Great war movie

Rating: 8/10 (22 April 2019)

The movie tells the story of an "undisciplinate" major that, after various controversial transfers and actions, gets tasked with the challenging task of transforming 12 prisoners, all of them facing hard sentences and even death penalties, into a vicious assault team. Their mission? Invade a Nazi stronghold and kill as many high-ranking german officers as possible, in hope of having their sentences revoked.
This movie is superbly casted, featuring stars like Charles Bronson, Lee Marvin, Donald Sutherland and George Kennedy. Some members of The Dirty Dozen are portrayed by some lesser-known actors, but nonetheless their performances are spot-on.
Even though the squad is assembled by soldiers that have done some horrible crimes, you cannot root against them on their mission. And also it is good to see so many different and peculiar personalities progressively morph into a tight-knit crew. All this presented to us through funny scenes, great acting and direction, and style. Not to mention the last 30 minutes, one of the most gripping movie sequence of events that I have ever watched - pure catharsis.
However, I will admit that I found the movie to be a little too long. I reckon that some scenes could have been shorter, and some completely removed from the movie. But nonetheless, with a little bit of patience, it is possible to get through the tepid scenes and enjoy the movie thoroughly. A must watch.
8/10