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23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An all time classic, 26 Feb 2001
By A Customer
Gregory Peck plays Mallory, the worlds greatest living mountaineer, linguist and commandoe, picked along with Anthony Quin, to escort a group of sabotuers onto Navarone, where terrifying anti-shipping guns are impeding the rescue of a British garrison. When the vessel sinks in a storm, Mallory is compelled by fate to join and ultimately lead the deadly mission, stirring stuff indeed and highly enjoyable to boot. All of the characters are flawed in that wonderful Great Escape way. Instead of a claustrophobic miner, we get the knief man who's lost his taste for killing. No blind forger hear but a man who's closest comrade will kill him at the end of the war. There's good Germans and bad Germans, a traitor in the camp, Anthony Quayle with gangreen, romance and a surprise ending(well sort of). My personal favourite is where Messrs. Peck and Niven appear to share a cigarette of dubious nature in the closing moments of the film!This film is a classic, and has always been well regarded, but is it worth buying on DVD? Now to be fair this movie is long in the tooth, and has long been the staple fair of Sunday matinees and video-store bargain bins. So is it worth forking out for? Simple answer:yes! Long answer: Aside from a great tranfer, where the day-for-night shots are printed as night,its in widescreen, with Dolby digital sound! To boot, there is a plethora of extras. Not many forty year old movies come with a directors' commentary, but this does. As J. Lee Thompson was a studio gun-for-hire, this was just another job rather than a personal obsession, so dont expect great personal insights. For me the real goodies are the bizarre promo films thrown in for good measure. Publicity films date faster than calenders and theses are excellently silly, fun, pathe style newsreels. Worth a look if only to see Peck playing football with war-orphans in Nazi regalia, and check out the gals shopping. This is capped with an indepth making of, based around lenghty interviews with Peck, Quin and Thompson. Some great personal reflections. Fans of this movie will need not my recommendation, but I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and all the bonus material. Two thumbs up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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