Plot
Allied POWs plan for several hundred of their number to escape from a German camp during World War II.

Release Year: 1963

Rating: 8.3/10 (81,617 voted)

Director: John Sturges

Stars: Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough

Storyline
Based on a true story, a group of allied escape artist type prisoners of war are all put in an 'escape proof' camp. Their leader decides to try to take out several hundred all at once. The first half of the film is played for comedy as the prisoners mostly outwit their jailers to dig the escape tunnel. The second half is high adventure as they use boats and trains and planes to get out of occupied Europe.

Writers: Paul Brickhill, James Clavell

Cast:
Steve McQueen - Hilts 'The Cooler King'
James Garner - Hendley 'The Scrounger'
Richard Attenborough - Bartlett 'Big X'
James Donald - Ramsey 'The SBO'
Charles Bronson - Danny 'Tunnel King'
Donald Pleasence - Blythe 'The Forger'
James Coburn - Sedgwick 'The Manufacturer'
Hannes Messemer - Von Luger 'The Kommandant'
David McCallum - Ashley-Pitt 'Dispersal'
Gordon Jackson - MacDonald 'Intelligence'
John Leyton - Willie 'Tunnel King'
Angus Lennie - Ives 'The Mole'
Nigel Stock - Cavendish 'The Surveyor'
Robert Graf - Werner 'The Ferret'
Jud Taylor - Goff

Taglines: put a fence in front of these men...and they'll climb it...

Release Date: 4 July 1963

Filming Locations: Bavaria Filmstudios, Geiselgasteig, Grünwald, Bavaria, Germany

Box Office Details

Budget: $4,000,000 (estimated)

Runtime: 172 min

Trivia:
The film was shot entirely on location in Europe, with a complete camp resembling Stalag Luft III built near Munich, Germany. Exteriors for the escape sequences were shot in the Rhine Country and areas near the North Sea, and Steve McQueen's motorcycle scenes were filmed in Fussen (on the Austrian border) and the Alps. All interiors were filmed at the Bavaria Studio in Munich.

Goofs:
Errors in geography: Immediately after Lt. Henley tells Colin that they are just one mountain ridge away from Switzerland, their plane flies past the famous castle of Neuschwanstein, which is on the Austrian border, about 60 miles (and some very high mountains) away from Switzerland.

Quotes:
Sergeant-Hauptmann Strachwitz: I will not take action against you, now. This is the first day here and there has been much stupidity and carelessness... on both sides!

GREAT MOVIE: MORE HISTORICALLY ACCURATE THAN SOME REALIZE...

Rating:

This is a great movie which much more historically accurate than it is often given credit for. So many who say otherwise are ill-informed and obviously don't know much about the actual history of that actual escape. The depiction of what happened to the recaptured prisoners in the movie of THE GREAT ESCAPE is reasonably accurate as detailed on the historyinfilm site...specifically on the "Reprisal" page; along with being detailed in the various published accounts.

Hitler ultimately calmed down after being reasoned with by Goering, Feldmarschall Keitel, Maj-Gen Graevenitz and Maj-Gen Westhoff, and dictated that more than half the prisoners be shot and cremated. So, as depicted in the film, several of those recaptured were not executed and were indeed returned to confinement. In fact, even those executed were not "shot on the spot" for the most part, but were actually executed later after being turned over to the Gestapo; most being shot while being allowed to relieve themselves, under the guise of "trying to escape".

Furthermore, there are many accounts as to how much more humane the environment was within the camp (which even had a popular and very successful theatre, featuring prisoners who would later be name performers) than many other POW camps...and certainly nothing like the harsh conditions associated with the Concentration or Extermination camps.

To quote one source:

"It must be made clear that the German Luftwaffe [the German Air Force], who were responsible for Air Force prisoners of war, maintained a degree of professional respect for fellow flyers, and the general attitude of the camp security officers and guards should not be confused with the SS or Gestapo. The Luftwaffe treated the POWs well, despite an erratic and inconsistent supply of food.

Prisoners were handled quite fairly within the Geneva Convention, and the Kommandant, Oberst (Colonel) Friedrich-Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau, was a professional and honourable soldier who won the respect of the senior prisoners."

Finally, virtually all the major engineering aspects in regards to the tunnels and the initial escape in the film are as they were actually acheived in the real escape.

It would behoove some to learn a little more actual history or do a little simple research before shooting from the hip with supposed "knowledge" of reality. THE GREAT ESCAPE certainly takes liberties in tone and character portrayal, but not in the key elements that are disparaged out of sneering ignorance.

BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI is also a great film, but took even greater liberties with the technical details of the events described than THE GREAT ESCAPE did....and offering up VON RYAN'S EXPRESS as a more realistic alternative is simply delusional and ridiculous.

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