Typically American

Rating: 2/10 (10 October 2003)

The special operations by convicts are described in the books in the series 0011 by the Germans on the East-front. There were never American convicts doing an action in war. The attack by the SS-parachutists and convicts on the headquarters of Tito were well conducted and at the last moment Tito could escape but there were heavy losses specially on the side of the partisans. Oberstürmbannführer (he never became general but he laughed at the action by the parachutists on the raid on Tito) Otto Skorzeny did a lot of operations in the uniform of the enemy and he even got into the headquarters of the Hungarian army. In the battle of the Bulge he just had not enough American material (jeeps, weapons etc...) to conduct a similar operation. I think Robert Aldrich made the movie at a moment Americans needed support for their war against Vietnam. However, in reality German sharpshooters shot and did not miss their target, something the Americans seem to have forgotten since then. I found this movie a pleasure to watch at but at the same moment I had to imagine that it was only cinema and had nothing to do with reality. So I imagined that the killed human beings in the movie were only puppets and that it was only a game. The actors are good and the action is good. Telly Salavas, Don Suterhland, Bronson, Lee Marvin they are OK. Just one question: in our time of computer-games, did this movie get old?