wrong, but if I remember correctly - in real life 76 escaped, 73 were recaptured and 50 were summarily murdered on Hitler's personal
order. One of the fifty murdered was my grandfather on my mom's side, Flight Lieutenant Patrick Langford. R.I.P. grandpa.
Thank you for sharing. ♥️
Your grandfather was a genuine hero!
@@SPEEDPAINTER1 not so much for me, but I wish my mom could have gotten to know her own father. He enlisted in the royal Canadian air force in Dec. of '39 when mum was 4 years old.
Sorry for your loss.
One of the parts of the movie that bothers me is the almost total lack of representation of the Canadian involvement in the escape and misrepresentation of the American involvement. Canadians played a big part and were nowhere to be seen in the movie aside from one small mention at the beginning. Wally Floody (who acted as a consultant for the movie) was in charge of the tunnels. He was recommended as the consultant by the book's author Paul Brickhill who was unable to do it. Brickhill was also a prisoner there.
Next is Stalag 17 and Bridge over the River Kwai, both with William Holden.
Three of the main actors in this movie, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, and Lee Marvin, all got their big break staring in the 1960 movie "The Magnificent Seven" with Yul Brenner and Eli Wallach.
Not Lee Marvin. You must be thinking of James Coburn.
@@zq9m3xh8 Yes, you are correct. The one who got out through Spain with the help of the French Resistance.
Charles Bronson worked in mines as a teenager and was as claustrophobic as his character in the film.
Now do _Chicken Run_ !
Apparently, you can see a young Harrison Ford riding inside the train where the gestapo were checking for identifications.
At the beginning of the movie Donald Pleasance- Collins, the guy who went blind- made a few suggestions, and the director told him to just do his acting job and keep his suggestions to himself. Then it was revealed that he had actually been in a German POW camp during WWII.
"Colin" is the character's first name, like Colin Firth or Colin Kaepernick. His last name is "Blythe".
And yes, Donald Pleasance is always amazing. Did you ever see his episode of "The Twilight Zone"?
Feels similar to how Sir Christopher Lee corrected Peter Jackson on the LotR set where he told people exactly what sound people make when they stabbed, because he was a liaison officer for SOE in WWII and knew the sound.
@@Jessica_Roth You should see his role as Himmler in The Eagle Has Landed (1976)
@@davidekstrand8544 Ohhh, I forgot that. I love the film (and the book), I forgot Pleasance was in it. Thanks.
It would be great if they did that one, too.
Both his and Ashley-Pitt's characters were created because out of the 23 who were recaptured, seventeen were sent back to Stalug Luft III and six were sent to death camps, but two of the six's fates were left unknown.
The main guy in charge of the tunnels played the old dude owner in Jurassic park.
My Grandfather was in a POW camp in Zell Am See in Austria, he escaped by hiding under a train for 1000 miles to Girona, Spain. He never talked about the war, but after he passed away we found a diary from that period. Unfortunately, he wasn't exactly Hunter S Thompson, so even though a crazy story, I don't think with entries like "it was cold and wet today" and "ate a raw potatoe for lunch" he'll ever get his own movie.
But he was a hero....
What a treasure! Maybe you could get a writer to do a book from the diary! At the very least, it's a news-worthy story!
Might not have been a wordsmith, but he was a brave man and a hero! Should think of letting someone fill in the blanks and write his story. Hell I'd be tempted to have a go at it. Either way, your grandfather was a hero
fact is rarely as exciting as fiction. Even the most historically accurate films are still 100x more exciting than the real thing due to Academy Award winning screenplay writers and the dialogue.
The Great Train Escape! :0)
In WW2, each country had prisoners segregated by branch of service and guarded by their counterpart service, so navy prisoners were in camps run by the german Kriegsmarine, air force prisoners in camps run by the Luftwaffe, and army prisoners in camps run by the Heer. This is a Luftstalag, so all of the prisoners are British, Canadian, or American air force personnel. German Uniforms are easiest to distinguish by looking at the rank insignia on their collars. The camp guards have between 1 and 4 wings on each collar, the commandant has wings inside a wreath, etc. These are Luftwaffe personnel. The collar patches are different colors to denote different areas of training: Yellow for flight personnel and paratroopers, red for Air defense. The SS and Waffen SS have different patches: one side is 2x Old Norse "sig" runes (letter "S"), and the other side is a series of pips or oak leaves and pips.
Henley was James Garner, one of the most likeable human beings in Hollywood - I've never heard anybody say anything but what a great guy he was. Of all the movies he was in, Garner's personal favorite was The Americanization of Emily with Julie Andrews, but he was in other highly rated movies as well. He also had a major TV career - he first became a star in a 1950s western series called Maverick, and later starred in a very successful detective series called The Rockford Files (1970s). The Rockford Files ran during the years I was in high school and was my absolute favorite show at the time - still worth checking out.
His Polaroid camera commercials with Mariette Hartley were fun too.
He was a great guy, made me proud to have him be from my hometown of Norman, Oklahoma.
He could handle a racecar too. Apparently the pro racecar drivers who were consultants and did some stunts in the racing movie "Grand Prix" were hugely impressed by Garner's natural talent as a driver. Garner did all his own driving for that movie. I used to watch The Rockford Files, one of my favorites. What a guy!
This flic is - like "Das Boot" - one of the greatest movies of all time!
It was shot at the same location / studios like "Das Boot": Bavaria Studios at Geiselgasteig/Munich.
Shots in the 3rd act were taken in southeren Germany (Würthemberg + Bavaria)
It is a movie that is absolutely timeless!
This film is fairly accurate to what happened. Though there was one major difference that was a huge plot point which was the season. The prisoners escaped during winter. It was rather a harsh winter and a lot of them turned themselves in as they were scattered out in the wild and snow freezing to death. Though Hitler wanted them all executed, someone convinced him to only execute 50. One of the escapees did indeed get caught when when a German officer said "Good Luck" to him.
Also the characters were fictionalized although based on true characters, some amalgamations of different people and their roles. There was only one American involved in the escape (and even he was a British citizen before the war and in the British army) and no exciting motorcycle chase, though it made for fantastic action. The ironically named Wally Floody, a Canadian, was in charge of engineering the tunnels and was a tunnel king, serving as a consultant for the film so the techniques used in the escape were accurate. The three men who did go all the way were a Dutchman and 2 Norwegians and they blended in better, being from occupied countries. Despite the historical nitpicks, it still is one of my favorite movies of all time.
Suggestion : A Bridge Too Far
Von Ryan's Express (1965), with Frank Sinatra is a similar great escape movie with a lot of action.
This along with the dirty dozen and stalag 17 are my fav war movies.
Hey guys! I wanted to add a bit of history that hopefully no one else has mentioned. The reason the relationship between the prisoners and guards was because they were all pilots so there was mutual respect between the German Luftwaffe officers and British, American and polish airmen.
Another thing that is interesting to me Is the surprisingly atypical portrayal of the German camp kommandant, who wasn't a fan of Hitler. The Luftwaffe was the least nazified of germany's armed forces.
And they were adhering the the Geneva Conventions, which affords POWs who are officers special privileges that enlisted men didn't get (besides Russians), a major one being no forced labor (which would be a major plot point in another amazing, classic WW2 movie Bridge on the River Kwai. But there was also this old fashioned "gentlemen mutual respect" between pilots of opposing armies that carried over from WW1. Crazy times.
Actually at the trails after the war, many of the surviving POWs testified on behalf of the guards to aqcuit them of war crimes
@@chimpymcmonkey5402 This was true to life. The real commandant was so horrified about the executions he allowed the prisoners to build a memorial to the Fifty that still exists in Poland. The prisoners later testified in his defense at Nuremberg.
@@chimpymcmonkey5402 In real life, when rumors of the Allies mistreating German prisoners led to calls for reprisals in the form of executing Allied prisoners, the real life commandant, Col. Von Lindeiner, held a confidential meeting with his deputy commandant, Maj. Simoleit, to discuss what to do if they received orders to kill prisoners as reprisal. Simoleit said "If I should receive such a dreadful order I would refuse to obey. I prefer to be executed for military insubordination and would not try to save my miserable life by obeying." Von Lindeiner shook Simoleit's hand and told him "We both know what we have to do."
Von Lindeiner donated to building a memorial for the 50 escapees who were killed by the Gestapo. After surrendering to the British, he testified in the Allies' investigation of the killings. Von Lindeiner's former prisoners actually came forward to testify in his defense, saying that he adhered to the Geneva Conventions in his treatment of POWs and that he had earned the respect of the prisoners. He was repatriated in 1947 and died at the age of 82 just months before the theatrical release of "The Great Escape."
We'll never see an ensemble cast of greats like this in a movie again.
Okay Guys... now Everyone give me the Thumbs Up for "THE DIRTY DOZEN" to be the Next WAR Film...
Henley was james garner (the Rockford files)Donald pleasance was a james bond Vilan. Richard attenbrough was in jurassic Park and David McCallum was in the man from uncle
Interesting to see McCallum and Bronson in the same movie, Bronson later married McCallum's wife Jill Ireland.
This is one of the greatest films of all time. An absolute gem and a stellar cast
I was about to comment that. Bronson, McQueen, Garner, Pleasance etc. HOF cast
I clicked immediately. ...
Do a bridge to far next. Also star stud cast.
@@OneArmedRetroGamer Don't Forget McCallum Who 60 Years After This Film Was Made, Still Has A Starring Role On NCIS...
Youve got what, a third of the Magnificent Seven in here :)
Hint…you should do that next:)
James Garner was perfect as “Henley”…one of the GOATs
Next up: ‘Stalag 17’. Won’t be disappointed.
William Holden won the Oscar for Best Actor.
A small detail, but Charles Bronson (Danny) Had actually worked in mines as a teenager, so he was experienced at digging tunnels.
Fun Fact: Steve McQueen (The Cooler King) was also a stunt man and an excellent motorcyclist. During his big chase scene, he's actually one of the German soldiers chasing HIM.
Fun Fact #2: "Big X" is played by Richard Attenborough, the guy who says the iconic line..."Welcome to Jurassic ParK."
Fun Fact #3: Danny, "Tunnel King" is played by Charles Bronson, later known for films such as "Death Wish" (Another film you should react to :)
Fun Fact #4: "The Forger" is played by Donald Pleasance, known for his role as Dr. Loomis in the original "Halloween"
Came to say the thing about Steve McQueen chasing himself too lol.
Am today years old learning fact #2.
@@S_047 In that case, I wish you a happy birthday. :)
Wow I never knew that that Steve was playing 2 roles riding the bike. Thanks for the intel
Some might also recognise Ducky from NCIS playing Ashley-Pitt, James Garner from the Rockford Files as The Scrounger. James Coburn (the Manufacturer) and James Garner appeared together in the 1994 Maverick film with Mel Gibson.
“That Henley actor guy” is James Garner. If you get the chance, you should check out two of the classic series he starred in, “Maverick” and “The Rockford Files.” You won’t be sorry. He was also a major movie star, something was rare at the time for a TV actor. The guy had it all: charm, believability and the ability to play drama and comedy.
"You must be the dumbest lookin ape I ever seen. I didn't think anybody would be ridicules enough to try and follow me in a big red Cadillac convertible. But there you where chrome rims and all."
Absolutely! Don't forget his surprise 1970 hit, "Support Your Local Sheriff"!
@@glawnow1959 And its "mirror" film "Support Your Local Gunfighter."
He could do drama and comedy. He aged fairly well too...had a hit in the 80s with Sally Field 'Murphy's Romance' IIRC.
Also plays grandpa in 8 simple rules
In the reality, as in the film, the commandant of the camp was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to the eastern front. He survived the war and in the 1960s he was invited to England by the veteran club for the survivors of the camp to a traditional gathering. The former POWs celebrated the former Commandant as a very decent officer and a gentleman.
Steve McQueen, James Garner, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, Richard Attenborough ("Jurassic Park") are all veterans. Donald Pleasence was a German POW. Charles Bronson was claustrophobic, having spent several years as a coal miner.
And if I'm remembering correctly, James Garner was a scrounger in a POW camp during the Korean War
R.I.P. Roger Bushell (Big X)
Stephen King loved this movie so much, he made a tribute to it in Shawshank by making Andy dispose of his wall the same way they disposed of the dirt in the Great Escape.
but thats the part which detroys the movie. you have around 60.000kg of dirt per tunnel. Thats 3 Truckloads of dirt. and they had to 60000 times empty their trouthers. And that only per tunnel. I dont know how they didi it in reality. But try to dump 150 t somwhere withou anybody noticeing it.
@@eve-llblyat2576 they had a bunch of ways they hid the dirt. But the trouser thing was absolutely one of the ways they did it so I'm not sure why that "destroys the movie"
They were also hiding dirt in the attics of the buildings.
@@eve-llblyat2576 Well since the movie is based on a true story, they obviously succeeded in hiding the dirt.
Fun Great Escape Movie Fact: Steve McQueen performed many of the motorbike stunts himself, sometimes dressed as a German soldier, so at one point during the film, McQueen is actually chasing himself, during the motorbike chase. :)
James Garner was one of the coolest dudes ever.
Yep. Watched reruns of The Rockford Files on cable in the 80s.
He was great in that show.
Smart, funny, likeable... as cool as they come.
@@mrkelso I'd always remember this story of James Garner from Gerald McRaney.... ua-cam.com/video/ZRhiLvfsa4c/v-deo.html
But it's Steve McQueen who is known as Mr Cool😎
@@dannytse8767 That's awesome!
Big X (richard Attenborough, r.i.p.) was the brother of tv nature show guy David Attenborough
Now that you've seen "The Great Escape," you've completed the prerequisite to watch the critically acclaimed "Chicken Run."
Chicken Run, you say? I just went to Amazon and ordered it. Thanks!
Chicken run while a little bit derivative is not a bad flick itself, it's actually a childhood favorite of mine
I think Chicken Run is on Netflix now!
Have you seen Free Birds?
😂
Donald Pleasance (Colin) was an actual POW in WWII, he was a wireless operator in the RAF and flew in over 60 missions before his Lancaster bomber was shot down in 1944. He said that the set was a very accurate depiction of a German POW camp.
Charles Bronson (Danny) was a coal miner before becoming an actor, and advised the production on the actualities of digging underground. Similarly to his character in the film, Bronson developed claustrophobia from his experiences as a coal miner. Unlike his character though, Bronson was fluent in Russian having spoken it as his first language from childhood.
James Garner (Hendley) based his "scrounger" character on his own experiences as a "self confessed scrounger" during his military service in the Korea War.
Henley, James Garner, is in a real good movie with Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, and Donald Southerland called Space Cowboys. They're all much older, but it's a really good movie.
Yep, great cast in a fun movie.
This is a movie that should be passed down and shared through generations. I saw this when it came out in 1963 at our little hometown theatre when I was just a kid. When my sons were around 9 or 10 I shared this movie with them. They loved it and spent the next couple of weeks whistling the theme song. My oldest son told me he shared the movie with his children...my grandchildren. Now he and his son are whistling the theme song while doing their chores. I loved hearing that!
It's sad that some of these great movies will be forgotten if they are not shared.
It warms my heart to see so many people recommending Stalag 17. It's been an all-time favorite of mine forever but I haven't met that many people that have seen it.
ye gotta do 'a bridge too far', unbelievable cast (Hopkins, Caan, Redford, O'Neal, Olivier, Hackman, Bogarde, Fox, Caine, Schell, Kruger, Connery) and largely true ww2 story too, one of the best war films ever made in the west... and directed by Big X himself, Richard Attenborough!
My mother had a big crush on James Garner (Hendley). She would act like a silly schoolgirl when she’d see him in a movie.😍
Same with my sister. She was working at a golf club/hotel where he was staying and he called her "honey" when he made some reservations on the phone. She told that story for years.
At the time of filming, some things were still classified. Among those was the amount of smuggling that happened with Red Cross Packages. Things like special made cardboard, when you take the multiple layers apart, you'll find maps or documents. Magnetized needles (for compassess) hidden inside the edges of the boxes etc.
You're favorite guy James Garner is in "Support Your Local Sheriff" which is an awesome comedy western that you should definitely check out.
The Camp Commandant was not killed. The Gestapo investigated the escape and, whilst this uncovered no significant new information, von Lindeiner was removed and threatened with court martial. He feigned mental illness to avoid imprisonment. In February 1945, he was wounded by Russian troops advancing towards Berlin while acting as second in command of an infantry unit defending Sagan. He later surrendered to advancing British forces as the war ended. Von Lindener was imprisoned for two years at the British prisoner of war camp known as the "London Cage". He testified during the British SIB investigation concerning the Stalag Luft III murders. Allied former prisoners at Stalag Luft III testified that he had followed the Geneva Conventions concerning the treatment of POWs and had won the respect of the senior prisoners. He died in 1963.
So the BRITS commited the crime of imprisoning him, when the war was over. BRIT "justice".
@@marioarguello6989 He was either a suspected war crime or a useful witness to that war crime, of course he was held until the investigation was over.
I highly recommend the 1968 action crime thriller BULLITT, where Steve McQueen plays a San Francisco Police Detective who gets ahold of a mob witness/corruption case and won't let go. It has the most realistic car chase in film history. It won the Oscar for Best Film Editing.
Bullitt is a must!
German actor Hannes Messemer plays Colonel von Luger (the camp commandant). He's based on the real life Colonel Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau (the commandant of Stalag Luft III during the actual great escape). Like the fictional von Luger, the real Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau was anti-Nazi, and a number of former British POWs testified in his favor during an investigation concerning the murder of the escapees. They noted that the colonel was respectful of them and followed the Geneva Conventions regarding the treatment of POWs.
James Garner(Henley) has been in many movies. I'd recommend his Support Your Local Sheriff/Support Your Local Gunfighter movies.
A lot of the actors during those times were actual WWII veterans. Charles Bronson grew up so poor he had to wear his sisters dresses to school and started working in coal mines when he was 10. He is claustrophobic in real life and said in an interview he would never again step into a mine or tunnel.
Have you heard this Charles Bronson story from Kurt Russell? ua-cam.com/video/R55cF-kA-zY/v-deo.htmlsi=tKChgmqOlxRTRsTP
When James Garner (Hendley) starred in the TV series "The Rockford Files," there was an article about him in TV Guide that started with the line "James Garner is like Sara Lee. Nobody doesn't like him" (referencing the Sara Lee dessert company's popular commercial jingle "Everybody doesn't like something, but nobody doesn't like Sara Lee"). He was always known for that likable, "regular guy" persona.
loved the rockford files, great series
He was beautiful.
My mom bought that TV Guide when we were grocery shopping. She saw his picture on the cover and thought it looked so much like my dad that she had to get it (she never bought magazines). She kept it for years 🙂
@@yepimheretoo2270 That cute!
Yet one of the most infamous pieces of footage of him is that moment in that racing film where he lost the rag with someone. And yes i know from reading about him he was well liked and popular but imagine once in your life having an off day and it gets captured for posterity.....
One day, the police in the German town where this movie was shot set up a speed trap near the set. Several members of the cast and crew were caught, including Steve McQueen. The Chief of Police told McQueen "Herr McQueen, we have caught several of your comrades today, but you have won the prize (for the highest speeding)." McQueen was arrested and briefly jailed.
Another Steve McQueen movie you really need to watch is THE TOWERING INFERNO, where a San Francisco fire chief and an architect, (Paul Newman), try to save his girlfriend, (Faye Dunaway), and others,(William Holden, Fred Astaire, Richard Chamberlain, Robert Wagner, Susan Blakely, Jennifer Jones, OJ Simpson and Robert Vaughn,) stuck in a burning high rise.
Absolutely, the disaster movie classic along with The Poseidon Adventure (1972).
Based on the book, a true story, and very true to the book's narrative. Some great actors and acting. One of Charles Bronson's rare movies without a mustache, and i think you've seen James Garner previously in Maverick i think. I always liked that the Aussie (James Coburn) escaped.
Since your "favorite character" was played by James Garner, I want to recommend "Support Your Local Sheriff", a western/comedy.
Absolutely must watch. Garner had such charisma
Damn, there's a lot of us Garner fans in this comments section! Hey, he was that appealing.
One of those films that get better and better the more you watch it. Its a broad comedy but still has little comic touches sprinkled throughout the film that it takes multiple viewings to get them all.
Perhaps one of my favorite WWII movies of the 60s. If you want to know more about the true story based on this film, you'll need to read the book by Paul Brickhill ( who died in 1991 and was born in Australia in 1916)"The Great Escape." Best known for writing several historical books on WW2 subjects, the most famous being "The Great Escape" filmed in 1963 (The Great Escape (1963)) with Steve McQueen. Brickhill himself was a prisoner of the camp in question, Stalag Luft III, and participated in what was to be the most famous prison break in World War II. James Garner who played Hendley has been in many great movies. As a kid I grew up warching him in the TV show "Maverick" (1957-1962) but he is best known for the TV detective/police show "The Rockford Files" (1974-1980). The best movies I have of him him in that's in my collection, along with "The Great Escape," are "The Children's Hour" (1961) with Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine and Veronica Cartwright, "Murphy's Romance" (1985) with Sally Fields, "Fire in the Sky," (1993) with D.B. Sweenet and Henry Thomas, and "The Notebook" (2004) with Gena Rollands and Ryan Gosling. Hope you get to see these when you get the chance.
This, Kelly's Heroes, and Where Eagles Dare are some of my favourite classics.
I would add The dirty dozen to your list also
YES! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE watch Kelly's Heroes.
Woof woof woof!!! :)
Canons of navarone is also a missed classic
Guns of Navarone
@@bwhitetemp I can't believe it's 2nd to last on that Patreon war movie list, it's the best one on there apart from The Great Escape. :-)
As a Scot this one is even more exciting because of all the Celts in the cast: James Donald (Ramsay - the SBO), David McCallum (Askley-Pitt - Disperal), Gordon Jackson (MacDonald - Intelligence) and Angus Lennie (Ives- the Mole). Though nobody would ever know the first two were Scottish.
James Garner, supported Brando in "Sayonara", great in "Support Your Local Sheriff", WWII thrillers "36 Hours" and "The Americanization of Emily"!...🙂
Donald Plesance, who played Colin, was actually in the RAF in WWII as a radio operator on a Lancaster bomber. He was shot down over Germany in 1944. Captured, he was a POW at Luft Stalag I for the remainder of the war. Plesance acted and entertained his fellow POWs while imprisoned. He was discharged in 1946 after being liberated.
If you want to check out other great Steve McQueen movies, I highly suggest "Sand Pebbles," (1966), inspired by true events, and "Papillon" (1973) also based on the account of an actual prisoner on Devil's Island, French Guyana. Both films have some all-too-realistic, gut-wrenching moments, but also outstanding performances by McQueen. Some have said that Sand Pebbles was McQueen's only shot at an Oscar.
"See you in Piccadilly!" :0)
For the record, there was no American involvement in the real escape, but they feared that an all British escape would not appeal to an American movie audience, hence the addition of McQueen and some other American actors to play non British roles.
You can't beat a classic. No green screen was harmed in the making of this movie. Also check out The Flight of The Phoenix (1965). Just stay clear of the 2004 remake.
"Stalag 17" and "Bridge On The River Kwai" are also great WW2 movies that take place in prisoner of war camps.
King Rat also
2 British POW films I like are "The Colditz Story" and "The Password Is Courage"
Kwai is a great movie, but its pretty much fully fiction.
Stalag 17 never impressed me. Yes, Holden is good, but much of the movie seems more like the play from which it was derived. Billy Wilder made some great films, but Stalag 17 is not one of them, IMO.
The Japanese using forced labor for construction projects that killed thousands is a historical fact.
Donald Pleasance the actor playing the "Forger" flew over 60 missions in bombers in WW2 and was shot down and was imprisoned in the same sort of camp. Sweden was one of two neutral counties in Europe in WW2 and they were escaping in a ship sailing there. That really did happen.
"Stalag 17"is another good prisoner camp movie. Lot's more comedy. It was also an inspiration for the "Hogan's Heros" TV series.
Stalag.17 comedy? Two pies shot dead right away, fear of a spy within the POW's, one prisoner only caring about himself.
It's a lot more like king rat.
Interesting fact: the guy who created “Hogan’s Heroes” was the same guy who produced and got “The Godfather” made. A fantastic series was made of the story of the making of The Godfather called “The Offer”, which you can see on Paramount+
@@craigplatel813
Thinking that myself, if Lm remembering the right movie, with Willam Holden right?
@@craigplatel813 maybe not a 'comedy', but certainly a 'lighter' film. Plus, Harry and The Animal were definitely comic relief.
Yes, William Holden was in Stalag 17 (I believe he won an Oscar). And, because it’s directed by the legendary Billy Wilder, there are moments of levity with Richard Strauss and Harvey Lembeck. William Holden is an early cinematic “anti-hero.” I’ll say no more, except watch this movie!
Their biggest setback was that Col. Hogan wasn’t their commander. Now HE knew how to build tunnels! 😂
FUN FACT: The actor who plays Ashley-Pitt (The guy with the sand dispersal technique with the trousers) played by David McCallum, also had a musical career. His song called "The Edge" was sampled by Snoop Dogg for the song "The next episode"
so did John Leyton, who was one of the diggers.
Bronson would later steal his wife Jill Ireland. lol
James Donald, who played the British senior officer, seemed to be in virtually every other British war film made from 1940 to 1964, including “The Bridge on the River Kwai.”
Wasn't he I Laurence of Arabia too?
@@J4ME5_ No, because David Lean took against him on Kwai. "He's defied me, I'm going to torture him."
Gordon Jackson is the same
He was also in "Conduct Unbecoming" with Richard Attenborough, Trevor Howard, Stacey Keach, Michael York, Susannah York.
He was also in the 1958 film The Vikings with Kirk Douglas
Donald Pleasence reportedly had flashbacks to being a POW due to the accuracy of the sets.
Also it's awesome how Donald Pleasance cane be one of the most lovable characters and one of the most notorious Bond Villains ever.
and of all the actors in The Great Escape, he actually was a surviving RAF POW who was at Stalag Luft 1
I honestly think Colin saying "thank you for getting me out .." to James Garners character as he draws his last breath and dies is one of the saddest moments I've ever seen in any film.
James Garner was primarily known for the detective series The Rockford Files.
Only if you're too young to remember the "Maverick" TV show and all Garner's movie roles.
@@paintedjaguar No love for Nichols?
@@brucechmiel7964That was short-lived.
@@Madbandit77 Haha I saw what you did there. But seriously it was a good show. It's also how we got Stuart Margolin in The Rockford Files. Though by 72' he was doing Love, American Style.
@@brucechmiel7964Margolin, who passed away last year, earned two guest Emmys as squirrel-brain con man Evelyn "Angel" Martin on "Rockford". The execs at NBC at the time didn't like him, but Garner fought for him.
The thing I find curious, is the amount of wood they are trying to scrounge and then when they shut down the other two and focus all their efforts on Tom including the wood, and then Tom gets discovered. CLEARLY they can’t get back into Tom. Otherwise they would’ve continued it and as such, they can’t go salvage that wood so all of that wood is wasted so now that they have to abandon Tom and open up Harry where the heck do they get the wood for that tunnel since they put everything in Tom
I love how you immediately understood the ending. They may have got caught but their spirit will never be broken.
A little gossip… David McCallum’s wife, Jill Ireland, was staying on the set. She developed a romance with Charles Bronson, who she later married.
The screenplay was written by James Clavell who had been a POW of the Japanese. He wrote King Rat about his experiences, along with major best sellers.
Many commenters ignore the role Bud Elkins, a great stuntman, played in the motorcycle chase and jumps.
Starting some time around 1970, this was shown on British tv every Christmas (I know) for about 20 years, it became part of our holiday tradition and every iconic scene and phrase was absorbed into our consciousness. glad you liked it too - 'Good luck'. 👍
British actor Donald Pleasence, who plays the forger who goes blind, was also a technical advisor for the film. He was the only man in the film team who had experience as a POW during the war - he served as a navigator onboard an RAF bomber when he was shot down over Germany. Pleasence made several attempts to escape, in the same way as portrayed in the film. He was also tortured by the Gestapo.
Guys, you should watch the 50's classic "Stalag 17" An absolutely brilliant film.
The James Garner movie I'd recommend is "The Americanization of Emily" (1964), which is one of the best antiwar films ever made. Good acting, unforgetable dialogue, and a message that'll make you rethink a lot of societal norms.
YES!!!
One of the greatest true stories ever made!
Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Donald Pleasance, James Donald, Charles Bronson, Angus Lennie, David McCallum, Gordon Jackson, John Leyton, and James Coburn star in this WWII epic.
True story , but movie is highly inaccurate , by last survivor of the escape team ,Jack Lyon , died in 2019 at age 101 , shots were fired before he could get in to the tunnel.
76 escaped , 73 were recaptured , 50 were executed by order from Adolf himself , only 3 men were able to get away , Per Bergsland , Norwegian RAF pilot , Jens Müller, Norwegian RAF pilot and Bram van der Stok , Dutch RAF pilot ... Per and Jens did go to Sweden and Bram , via France to Spain , so that part was accurate .
Also the whole camp hold nearly 11 000 POWs , in 10´ x 12´ huts , in movie its tiny camp with bigger barracks .
Truish
These people are legends. Im not sure they can understand who is Charles Bronson, James Garner, James Coburn.... These guys are bigger stars than any movie actors today.
@@pete_lind also no mass machine gunning, they were shot individually at different locations for the most part
not really true story
one of my favourite classics BUT sadly all new releases on bluray, as vod and on uhd are cropped as hell :-( only the original mgm-dvd shows the amazing wide cinemascope picture with the wonderful picture composition.
Another war film you should watch is the 1953 film STALAG 17, where POW'S begin to learn that one of their own might be a Nazi spy, but which one? William Holden stars.
Beat me to it ;-)
One of my all-time davorite movies.
Don't forget that Charles Bronson, Steve McQueen, and the Australian james Coburn was in g he magnificent seven. A good review guys.
It’s amazing how many not only recognizable, but famous actors appear throughout this entire film. A good approximate depiction of what really happened in WWII, and great filmmaking. Thanks for watching it. I haven’t finished the reaction, yet, but it takes a great director to make you wish a film as long as this one wasn’t over when it finishes. Thanks, guys.
Well, considering practically all of the actors in the film were themselves war veterans of WW2, I'll take their 'approximate' portrayal.
And Josh Randall.
Another POW movie I would recommend, that nobody ever reacts to, is The Colditz Story with John Mills.
Now try "Von Ryan's Express" starring Frank Sinatra and Trevor Howard.
Yep and The Wild Geese (1978) also.
My father-in-law, a B-17 co-pilot, was forced to jump out of his plane over Hungary and captured. He was sent to Stalag Luft III, approximately three to four weeks after the Great Escape. As Paul Brickhill's book details, the Russians liberated the POWs of Stalag Luft III in January 1945. BTW, there were 10.949 inmates, so 250 escapees was not "all of them" by a long shot. The actual escape took place in March and it was cold and snowy. The two who boarded the Stockholm weren't in Sweden, but they had reached a major harbor and boarded a freighter headed for Sweden, which was officially neutral in the war. When my wife and her brother watched this movie with their father during the CBS Thursday and Friday Nights at the Movies back in the late 60s/early 70s, they knew better than to turn around and ask him about his POW experience. Men rarely discussed such things back then, and the only stories he told about being a POW at Stalag Luft III were short funny ones. A quick footnote: When my dad saw this movie with my sister and I at the same time, he noted that he had friends on the railroad in Port Arthur TX who remembered the teenaged Steve McQueen riding his motorcycle the same way he does in this movie, when he worked in some unsavory places on the Gulf waterfront.
If you do another war film poll, another vintage classic you can add is The Bridge on The River Qwai (1957).
One of my favorite films of the 1960s. Legendary actors, incredible action, inspirational drama based on real events.
One of my favorite James Garner movie is The Americanization of Emily. He plays another scrounger who works for an Admiral right before D-Day. Also stars Julie Andrews, and James Coburn (who plays the Australian Sedgwick in this movie). Both Garner and Andrews considered it their favorite movies that they made.
In a documentary, they interviewed one of the escapees. He said he sailed through checkpoint after checkpoint, his papers passing inspection each time. He said he was getting confident that he would make it, but then a German guard examined his papers and immediately arrested him. He asked the German (who spoke some english) how he knew they were forgeries. "No one walks around in the exact same clothing that they're wearing in their passport." 😲
The Red Cross was used to smuggle in ridiculous amount of contraband into POW camps. The OSS had an entire department dedicated to hiding anything and everything in those care packages. Maps, compass', money (to bribe guards), even radios. Anything that could help an escape.
Oh, and the POWs who didn't have any escape related skills, they still helped. Their job was to keep everything as normal as possible to keep the guards from getting suspicious.... and help dispose of all that dirt. It really was a team effort.