Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Inaccurate and contrived - but still a little fun to be had, 4 Nov 2007
Infamous as the war movie denounced by Eisenhower for its woeful inaccuracies, anyone approaching this movie should be well aware of its pitfalls. However, if you can overlook them or at least partake with a generous pinch of salt, there are still some treats to appreciate.
The battle of the bulge was set in one of the bitterest winters on record in 1944, when the Germans used the bad weather to confound the Allies air superiority to launch a massive all out attack designed to splinter the Allies and change the course of the war. As the disclaimer at the end of the movie says, this film is a highly compressed, fictionalised version of that, with all the characters merged and renamed.. in other words, it is a fictional version of what happened - and it shows.
The bitterest Winter is hinted at in a few moments of the movie as during the initial battles we see some pockets of snow and men stamping their feet to keep warm - however, as the movie progresses, the films actual shooting location in Spain becomes more apparent as we see dusty desert and sweaty men. Worse, the two environments are poorly spliced together leading to woeful continuity, and almost the entire movie is plagued by incongruously sunny weather. The tanks bear no resemblance to those used, and the grimness of war is covered over, with death conveyed in the old fashioned `throw-up-your-hands-in-the-air-and-fall-down-dead' approach to moviemaking. Now that the movie is over, I am hard pressed to remember a single moment that actually showed blood. One would think that having directed on `The Longest Day' (a far superior film) Ken Annakin would have learned some lessons in the importance of historical accuracy, and how it can bring an audience in. Here, the contrivances which have Henry Fonda almost single handedly figure out the whole sequence of events and be in all of the major battle scenes, serve to disengage the viewer.
So that's the bad out the way - but in fact, from a one star movie, a sort of watchable movie is rescued thanks to two things - Firstly, the cinematography - shot in Ultra-Panavision, a process designed to give an epic widescreen image, enough to project onto Cinerama (a process which used 3 curved screens, and in its true form, 3 synchronised projectors, to create an all encompassing experience). This movie has clearly been made with this process in mind, as scenes of trains hurtling along tracks and cars weaving down slippery roads are shown at some length from point-of-view angles... the end result is rather like watching a movie shot in 3D in its 2D form - the action seems contrived. However, the aerial, crane and dolly shots in this magnificently restored version use the widescreen to dramatic and exciting effect, and should only be watched in widescreen...the reputation of this movie has suffered greatly from too many years in pan-and-scan format designed for the TV screen.
And secondly, the magnificent performance of Robert Shaw as the fictionalised panzer commander, based on Colonel Peiper - the youngest man to reach full Colonel in the German army. His is a complex character, showing humanity to his aide, and passion for the process of war - and yet disdain for the hierarchy that sends him to battle.
Apart from Shaw, there are a few other moments which attempt to add some humanity to the proceedings, with heroism being forged from tragedy, such as the young lieutenant who survives the infamous (and historically accurate) massacre of prisoners at Malmedy, and becomes galvanised to lead the fight as a result. However, the pluses are outweighed by the clumsy script, inaccuracy and dusty desert filling in for frozen Belgium. The unlikely ending at the fuel dump serves as the nail in the coffin.
Has a certain boys-own appeal perhaps, or to watch to enjoy the incredible amount of Franco's hardware on display...but in this day of Saving Private Ryan and other of its ilk, an audience have come to expect much more. Worth a rent perhaps, but not one to watch twice.
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26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the best WW2 epics, beautifully restored, 25 Sep 2006
Battle of the Bulge is probably the least accurate but most enjoyable of the spot-the-star WW2 roadshow epics. When Samuel Bronston's Spanish production empire crashed, his head of story Philip Yordan teamed up with former combat photographer Milton Sperling and picked up the slack with a slew of Spanish-lensed epics of his own backed with blocked US funds - Custer of the West, The Royal Hunt of the Sun and this lavishly mounted affair that took full advantage of all that WW2 Nazi hardware that found its way into Franco's possession. It's dominated by Robert Shaw's disillusioned but still fanatical eternal warrior with the rest of the characters fairly standard issue, although the individual scenes are far better written than is the norm in the likes of Anzio or Midway. Like the Bronston films, the script is a surprisingly intelligent affair, establishing an interesting set of battle lines, with Germany reduced to rubble, its people vanished and its armies living underground while the over-confident Americans are virtual tourists in liberated territories, more interested in the menu for Christmas dinner than intelligence reports of a possible offensive. Not that it is without problems: the geography, like the `history,' is more than somewhat suspect. Indeed, you can even catch a glimpse of the Forum Romanum set from The Fall of the Roman Empire in the background of the "It can be done!" scene as Shaw inspects the tanks. Add to that the fact that the production was plagued by good weather, so sequences are prone to go from blizzard to parched, and the result should be a mess, but it works well both as widescreen spectacle - especially the incredibly impressive final shot of hundreds of abandoned tanks - and as an archetypal Hollywood war movie.
Unlike the previous video and laser disc releases, this DVD is fully restored to its original roadshow length, and also features the original trailer, featurette and 1965 interviews with Robert Shaw and Milton Sperling.
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25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the Greats..., 21 Jun 2006
I'll start by saying that this film was made decades before I was born but that I first saw it as a kid and was amazed by the battle scenes, especially the sheer expanse and number of tanks involved on screen at any one time.
The actors are top notch old greats, the only names missing are Steve McQueen, Clint Eastwood and John Wayne, apart from those three, all the great actors of the period feature in the film, from Bronson to Ryan.
There are glaring inadequacies in the film, such as the fact that some of the 'driving' scenes are quite clearly shot in a studio and look cheap and silly in the modern world. The other big mistake is the fact that all the German tanks are American M26 Pershing Heavy Tanks and the American tanks are all M24 Chaffee Light Tanks, when they should have been mostly M4 Shermans. However, surprisingly this does not take away from the plot or the film as a whole. The tank battles are immense and huge and there is some great scenes in it, especially the one with Robert Shaw and Hans Christian Bleck where Bleck (Corporal Conrad) shouts at Shaw (Colonel Hessler) over his love of the war. The scene with Bronson and Shaw is also memorable.
All in all its a great film and I would recommend it to anyone, even if you don't have a clue who any of the actors are. Do not simply be put off by the films age, it is one of the best war films of all time. An absolute classic!
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