AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

thegulls1 I read Jack Higgin' novel before watching the movie and thoroughly enjoyed this presentation. The character of Liam Devlin, a tough Irish nationalist, (played beautifully here by a 'young' Donald Sutherland), was one Higgins re-used effectively in a few novels. In this story, a mission to kidnap Winston Churchill is hatched by the German High Command. The specific plot, a pipe dream of Himmler and Hitler, is concocted by Col. Radl, played skilfully by Robert Duvall, as always. He recruits a team of crack German commandos led by Michael Caine's Kurt Steiner. He and his team have fallen into disfavour, explaining why they accept such a wild, suicide venture. Nonetheless, Radl plants Devlin in Northern England in the fictional town of Studley Constable, where a disillusioned female Boer descendant has indicated the PM will arrive for dinner, cigars and brandy. Intelligence? Check. Team of Kidnappers disguised as Polish Nationals? Check. Means of escape I.e. a Brit- looking patrol boat? Check. What could go wrong? Superb performances by a great cast. Just one change from the book that may cheer you up: Steiner & his men are condemned because they interfere with an S.S. operation to load Jewish captives onto a train headed to a Death Camp. The Jewish girl they load onto a different train gets shot anyway-in the book, she gets away Scot-free! Ponder that as you see how this one finally turns out.

GusF Based on the 1975 novel of the same name by Jack Higgins, this is an extremely enjoyable "Boy's Own"-type adventure thriller concerning a Nazi plot to kidnap Churchill in 1943. I first saw the film in 2006 and I did not particularly enjoy it. I think that the major problem that I had with it then was that I was expecting it to be on the same level as the director John Sturges' previous films "The Magnificent Seven" and "The Great Escape", my fourth and fifth favourite films respectively then and now, and it most certainly isn't. However, I was unfair to it on that occasion. On my second viewing of it today, I enjoyed it considerably more for what it was as opposed to disliking it for what it wasn't. There was a few rather silly moments but it has a cracking script by Tom Mankiewicz. I would praise Sturges' direction from what I saw on screen but, according to Mankiewicz and Michael Caine, most of the editing work was done by Anne V. Coates so it is a little hard to gauge it in the way that I normally would for such things. This was Sturges' final film, incidentally.Michael Caine is characteristically excellent as the highly decorated but disgraced protagonist Oberst Kurt Steiner. He is introduced while trying to save a young Jewish woman from being rounded up by the SS in Poland, saying that he does not have any strong feelings about the Jews one way or the other but he has seen too many people die in the war already. Steiner is a comparatively honourable man who at times is even sympathetic in spite of the fact that he is leading the mission to kidnap the Prime Minister. In fact, most of his men are honourable as one of them gives his life to save a little English girl from being crushed by a waterwheel. He meets that unpleasant fate himself. His Free Polish uniform is torn and it is revealed that he is wearing a German one underneath and, consequently, that they are Germans. Steiner insisted that he and his men be allowed to wear their German uniforms, one of the aforementioned silly moments.I said in my review of "Ordinary People" last week that Donald Sutherland is one of the best actors of his generation and I stand by that. However, he was badly miscast as the Germans' IRA accomplice Liam Devlin. He does the best that he can with the role but his Irish accent is not great and the character is a little clichéd, his second line being "Top o' the mornin' to ya." Bar one year in Edinburgh, I have lived all of my 28 years in Ireland and I have yet to hear anyone say that unless they were mocking Irish stereotypes! Richard Harris was strongly considered for the role and he would certainly have been more suited to it as, aside from his nationality, he often played rough and ready characters. However, perhaps he was too suited to it. The producers decided that it was a bad idea to cast him since he was known for making pro-IRA statements in real life. Considering that this was a British film made in the 1970s, I don't think that it was a great idea or a very tasteful one to make Devlin a lovable rogue, essentially. His love story with Molly, admittedly played very well by Jenny Agutter, is nice but it doesn't really add much to the film.The film has a very strong supporting cast overall such as Robert Duvall as Oberst Radl, Anthony Quayle as the Cassandra-esque Admiral Wilhelm Canaris (who was executed for treason in 1945), a suitably creepy Donald Pleasence as Himmler, Jean Marsh as the sleeper agent Joanna Grey, Sven-Bertil Taube as Hans, John Standing as Father Verecker, a very young Treat Williams as Captain Clark, Michael Byrne as Karl, Siegfried Rauch (the most prominent German cast member) as Brandt and, last but not least, Larry Hagman as the blustering, buffoonish US Army Colonel Clarence E. Pitts. Interestingly, he played a somewhat similar character in his cameo in "Superman", likewise written by Mankiewicz. The film also features nice small appearances from Maurice Roëves, Judy Geeson, Jeff Conaway, Roy Marsden and Denis Lill.Overall, this is not a heavy hitter when it comes to World War II films but it's great fun. Oh, and what a twist at the end!

Wuchak Michael Caine is outstanding as Colonel Steiner, an untamed German paratroop commander, who's covert mission is to go to Great Britain and kidnap Winston Churchill whilst on a retreat. The Germans are helped by Irishman Liam Devlin, played by Donald Sutherland, who essentially paves the way for their operation at a coastal hamlet (shot in Cornwall and Berkshire, England). Jenny Agutter plays Devlin's near-jailbait romantic interest in the quaint village, while Larry Hagman and Treat Williams play American officers, the former foolishly gung-ho. Robert Duvall and Donald Sutherland are also on hand as German officers.As you can see from the plot, this is an unconventional WWII picture. It doesn't feature the typical major battles or stereotypical characters and situations of most war flicks. Both Caine and Sutherland shine in their roles, especially Caine as the fearless Steiner. Many memorable moments abound.The film runs 131 minutes but feels shorter.GRADE: B+

AaronCapenBanner Based on Jack Higgen's novel, film tells the story of a secret German plan to kidnap Winston Churchill as a bargaining chip against Great Britain! Michael Caine leads the mission, where they are disguised as Polish soldiers on maneuvers, and helped by an IRA supporter(played by Donald Sutherland) who will do anything in his war against the British. Robert Duvall, Donald Pleasance, Jenny Agutter, and Jean Marsh round out the fine cast.Despite the fanciful premise, this is an old-fashioned and very entertaining adventure, well directed by John Sturges, and features a good script as well, leading to the surprise climax.