The Great Escape

Director: John Sturges John Sturges

Overview

The Great Escape is based on the true story of a group of Allied prisoners of war who managed to escape from an allegedly impenetrable Nazi prison camp during World War II. At the beginning of the film, the Nazis gather all their most devious and troublesome POWs and place them at a new prison camp, which was designed to be impervious to escapes. Immediately, the prisoners develop a scheme where they will leave the camp by building three separate escape tunnels. Richard Attenborough is the British soldier who masterminds the whole plan, and who commands his motley squad--featuring Charles Bronson as a Polish trench-digging expert, James Garner as an American with a talent for theft, Donald Pleasence as a masterful forger, and Steve McQueen as an American rebel--through the construction of the tunnels and, eventually, their escape. An epic adventure film, The Great Escape runs nearly three hours, featuring a rousing Elmer Bernstein score and exciting action sequences -- including a notorious motorcycle chase between McQueen and the Nazis -- the likes of which had never been seen before in Hollywood productions.

Product Details

Release Date:	05/12/2020
UPC:	0715515245814
Original Release:	1963
Source:	Criterion Collection
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[Wide Screen, Color]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Mono, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround]
Time:	2:52:00
Sales rank:	8,630

Special Features

New, restored 4K digital transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack; Alternate 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack; Two audio commentaries, one from 1991, featuring director John Sturges and composer Elmer Bernstein; the other, from 2003, featuring actors James Coburn, James Garner, and Donald Pleasence; New interview with critic Michael Sragow; "The Great Escape": Heroes Under Ground, a four-part 2001 documentary about the real-life escape from the Stalag Luft III prisoner-of-war camp during World War II, including interviews with POWs held there; The Real Virgil Hilts: A Man Called Jones, a 2001 program on the United States Army Air Forces pilot David Jones, the inspiration for Steve McQueen's character in the film; Return to "The Great Escape," a 1993 program featuring interviews with Coburn, Garner, and actors David McCallum and Jud Taylor; Trailer; English SDH subtitles

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Steve McQueen	"Cooler King" Hilts
James Garner	"The Scrounger" Hendley
Richard Attenborough	"Big X" Bartlett
James Donald	Senior Officer Ramsey
Charles Bronson	Danny Velinski
James Coburn	"The Manufacturer" Sedgwick
David McCallum	Ashley-Pitt "Dispersal"
Donald Pleasence	"The Forger" Blythe
Gordon Jackson	MacDonald "Intelligence"
John Leyton	Willie "Tunnel King"
Angus Lennie	"The Mole" Ives
Nigel Stock	Cavendish "The Surveyor"
Jud Taylor	Goff
William Russell	Sorren
Robert Desmond	"The Tailor" Griffith
Tom Adams	Nimmo
Lawrence Montaigne	Haynes
Hannes Messemer	Von Lugar "The Kommandant"
Robert Graf	Werner "The Ferret"
Harry Riebauer	Strachwitz
Hans Reiser	Kuhn
Robert Freitag	Posen
Heinz Weiss	Kramer
Til Kiwe	Frick
Ulrich Beiger	Preissen
George Mikell	Dietrich
Karl Otto Alberty	Steinach

Technical Credits

W.R. Burnett

James Clavell

John Sturges	Director,Producer
Elmer Bernstein	Score Composer
W.R. Burnett	Screenwriter
Fernando Carrere	Art Director
James Clavell	Screenwriter
Bud Ekins	Stunts
Daniel L. Fapp	Cinematographer
Bert Henrikson	Costumes/Costume Designer
Emile LaVigne	Makeup
Jack N. Reddish	Asst. Director
Ferris Webster	Editor

Editorial Reviews

Director John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven) pulls out all the stops in The Great Escape, his classic big-budget World War II POW extravaganza. The title pretty much says it all: The film tells the true story of some determined Allied prisoners who manage to tunnel out of a new and presumably escape-proof camp in which they have all been interred. Sturges lovingly details every aspect of their elaborate scheme, as the prisoners bring a host of skills -- engineering, forgery, and even tailoring -- to the job at hand. There is some rudimentary character development along the way, but don’t expect detailed, complex glimpses into the inner workings of these guys’ psyches. The inmates (Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, James Garner, and many more) are cleanly drawn as heroic to a man, and their camaraderie, ingenuity, and courage allows them to pull off a truly impressive feat. Yes, these are idealized portraits, but immensely satisfying ones. The structure of The Great Escape evokes a powerful sense of liberation, as the claustrophobic atmosphere of the first half of the film gives way to open-air chases in the second half, including McQueen's famous motorcycle romp through some spectacular wide-screen vistas of the German countryside, with a battalion of soldiers in hot pursuit. Topping it all off is a memorable -- and eminently whistle-able -- score from Elmer Bernstein. The Great Escape is Hollywood entertainment at its finest. Sit back and enjoy.

Barnes & Noble - Gregory Baird

John Sturges' The Great Escape could easily be the most under-appreciated movie of its genre and decade, which may seem a strange thing to say about a movie that is one of the most popular World War II adventure films ever made. It not only defined the screen personae of Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough and much of the rest of the cast, but along with The Magnificent Seven represented a high-water mark in Sturges' career. Yet, despite that and the millions of dollars it earned at the box office, The Great Escape didn't command much respect until years after its release. Critics lumped the film together with such mammoth World War II productions as The Longest Day, The Guns of Navarone and Battle of the Bulge and overlooked its unique status as a fundamentally tragic movie that still managed to appeal to audiences in an upbeat manner. Beneath the fact-based heroics, the humor of many of the portrayals and Elmer Bernstein's rich, rousing score lay the elements of a classic tragedy. While ordinary viewers responded to the driving dramatic forces among the characters -- Bartlett's obsession, Hilts's self-absorption and cynicism, Hedley's practical approach to survival and the mission -- critics and scholars viewed the movie as an artless, empty blockbuster. They were looking for self-conscious subtlety and obvious artistic touches in a story that required only a straightforward, unpretentious telling. The Great Escape expresses its depth and drama through action rather than ponderous dialogue, and in that sense, was probably too true to its subject for its own good, at least in terms of achieving critical respect. Only in recent years have film historians grudgingly confronted the fact that The Great Escape's audience has broadened since its release, and reappraised its unique qualities.

All Movie Guide - Bruce Eder

John Sturges' The Great Escape could easily be the most under-appreciated movie of its genre and decade, which may seem a strange thing to say about a movie that is one of the most popular World War II adventure films ever made. It not only defined the screen personae of Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough and much of the rest of the cast, but along with The Magnificent Seven represented a high-water mark in Sturges' career. Yet, despite that and the millions of dollars it earned at the box office, The Great Escape didn't command much respect until years after its release. Critics lumped the film together with such mammoth World War II productions as The Longest Day, The Guns of Navarone and Battle of the Bulge and overlooked its unique status as a fundamentally tragic movie that still managed to appeal to audiences in an upbeat manner. Beneath the fact-based heroics, the humor of many of the portrayals and Elmer Bernstein's rich, rousing score lay the elements of a classic tragedy. While ordinary viewers responded to the driving dramatic forces among the characters -- Bartlett's obsession, Hilts's self-absorption and cynicism, Hedley's practical approach to survival and the mission -- critics and scholars viewed the movie as an artless, empty blockbuster. They were looking for self-conscious subtlety and obvious artistic touches in a story that required only a straightforward, unpretentious telling. The Great Escape expresses its depth and drama through action rather than ponderous dialogue, and in that sense, was probably too true to its subject for its own good, at least in terms of achieving critical respect. Only in recent years have film historians grudgingly confronted the fact that The Great Escape's audience has broadened since its release, and reappraised its unique qualities. Bruce Eder

All Movie Guide