Movie Reviews
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The Great Escape (1963) Rating:   (3.5 out of 5)Starring: Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard
Attenborough, James Donald, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, and James
Coburn.
Directed by: John Sturges
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| Bartlett (Attenborough) and Hilts (McQueen) are the heart and
soul of The Great Escape. |
The Great Escape is one of those movies whose parts are
greater than the whole. I mean, who can forget Steve McQueen's turn as
the "Cooler King" Hilts? Or his spectacular motorcycle
ride? Still other noteworthy performances: Richard Attenborough's subtle
and complex portray of "Big X" Bartlett; Donald Pleasence's
touching Colin "The Forger" Blythe; James Garner's charming
Bob "The Scrounger" Hendley; Hannes Messner's tightly
controlled camp commandant, Von Lugar. Plus we have great and
memorable pieces:
the claustrophobia of tunnels, the clever misdirection as the men hide
their work, and the amazing ingenuity of the whole escape
organization. And yet, watching The Great Escape again
recently, I kept asking myself, "Is that all there is?"
Part of that is a function of having seen the movie a dozen or more
times. Every scene feels familiar to me, so the surprise is gone,
but by the same token, I've watched Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
at least as often, and it still feels like a great movie. The
Great Escape, by contrast, feels lighter. It tackles fewer big
themes, and the movie itself plays out with few surprises or twists. Of course, it is based on a true story, and though truth is
often stranger than fiction, it is also often duller than fiction.
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| MacDonald (center) and Hendley (far right) consider their new
surroundings. |
Watching The Great Escape I was struck by how different a
style of filmmaking it embodies from what we are now used to. Think about the cast list. A lot
of the actors, of course, became bigger stars after the movie came out
(in part because of their roles here), but still, this is a large ensemble
cast of established actors. Over the course of three hours we get to
know a plethora of characters, and most of them are given enough
screen time for us to form an attachment. We still get
ensemble pictures, most notably teen comedies (American Pie (1999)
is an example), but few ensemble dramas with grown-ups in lead
roles. Some critics have attributed the disappearance of the
ensemble movie to the increased importance of "stars" to
"open" the movie in its first weekend. Obviously, if
you're going to pay Jim Carrey $20 million to headline, you're going to damn
well make sure he's in every scene... and of course, even if you, as a
filmmaker, were willing to pay that kind of money and use him sparingly,
the star and his agent would probably balk. This suggests a
structural problem of sorts. Unfortunately, it is hard to make a good
drama that centers completely around a single character, since drama
usually comes from the interaction of characters with each other. Does that mean
we're doomed to never see another movie like The Great Escape?
Nah. First, we do get occasional ensemble pictures made by
directors with especially strong visions: Scorsese, P.T. Anderson,
Tarantino (I'm still hopeful that he will return to directing on a
regular basis), Doug Liman, and Spielberg (i.e. Saving Private Ryan
(1999)). Second, the main problem in Hollywood isn't that
money drives all the decisions. Money has to play a part; making
movies is expensive. No, the problem is that the high stakes stifle
risk-taking. Ensemble movies aren't dead, they just need a spectacular
success -- preferably one not associated with a particularly strong
director -- to show the way.
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| Hilts checks out the soil for its tunneling properties. |
The strength of the ensemble approach is evident early on in The
Great Escape. The movie begins with several truckloads of
prisoners arriving at a newly built prison camp, Stalag Luft III. As the men fan
out, they immediately start testing the defenses... before even locating
their own barracks. Some kick at the soil, others check out the
guard towers, still others begin to locate comrades from other
camps. The movie is set in 1943, and the prisoners are mostly
British fliers, although a Pole (Danny Willinski, played by Charles
Bronson) and three American (mostly notably Hilts and Hendley) round out
the crew. At first the prisoners are surprised to see so many
escape artists in the mix, but the Germans soon explain the situation. Von
Lugar meets with the ranking POW, Group Captain Rupert Ramsey (James
Donald, who also starred in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
and King Rat (1965), both of which will be reviewed here sooner
or later). Von Lugar and Ramsey have a surprisingly respectful
relationship, more the meeting of equals than prisoner and warden.
Von Lugar explains the scheme of the camp. The goal, according to
him, is to place "all our rotten eggs in one basket," the
basket in this case being a newly design, camp "organized to
incorporate all we have learned about security measures," and manned by elites guards
commanded by a real soldier. Ramsey is
surprisingly candid about his obligation to try to escape; Von Lugar's
reaction is cool, but understanding.
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| Danny (top) and Ives (bottom) find that these guards are no
fools. |
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While this is going on, the men are already testing the guards.
Danny tries to blend in with a group of Russian work prisoners who are
being led away as the new POWs arrive. Others, including Ives
(Angus Lennie), try to hide in the back of an exiting truck under some
branches and leaves. In the meantime, Hilts thinks he's found a
blind spot between two guard towers, and he tests the situation by
tossing his baseball across the warning wire to get a closer look.
Needless to say, all of these shenanigans come to naught. A guards
stop Danny with the help of a booklet containing pictures of all the
prisoners, while other guards use picks to drive the men out from under
the brush. As one of the other prisoners observers, "I'd say
we made
fools of ourselves." Hilts and Ives get 20 days in the
"cooler" for their troubles. Still, from a movie making
perspective, this veritable maelstrom of activity gives us a sense of
the numerous stronger personalities in the mix.
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| Bartlett (left) and Von Lugar (seated at desk) entertain
leather clad Gestapo officers. Where is Ilsa to spice
things up? |
Luckily all of this uncoordinated activity changes with the arrive of Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett.
Bartlett arrives in care of the Gestapo, and the men try to stifle their
excitement lest they tip off the Germans about his identity. Bartlett is "Big
X," the head of the X Organization, a group of prisoners with
orders "harass, confuse and confound the enemy" behind the lines. Just how
much the Germans know of Bartlett's position is unclear, but he's
apparently helped by the bureaucratic politics of the 3rd Reich.
Von Lugar is adamant that the "Air Force officer prisoners are the
responsibility of the Luftwaffe," and so Bartlett passes out of Gestapo
hands with the warning: "Squadron Leader Bartlett, if you escape
again and be caught, you will be shot." Like many
movies from the period, The Great Escape goes to great pains
to differentiate between "good Germans" and "bad
Germans." Von Lugar even goes so far as to return the Gestapo
officer's Nazi salute half-heartedly. This may have gone on, of
course, but I think that recent evidence suggests that the situation was
more complex than that in reality. The notion that atrocities were only
committed by Gestapo and SS units is simply untenable at this point, and
the amount of resistance to the Nazis was slight up until the last days
of the war. Maybe Von Lugar was really an exception, but I suspect
the movie white washes his character significantly.
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| Bartlett and Ramsey have a heart to heart followed by a
meeting of the X Organization. |
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Bartlett immediately calls a meeting of the X Organization. He
announces a plan for a mass breakout of 250 men. He plans three
simultaneous tunnels (Tom, Dick, and Harry), each dug 30 feet deep (to evade sound detectors)
and covering the 300+ feet to the tree line outside the wire. Bartlett's character is the most interesting in the
picture. Is he a megalomaniac? Clearly, most of the other
men are surprised at the audacity of the plan. The rapidity with
which it is announced is also surprising. I would have thought
that a couple of weeks of option-generation and information gathering
would have been useful. Later on, the movie hints that Bartlett
might not be quite stable, that his own "wire fever" or desire
for personal revenge may be
affecting his judgment. More disturbing is the fact that Bartlett
encourages the men under false pretenses. While he talks to the
men about escaping, when he's alone with Ramsey, it is clear that he is
less interested in getting men back to their homes and families than he is
in forcing the Germans to divert resources chasing after the
escapees. Now, of course, this is a command decision at one
level. Ramsey and Bartlett are ranking officers, and if they
choose to use their men in this fashion in order to support the war
effort, then that is their prerogative. And yet, we're not talking
about a normal military situation. We're talking about using men
on a very high-risk mission, under false pretenses, in order to achieve
difficult-to-measure goals. Ordering men to their deaths to take a
key bridge so that the army can advance is clear. Ordering men to
offer themselves up in order to "disrupt" rear area operations
is more difficult to assess. Plus, it seems to me that oath or no
oath, once soldiers become POWs, they are essentially free agents in a
moral sense. Of course, this doesn't extend to treason, but don't
men who have fought and been captured have a right to sit out the rest of
the war if they so desire? The movie sort of approaches these issues obliquely,
and in the end, it is pretty clear that all of the men go along
enthusiastically and of their own volition, although I think that
Bartlett's audacity and enthusiasm end up playing a crucial role in
that.
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| Danny starts his 17th tunnel. |
Much of the movie is really a technical exposition of the escape
process. We see Hendley scrounging up supplies, and later blackmailing
a guard to get a camera to make picture IDs. We see Danny
hammering his way through the concrete foundations to the barracks, the
sound of his makeshift pickaxe covered by men working on vegetable
gardens outside. We see Lieutenant-Commander Eric Ashley-Pitt
(David McCallum) plan and scheme to get rid of the dirt generated by the
tunneling activities. We see Blythe training a roomful of men to
forge documents. We see Ramsey leading the men through parade
ground drill. There are relatively few moments of tension early
on. Still, Von Lugar isn't stupid, and he quickly becomes suspicious of
how domesticated the British prisoners seem to be. Having gathered
all the hard cases together, he is surprised that the main activities
seem to be drill and gardening.
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| Hilts and Ives return to the cooler muddy but otherwise
unharmed. |
In a way Hilts and Ives serve as comic relief. They bond while
in the cooler, and immediately after being released they plan an
escape. When Ramsey and Bartlett hear about it, they consider
ordering them to stand down, but in the end they decide that the men
have to attempt some solo escapes in only to divert attention from the
planned mass bust out. Hilts and Ives plan to dig under the wire
and "burrow right through the dirt like a couple of moles," with Ives in front passing dirt to Hilts who will then pack
in in behind them as they move forward underground. Ramsey and
Bartlett are clearly amused by the plan. "Hilts, um, how do you
breathe?" Bartlett asks. Hilts has an answer: "We have a
steel rod with hinge and we shove it up and make air holes as we go
along." Needless to say, this plan fails, and a muddy Hilts and Ives get sent back to the cooler. Each
time Hilts tries to escape and gets caught, someone is there to hand him
his trademark ball and mitt so he can pass the time in solitary.
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| Working in the claustrophobic tunnels. |
The operation continues to move forward. Ashley-Pitt finds that
he has to dispose of even more dirt than expected, and he ends up
stashing it all over the camp, including in the attic of the
barracks. Danny fights his way through multiple cave-ins, until finally, they decide to shore
up the tunnels much more
extensively by cannibalizing the barracks for as much wood as possible
without tipping off the Germans. The camp tailor cuts up the men's
uniforms to make civilian clothes. It is really quite amazing how
much they were able to do right under the nose of the guards... not quite Hogan's Heroes territory, but surprisingly close. Of
course, the thing about prisoners, whether criminals or POWs, is that
they have nothing if not time on their hands. It is no wonder
prisons are such hothouses. I mean, prisoners have all day to
think about escaping or about various personal machinations. They
also get a lot of room from the Germans, who seem content to let the men
sort out such things as barracks assignments for themselves, and provide
them tools to use for gardening... and tunneling.
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| Hilts looks on dubiously as Bartlett and MacDonald spin their
offer. |
When Hilts gets released from solitary, he gets a strange offer from
Bartlett and intelligence officer Flight Lieutenant MacDonald (Gordon
Jackson). Bartlett and MacDonald want Hilts to break out, and then
to let himself get recaptured. Why? Because despite all the
involved planning, neither MacDonald nor Bartlett know such basic
information as the location of the nearest town or rail lines.
Though we're supposed to see the RAF men in The Great Escape as brave
and resourceful, I can't help but think that the whole operation seems unfocused and amateurish. In the rush to launch an escape, it
seems to me that Bartlett in particular is rash in his actions.
Gathering info on the surrounding countryside should have been the first
step in the process, not the penultimate. In a way, The Great
Escape highlights the difference between the British and American
way of war. Whereas the British were willing to rely on aplomb and
improvisation to brazen they way through a problem, Americans tended to be
more careful planners. In some ways, The Great Escape
serves as a metaphor for the Second World War. The British have
style and grit, but lack the resources and systematic approach to win in
a new era of warfare. The Great Escape is a last hurrah for
gentlemen warriors getting by on wits and guts... or something like
that. Anyway, back to
Hilts... he refuses. From his perspective, once he gets outside
the wire, his plan is to keep running until he makes it back to the
States. Bartlett and MacDonald, though disappointed, seem to
accept the argument. (BTW, Hilts plays like a
foreshadow of McQueen's later role in Papillon
(1973). I wonder if he ever reflected on the similarities
between the two characters, both individualists, who spends a large portion of their
movie in solitary and have an unquenchable thirst for freedom.)
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| While the men celebrate the American Revolution, the guards
discover Tom. |
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More comic relief: Hilts, Hendley, and the third American in the camp
throw a party on the Fourth of July, complete with fife and drums and
several big jugs of moonshine. The Brits accept the invitation to
the party with good humor. I was surprised that the Germans didn't
seem to mind the prisoners getting sloshed on homemade booze, but I
guess that falls under the category of not rocking the boat unnecessarily. The good mood, however, quickly turns sour.
While the men are outside drinking, a German guard discovers the tunnel
Tom during a routine inspection of the barracks. Ives, whose
fragile psyche has been taxed by several years in the camps, repeated
failed escape attempts, and time in the cooler, snaps. He makes a
run for the fence, and tries to climb the wire in broad daylight.
Not surprisingly, he gets shot. Ives' breakdown changes Hilts'
mind about helping Bartlett and MacDonald. He breaks out the next
day, and is quickly "recaptured" and sent to the cooler with
his precious scouting information.
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| Blythe and Hendley share a pot of tea over a chessboard. |
While waiting for Hilts to be released, the work proceeds
apace. Though the tunnel seems to be making good progress, the
same can't be said about all the men. Blythe realizes he's losing
his eyesight. He tries to bluff his way past Bartlett, but
Bartlett discovers his impending blindness and tries to order him to
stay behind when the escape occurs saying that bringing a blind man
along is too big a risk. Hendley intercedes on this point.
He points out that given Bartlett's notoriety, he actually represents a
bigger risk to the operation than a blind Blythe. Bartlett
concedes the point, and then muses briefly on the thin line between
command responsibility and selfishness in his case, although he doesn't
really resolve anything. Hendley, though, takes the bull by the
horns and offers to shepherd (how is that for mixing animal metaphors?) Blythe through the process and
stay with
him on the outside. Bartlett acquiesces. One nice part about
making a nearly 3-hour movie is that you have time to build
relationships, so when Hendley sacrifices himself for Blythe, clearly
taking on much more risk than necessary, it is believable because we've
seen them become friends over time. In the meantime, Danny has a
breakdown of sorts. Though he's spent the past several months
digging tunnels, as the date for the escape approaches he begins to
dread the thought of being underground with dozens of other men.
This curious form of claustrophobia leaves him nearly paralyzed.
Danny's character, on the whole, isn't very well drawn. It is
tempting to blame Bronson here, but frankly, Danny's character does get
short-shrift in terms of screen time, so there is not much he could do with it.
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| A German guard stumbles on the escaping prisoners. |
Anyway, Hilts finally gets released from solitary. He briefs the others about the surrounding countryside.
Immediately, Bartlett puts the plan into motion. That evening, the
men gather at the remaining tunnel. As the first man breaks the
ground above, he discovers that the tunnel is 20 feet short of the tree
line. Obviously, it is too late to turn back. The men's
documents are all dated, and they would have to wait another month for
the moon to be back in its proper phase to allow another escape.
Luckily, the tunnel ends far enough from the wire that with a little
careful timing, small groups of men can escape when the guard has his
back turned. By coincidence, an air raid warning sounds. As
the Germans cut the power to black out the camp, the lights in the
tunnel also go down. On one hand, this is a blessing, since with
the lights out, the Germans can't see the prisoners rising up out of the
ground, and
the men can simply rush out into the woods. Unfortunately, the
lack of lights spooks Danny who blocks up the tunnel at a critical
moment. The men stuck behind Danny get overly anxious, and when
the air raid ends, and the lights come back on, one of them climbs out of
the ground too soon and gets spotted by a German guard thus cutting the
escape short.
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| Bartlett and MacDonald seated across from two SS
officers. Gutsy or crazy? |
The next morning we learn that 76 men got out. Von Lugar is
clearly not pleased, but he still salutes Ramsey; he remains a military
professional to the end. Because of the
botched end to the escape, the escapees are immediately pursued by the
Germans. They each take different routes. Bartlett and MacDonald
try to board a train and brazen their way past the German guards.
Handley and Blythe by contrast jump from the back of a moving train when
the Germans come through to check papers. Louis Sedgwick (James
Coburn), "The Manufacturer" from the escape committee, steals a
bicycle. Danny tries to escape by rowboat. The German
countryside seems oddly peaceful given the circumstance. When I
think of World War II, I usually have a picture of burned out cities,
and churned up terrain, but aside from various checkpoints, it almost
seems as if the war has not yet come to this part of Germany.
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| Scenes from an escape: Bartlett scampering across rooftops
(top); Hilts trying to leap to freedom (middle); and Hendley and
Blythe take an early exit from a moving train. |
Slowly, but surely, almost all the men get recaptured. Bartlett
and MacDonald get caught when MacDonald slips up and responds in English
to a Gestapo officer's wish of "good luck." D'oh!
That's the oldest trick in the book! Bartlett gives the Germans a run
for their money and forces them to pursue him across rooftops before they
finally track him down. Hendley and Blythe manage to steal an
airplane, but it develops mechanical difficulties just short of the
border and crashes. Blythe gets shot by approaching German troops. The
real excitement come from Hilts, who steals a motorcycle and leads the
Germans on a couple of wild chases through back roads and cross
country. At the climactic moment, he tries to jump the last fence
into Switzerland, only to get tangled up in the barbed wire. The
motorcycle chases were apparently pure fiction, and were added (along
with the American presence in the camp) in order to give the movie a
little more commercial appeal... also to placate McQueen, an avid
motorcyclist (remember that when you complain about how today's stars
make unreasonable demands on directors). Of the main characters, the only
ones who manage to escape are Danny and Sedgwick. Sedgwick manages
to hook up with some French resistance units who escort him to Spain.
Danny makes it to a harbor and manages to stow away on a freighter.
Most of the men are captured, and we get ominous signs when Cavandish
(Nigel Stock), the surveyor who miscalculated the distance to the trees,
is questioned by Gestapo officers. Basically, they point out that
dressed in civilian clothes, he is no longer a POW, but rather could be
considered a spy. Cavandish argues that although his uniform has
been tailored to look like a suit, it is still his uniform.
Hmmm. As you might imagine, the Gestapo officers are less than taken
with this sort of legalism. Still, the ending, when it comes, is
devastating. Although some of the men are taken back to the camp,
most of them -- including Bartlett, Cavandish, and MacDonald -- are
taken out to a field and shot. When Ramsey arrives for an accounting
from Von Lugar, the latter is embarrassed to report what has
happened. "I am instructed by higher authority to inform you
that 50 of your officers were shot while escaping." he says,
rubbing his hands nervously.
"How many of them were wounded?" Ramsey asks. Von Lugar can
barely speak the reply when he has to admit none were wounded, all were
killed. (As a historical note, 50 men were indeed murdered in
reprisal by the Germans, and several Germans were tried as war criminals
as a result.) The movie ends with Von Lugar being led away by the
SS, as Hilts is brought back to the camp... a surprisingly downbeat
ending.
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| The aftermath: The massacre (left)
and Von Lugar's arrest (right). |
The Great Escape is a fine movie. It has a great cast,
and is beautifully made. But ultimately, it is a pretty
straight-forward retelling of an escape attempt, heavily focused on the
technical details of the scheme. Though it touches on bigger
issues such as Bartlett's culpability in the death of 50 men, these
themes are really afterthoughts. The movie clocks in at 172
minutes, and in nearly three hours, I would have liked a bit more
introspection. Instead, what we gets is a very well made, well
acted, actioner. A great movie? Not really. Very good,
but not great, especially considering the last of shower scenes.*
That said, it is a lot of fun to watch (up until
the last 15 minutes or so), and has aged very well. The DVD
version is gorgeous (although 2.35:1 aspect ratio makes getting screen
caps a bear) and belongs in any complete home library.
Available at
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