A superior war film - A Children's Crusade - one of Peckinpahs' best

Rating: 8/10 (16 July 2000)

Think of Sam Peckinpah and you instantly think of the final bloody shoot out from The Wild Bunch, the controversial rape scene from Straw Dogs, or the other shoot out in Pat Garrett. All of them memorable movies that won deserved critical acclaim.
Cross of Iron is a film that has been continually overlooked in this context which is a great shame because for me its probably his second best film after WB.
Definitely an anti-war film taken from the ordinary German soldier's perspective. Not quite in the same league as All Quiet on the Western Front, but very emotionally involving for all that.
James Coburn plays cynical Sgt Steiner a man who has seen enough killing and is sick of it, even though he won the Iron Cross,he regards it as nothing more than a piece of useless metal.
Contrast this to Maximilian Schell's Captain Stransky, Steiner's commander. A self-confessed aristocrat with an image to maintain; a man who has seen very little frontline action and yet if he doesn't receive the very same Iron Cross would mean certain social death for him back home.

Both men are so socially & ideologically different and yet fight on the same side. A German who only fights because he has to whether he likes it or not, another German who is scared of fighting yet has his social standing to worry about. Nazism isn't even questioned here - there are no stereotypical jack booted Jerries or mad ranting generals; just ordinary men fighting for their own personal ends.
As usual we have the typical Peckinpah trademarks of slow mo action sequences of men being tossed in the air like litter as well as the cold blooded inhumanities one man (or woman in this case) can inflict upon another.
But in addition, and which is never really made clear in this film, is that this particular conflict isn't just about class and Iron Crosses but also of a Children's Crusade.
Peckinpah makes this harrowing point on quite a few occasions: the blonde Russian boy soldier that befriends Steiner for one, the scene at the end of the film where Steiner leads Stransky into battle and is almost killed by yet another boy soldier. But most telling of all is the musical score, initially sung in chorus by children coupled with a final slide-show of young children either being hung or suffering a miserable existence through no fault of their own.
A very good anti-war film then: a bit too simplistic perhaps but is excellent all the same. Coburn, Mason & particularly Warner play their parts with passion & openess.
****/*****