"Did it happen?"

Rating: 6/10 (24 January 2001)

WARNING: REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS

Never mind Schindler's List, what about von Steiner's football team? It's the silliest-ever premise for a movie: did you know that Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone played a football match against the Nazis in World War II? What makes it even dafter is that real football players make up their team. Seeing Caine shouting "leave it, it's mine" to PelÃ© and Bobby Moore is amusing, though despite the patently ridiculous plot all concerned play it with remarkable conviction.
Stallone, to his credit, manages not to disgrace himself against assured performances from Caine and Max von Sydow, and even gets to do a "bloodied, staying in the match as the final minutes tick away and his vision blurs in slow motion" bit a la Rocky. In fact, when a Nazi General starts clapping the victorious (actually it's a draw which is a weird outcome) Allied team, it may even have inspired him to make Rocky IV.
John Huston, the director of such variable projects as the classic Maltese Falcon, the so-so African Queen and the abysmal Casino Royale, manages to bring some dignity to proceedings. The whole thing is quite offensive when given a great deal of thought. The idea that the deaths of men in concentration camps have been laid to celluloid as kindly Nazis just wanting a bit of a kick-about is a dubious form of entertainment.
At a 110 minutes it's at least 20 minutes too long, though the final third with the actual match does generate sufficient interest. And of course, when an escape committee tunnel through into the Allies' changing room at half-time, you know that the team will insist on playing on. Stupid, but compelling...