The Great Escape (film)

In 1963, the Mirisch brothers worked with United Artists to adapt Paul Brickhill's 1950 book The Great Escape. Brickhill had been a very minor member of the X Organisation at Stalag Luft III, who acted as one of the "stooges" who monitored German movements in the camp. The story had been adapted as a live TV production, screened by NBC as an episode of The Philco Television Playhouse on January 27, 1951.[13] The live broadcast was praised for engineering an ingenious set design for the live broadcast, including creating the illusion of tunnels.[14] The film's screenplay was adapted by James Clavell, W. R. Burnett, and Walter Newman.

Steve McQueen (left) with Wally Floody, a former Canadian POW who was part of the real Great Escape and acted as a technical advisor in production of the film

Steve McQueen has been credited with the most significant performance. Critic Leonard Maltin wrote that "the large, international cast is superb, but the standout is McQueen; it's easy to see why this cemented his status as a superstar".[15] This film established his box-office clout.

Richard Attenborough's Sqn Ldr Roger Bartlett RAF, "Big X", was based on Roger Bushell, the South African-born British POW who was the mastermind of the real Great Escape.[16] This was the film that first brought Attenborough to common notice in the United States. During World War II, Attenborough served in the Royal Air Force. He volunteered to fly with the Film Unit and after further training (where he sustained permanent ear damage) he qualified as a sergeant. He flew on several missions over Europe, filming from the rear gunner's position to record the outcome of Bomber Command sorties. (Richard Harris was originally announced for the role.)[17]

Group Captain Ramsey RAF, "the SBO" (Senior British Officer), was based on Group Captain Herbert Massey, a World War I veteran who had volunteered in World War II. Massey walked with a limp, and in the movie Ramsey walks with a cane. Massey had suffered severe wounds to the same leg in both wars. There would be no escape for him, but as SBO he had to know what was going on. Group Captain Massey was a veteran escaper himself and had been in trouble with the Gestapo. His experience allowed him to offer sound advice to the X-Organisation.[18] Another officer who is likely to have inspired the character of Ramsey was Wing Commander Harry Day.

Flt Lt Colin Blythe RAF, "The Forger", was based on Tim Walenn and played by Donald Pleasence.[19] Pleasence himself had served in the Royal Air Force during World War II. He was shot down and spent a year in German prisoner-of-war camp Stalag Luft I.

Charles Bronson had been a gunner in the USAAF and had been wounded, but never shot down. Like his character, Danny Valinski, he suffered from claustrophobia because of his childhood work in a mine.

James Garner had been a soldier in the Korean War and was twice wounded. He was a scrounger during that time, as is his character.[20]

Hannes Messemer's Commandant, "Colonel von Luger", was based on Oberst Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau.[21] He had been a POW in Russia during World War II and had escaped by walking hundreds of miles to the German border.[22] He was wounded by Russian fire, but was not captured by the Russians. He surrendered to British forces and then spent two years in a POW facility in London known as the London Cage.

Angus Lennie's Flying Officer Archibald Ives, "The Mole", was based on Jimmy Kiddel, who was shot dead while trying to scale the fence.[23]

The film is accurate in showing that only three escapees made home runs, although the people who made them differed from those in the film. The escape of Danny and Willie in the film is based on two Norwegians who escaped by boat to Sweden, Per Bergsland and Jens Müller. The successful escape of James Coburn's Australian character, Sedgwick ("the Manufacturer"), via Spain was based on Dutchman Bram van der Stok. Coburn, an American, was cast in the role of Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) Flying Officer Louis Sedgwick who was an amalgamation of Flt Lt Albert Hake, an Australian serving in the RAF, the camp's compass maker, and Johnny Travis, the real manufacturer.

Tilman 'Til Kiwe' Kiver played the German guard "Frick", who discovers the escape. Kiwe had been a German paratrooper officer who was captured and held prisoner at a POW camp in Colorado. He made several escape attempts, dyeing his uniform and carrying forged papers. He was captured in the St. Louis train station during one escape attempt. He won the Knight's Cross before his capture and was the cast member who had actually performed many of the exploits shown in the film.

The film was made on location in Germany at the Bavaria Film Studio in the Munich suburb of Geiselgasteig in rural Bavaria, where sets for the barrack interiors and tunnels were constructed. The camp was built in a clearing of the Perlacher Forst (Perlacher Forest) near the studio.[24][25] The German town near the real camp was Sagan (now Żagań, Poland); it was renamed Neustadt in the film.[25] Many scenes were filmed in and around the town of Füssen in Bavaria, including its railway station. The nearby district of Pfronten,[26] with its distinctive St. Nikolaus Church and scenic background, also appears often in the film.[25] The first scenes involving the railway were filmed on the Munich–Holzkirchen line at Großhesselohe station ("Neustadt" station in the movie) and near Deisenhofen. Hendley and Blythe's escape from the train was shot on the Munich–Mühldorf railway east of Markt Schwaben. The station where Bartlett, MacDonald and Ashley-Pitt arrive is Füssen station, whereas the scene of Sedgwick (whose theft of a bike was shot in Markt Schwaben) boarding a train was created in Pfronten-Ried station on the Ausserfern Railway.[27][28] The castle Hendley and Blythe fly by while attempting to escape is Neuschwanstein Castle.[29]

Replica of the motorcycle used by McQueen and Ekins.

The motorcycle chase scenes with the barbed wire fences were shot on meadows outside Füssen, and the "barbed wire" that Hilts crashes into before being recaptured was simulated by strips of rubber tied around barbless wire, constructed by the cast and crew in their spare time.[30] Insurance concerns prevented McQueen from performing the film's notable motorcycle leap, which was done by his friend and fellow cycle enthusiast Bud Ekins, who resembled McQueen from a distance.[31] When Johnny Carson later tried to congratulate McQueen for the jump during a broadcast of The Tonight Show, McQueen said, "It wasn't me. That was Bud Ekins." However, McQueen and Australian Motocross champion Tim Gibbes both performed the stunt on camera for fun, and according to second unit director Robert Relyea, the stunt in the final cut of the movie could have been performed by any of the three men.[32] Other parts of the chase were done by McQueen, playing both Hilts and the soldiers chasing him, because of his skill on a motorcycle.[33] The motorcycle was a Triumph TR6 Trophy which was painted to look like a German machine. The restored machine is currently on display at Triumph's factory at Hinckley, England.[34]

The Great Escape grossed $11.7 million at the box office,[56] after a budget of $4 million.[57] It became one of the highest-grossing films of 1963, despite heavy competition. In the years since its release, its audience has broadened, cementing its status as a cinema classic.[4] It was entered into the 3rd Moscow International Film Festival, where McQueen won the Silver Prize for Best Actor.[58]

Critical and public response has mostly been enthusiastic, with a "Certified Fresh" 94% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.[59] In 1963, The New York Times critic Bosley Crowther wrote: "But for much longer than is artful or essential, The Great Escape grinds out its tormenting story without a peek beneath the surface of any man, without a real sense of human involvement. It's a strictly mechanical adventure with make-believe men."[60] British film critic Leslie Halliwell described it as "pretty good but overlong POW adventure with a tragic ending".[61] The Time magazine reviewer wrote in 1963: "The use of colour photography is unnecessary and jarring, but little else is wrong with this film. With accurate casting, a swift screenplay, and authentic German settings, Producer-Director John Sturges has created classic cinema of action. There is no sermonizing, no soul probing, no sex. The Great Escape is simply great escapism".[62]

In a 2006 poll in the United Kingdom, regarding the family film that television viewers would most want to see on Christmas Day, The Great Escape came in third, and was first among the choices of male viewers.[63]

In an article for the British Film Institute, "10 great prisoner of war films", updated in August 2018, Samuel Wigley wrote that watching films like The Great Escape and the 1955 British film The Colditz Story, "for all their moments of terror and tragedy, is to delight in captivity in times of war as a wonderful game for boys, an endless Houdini challenge to slip through the enemy's fingers. Often based on true stories of escape, they have the viewer marvelling at the ingenuity and seemingly unbreakable spirit of imprisoned soldiers." He described The Great Escape as "the epitome of the war-is-fun action film", which became "a fixture of family TV viewing".[64]

• Nominated Academy Award for Film Editing (Ferris Webster)
• Nominated Golden Globe Award for Best Picture
• Winner Moscow International Film Festival Best Actor (Steve McQueen)
• Nominated Moscow International Film Festival Grand Prix (John Sturges)
• Selected National Board of Review Top Ten Films of Year
• Nominated Writers Guild of America Best Written American Drama (James Clavell, W. R. Burnett) (Screenplay Adaptation)
• 19th place in AFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills

On 24 March 2014, the 70th anniversary of the escape, the RAF staged a commemoration of the escape attempt, with 50 serving personnel each carrying a photograph of one of the shot men.[65]

On 24 March 2019, the RAF held another event for the 75th anniversary of the escape. There was a screening of the film at London's Eventim Hammersmith Apollo, hosted by Dan Snow. The film was simulcast with other cinemas throughout the UK.[66]

A fictional, made-for-television sequel, The Great Escape II: The Untold Story, was released in 1988, with different actors including Christopher Reeve in the leading role, and directed by Jud Taylor (who played 2nd Lt. Goff in the 1963 film).[67] The film is not a true sequel, as it dramatizes the escape itself just as the original film does, although mostly using the real names of the individuals involved (whereas the original film fictionalized them and used composite characters). It depicts the search for the culprits responsible for the murder of the 50 Allied officers. Donald Pleasence appears in a supporting role as a member of the SS.[68]

• The films Chicken Run, Reservoir Dogs, the 1998 remake of The Parent Trap, Top Secret!, Charlie's Angels, The Tao of Steve, and Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult all contain references or homages to the film.[68]
• In the film Escape from Alcatraz, the warden's line, "Alcatraz was built to keep all the rotten eggs in one basket" appears to resemble Von Luger's line, "We have, in effect, put all our rotten eggs in one basket."
• Monty Python's Flying Circus, The Simpsons, Hogan's Heroes, Nash Bridges, Seinfeld, Get Smart, Fugget About It, Archer, Goodness Gracious Me, Shaun the Sheep, and Red Dwarf have all parodied or paid homage to the film.[68]
• In "Escape From Stalag Luft 112B", an episode of Ripping Yarns, Maj. Errol Phipps (played by Michael Palin) is depicted as being the only prisoner of war never to escape from the camp.[68]
• In the British television comedy series Mitchell & Webb, a sketch called "Cheesoid" features a scene where a character who has lost their sense of smell locates a clove of garlic deliberately placed beforehand on the floor, in the same way that Blythe places the pin on the floor in the film.[69] Another sketch involving a German-language version of the gameshow Numberwang sees an English contestant tricked into revealing her nationality in the same way that MacDonald is tricked by the Gestapo agent.[70]
• The 1986 video game The Great Escape for the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and DOS platforms, shares a title and similar plot to the movie. The game follows an unnamed prisoner of war who has been interned in a POW camp somewhere in northern Germany in 1942.
• In the first of two Ford commercials in which Steve McQueen's likeness from the film Bullitt was used, McQueen parks his car in a studio apartment garage beside the Mustang from Bullitt and the motorcycle from The Great Escape.[71]
• The 2003 video game The Great Escape for Xbox and PlayStation 2, is based on the film. The plotline follows that of the film of the same name, except there are also levels featuring some of the characters' first captures and early escape attempts, as well as a changed ending.
• Japanese video game designer, Hideo Kojima, stated that The Great Escape was the main inspiration for the stealth gameplay of Metal Gear and the 2004 video game Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, which takes place a year after the movie was released, references the movie in a Codec transmission early in the game. Major Zero, who at the time was using the code name Major Tom, discloses in a conversation to Naked Snake that he chose the name based on what he thought was the tunnel the prisoners used to escape. He later learned that he chose the wrong one; the tunnel was Harry, not Tom.
• Bernstein's Great Escape theme tune has been taken up by the Pukka Pies England Band, a small brass band who have played in the crowd at England football team matches since 1996.[72] They released an arrangement of the theme as a single for the 1998 FIFA World Cup and a newer version for UEFA Euro 2000.[73]
• Quentin Tarantino's 2019 film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood features Leonardo DiCaprio, as lead character Rick Dalton, in a scene where Dalton is imagined in the role of Steve McQueen's character, Hilts.
• Animated segments of the tunnel escape scene and Hilts' attempt to cross the German-Swiss border are used in the anime Girls und Panzer das Finale: Part 3 as learning material for Ōarai Girls' Academy's Rabbit Team.

• Andrews, Allen (1976). Exemplary Justice. London: Harrap. ISBN 978-0-245-52775-3. Details the manhunt by the Royal Air Force's special investigations unit after the war to find and bring to trial the perpetrators of the "Sagan murders".
• Barris, Ted (2013). The Great Escape: A Canadian Story. Toronto: Thomas Allen. ISBN 978-1-77102-272-9.
• Brickhill, Paul (1950). The Great Escape. New York: Norton.
• Burgess, Alan (1990). The Longest Tunnel. New York: Grove Press. ISBN 978-1-55584-033-4.
• Hehner, Barbara (2004). The Tunnel King: The True Story of Wally Floody and the Great Escape. Toronto: Harper Trophy Canada.
• Hevesi, Dennis (April 22, 2012). "Alex Cassie of 'Great Escape' Dies at 95". The New York Times. p. 20.
• Müller, Jens (1946). Tre kom tilbake [Three returned]. Norway: Gyldendal. Memoir by the surviving Norwegian escapee.
• Smith, Sydney (1968). 'Wings' Day. London: Pan Books. ISBN 978-0-330-02494-5. Story of Wing Commander Harry "Wings" Day.
• Vance, Jonathan F. (2000). A Gallant Company: The True Story of the Man of "The Great Escape". New York: I Books. ISBN 978-0-7394-4242-5.