The Great Escape
A Bank Holiday would not be one without showing The Great Escape (1963) and – sure enough – Film 4 showed it on a cold Easter Monday.
The previous day I had watched another team movie – Ocean’s Eleven (2001) – but it compared unfavourably.
The Great Escape has the advantage of a wonderful film score by Elmer Bernstein and a terrific cast of American and British actors.
Steve McQueen leads the way as the free-spirited Hilts, with Charles Bronson as the Tunnel King’, James Garner as the scrounger, James Coburn – whilst the British provide David McCallum, Donald Pleasance as the forger, Gordon Jackson as Mac and – holding it all together Richard Attenborough as Roger Bartlett – who plots the escape of 250 prisoners.
The movie divides into three parts, each of them pacy: the construction of the three tunnels (Tom, Dick and Harry); the escape itself; and the survival of all but one – James Coburn playing as Aussie but never quite capturing the accent. Fifty of the escapees are executed, which causes severe embarrassment to the camp Kommandant von Luger (Hanes Messenger) who – like the senior British Officer (James Donald) – has a code of honour being a career soldier, not a member of the SS.
There is no romantic interest, but arguably the best chase scene in any film – when Steve McQueen, on a motor bike, evades the Germans.
There is a lovely vignette too, when Mac gives himself away when wished “Good luck” in English by a Gestapo, having warned an escapee of this switch of language.
The Great Escape satisfies the definition of a classic, namely that you can watch it for the umpteenth time for 5 minutes but still soon get caught up in it.
