2003-04-04
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
To my mind, this is an under-rated should be classic war film. The plot is fairly simple; a group of allied commandos disguised as POWs attempt to infiltrate the German lines in North Africa in an effort to destroy the German fuel bunkers at Tobruk. These fuel reserves are vital to the tanks of the German war machine and the allied command has assembled a crack team of soldiers to pull off the job. The cast features a number of stars; Rock Hudson plays a Canadian Officer with vast experience of desert warfare conditions, Nigel Green plays the Colonel who has put the mission together and George Peppard plays a German Jew working for the British who, along with his fellow jews, take the role of German guards escorting the POWs back to Tobruk. The interaction between these characters is laced with mutual mis-trust which adds an extra edge to the film; especially when a traitor puts the mission at risk. The film features several action-packed battle scenes before reaching its climax at the port of Tobruk. This copy is only let down by poor editing; the original widescreen version featured subtitles for the German dialogue which has been lost in the cutdown picture and one or two scenes (especially the last) loose some of their impact where they have been shortened.
In summary, if you like war films then this is one for you.