yeoman's work

Rating: 6/10 (11 July 2018)

In a WWII POW camp, an allied prisoner attempting escape is met with bullets. Capt. Robert Hatch (Sylvester Stallone) presents a naked plan to the escape committee. English Captain John Colby (Michael Caine) is one of the prisoners and a former professional footballer for West Ham United. Maj. Karl von Steiner (Max von Sydow) challenges him to a game. Colby accepts the challenge and starts building a team but he rejects any escape attempts. He doesn't want to get his men killed and would rather wait for the war's end. Hatch is desperate to escape and Colby reluctantly allows him to join. The Germans see the propaganda potential and set the game in Paris. Real football players are included in the movie starting with Pelé.
It's a rather standard POW film. The actors are solid. Stallone does not embarrass himself as the brash American. There is no equal to Max von Sydow. John Huston is doing yeoman's work but not much more. The soccer stars would be appealing to fans but I don't recognize anybody other than Pelé. I'm surprised at his natural charisma coming through the screen. He's very effective at being Pelé. Tension isn't that high. The main problem could be the Nazis. The movie needs scary Nazis to elevate the intensity and they don't mistreat their prisoners enough. As for the soccer game, I'm sure it's appealing to see these great athletes on the pitch and the bicycle kick is beautiful but it has no drama. The drama is the escape and therefore, the score is actually meaningless. The game has no rooting value. The only way to make it meaningful is to play it in Berlin in front of Hitler with no chance of escape. The stakes becomes pride but the stakes here is escape. Overall, it's not boring but it could be better. I like the final escape which has a fun element. However, it is yet another example of the lack of ruthlessness by the Nazis.