I Can't See A Bloody Thing!

Rating: Null/10 (10 March 2009)

What a terrific movie The Great Escape is  and what a unique position it has captured in the hearts of the British public. Nearly half-a-century after it was made the TV stations still trot it out on at least one public holiday each year for us to enjoy and, even after numerous viewings, it's always a pleasure to watch. The near-three hour running time simply flies by, propelled by Bernstein's rousing score and a raft of memorable scenes that, it seems, will always remain in the public consciousness.
I saw this on the big screen last night, and to see it in all its Panavision glory really is an experience that adds immeasurably to the enjoyment, even though it would have been nice to have seen a restored print. The story, of course, is timeless, even though some of the stiff-upper-lips unintentionally teeter on the brink of parody, and the film takes us from one memorable scene to another: Hiltz bouncing his baseball in the confines of his cell, the body of little Ives (Angus Lennie, whose performance is tempered somewhat by childhood memories of his later appearance as stroppy chef Shooie McPhee in Crossroads) hanging from the barbed wire fence; the doomed Blythe (Donald Pleasance) meticulously counting his steps from the door to the pin he has strategically placed on the floor in an attempt to fool his comrades that he isn't going blind; Cavendish falling through the beds from which Hiltz has removed the slats; Gordon Jackson's character falling for the same trick that he earlier berates a fellow comrade for doing; David McCallum's desperate dash down the train platform after killing a Gestapo officer. And of course Steve McQueen's iconic escape attempt at the Swiss border on a hijacked German motorbike Terrific stuff.