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8.9/10
FilmFascination Rating
What would happen if you bring all the prisoner escapees in one camp and put the best security possible? Is it going to straighten the dog’s tail or is there going to be another escape? Obviously from the title of the movie, you know what happened. The Great Escape is based on a true story of the mass escape by British Commonwealth prisoners of war from German POW camp Stalag Luft 3.
Now that pretty much gives you the idea of the plot. The British group captain is warned that any man who escapes will be shot. Regardless, many men, immediately after entering the camp, try using various methods to escape. But when Roger Bartlett, the head of the ‘X organization’ (the escape-planning committee) is brought into the camp, he forms an intricate plan to break out 250 men altogether. What is commendable is that The Great Escape is so darn detailed. It is a movie that takes the viewers through every step the prisoners take in completing their operation. The wood needed, the type of soil, the roller wheels under the tunnel and so much more, never making it too heavy for the audience to digest all of it.
Most of the details were drawn from Brickhill’s book, including the choir practice to distract from the sound of hammering or the dreadful undershot of the tunnel. I would just have to wonder how difficult it must have been to shoot scenes like the underground ones in the 1960s. That gives the movie that realism. Not to mention that every actor in the movie had their own stories to tell from the war. So, they very well knew how it all was. In fact, for authenticity, Sturges hired a former X organization tunnel king Wally Floody as a technical advisor. He also put together a cast that included former POWs who brought their roles to life through their real-life experiences.
War movies tend to have many characters. Characterization in such a case tends to be a challenging task. Usually, there are two or three main characters around which the movie surrounds itself.
‘The Great Escape’ is no exception and has many characters in the movie. I am surprised myself but each one of them somehow makes their presence known. In the end, I just knew all of them with their unique quirks and personalities. Many movies can’t even make one character connect with the audience entirely and this movie here makes us connect with so many characters. Just amazing!
This was possible because to make the movie plausible, the real-life roles that many men did were shrunk down to one person in the movie. James Garner is ‘The Scrounger’ who can get any forbidden goods the operation needs. Donal Pleasance is ‘The Forger’, and Bronson, although claustrophobic is ‘The Tunnel King’. Gordon Jackson is the ‘Intelligence’. And the list pretty much goes on. It shows the breadth of work being done and the essentialness of each man’s task. These play a genius task of making characterization simple.
The damage produced due to the focus on details of the escape alone is the missing grimness of the camp. The illness and mental state of the soldiers that had started to degrade in real life aren’t given much of a focus in the movie. Other than some mocking sarcastic statements, the interactions with the Nazi keepers are pretty soft. But besides that, if we come down on the escape in The Great Escape, then it is one of the most engrossing prison break films. Mcqueen’s cockiness throughout the film, the humor and sarcasm of the whole cast, the famous bike chase action scene, and the heart beating rapidly when the escape takes place. There are moments when you just go breathless.
‘The Great Escape’ tries to stick to the real story as closely as possible. In the end, the movie might not give you the satisfaction you feel when Andy escapes in ‘The Shawshank Redemption’. But as the movie suggests, it is your perspective of looking at it that matters. The movie shows a lot of things about how each of the escapees’ journey goes after the escape. Perhaps that seems to be a minor downhill from a movie point of view. But it had to be shown from the historical perspective to keep things real and show how it actually happened. Even after so much effort, the strong men just smiled through their fate when it knocked on their door.
Finally, the movie makes you realize how brutal it was during that period and the sheer will of men to survive through the period just so they could see their family once again. Men who have never seen each other show immense teamwork and determination. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again- One of the reasons why I watch movies is to realize what it would have been to live through different circumstances. Movies like this take you to that time and give you a tinge of experience of that period. And that is what I love the most about ‘The Great Escape’.
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