Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1716 in DVD
• Released on: 2000-02-01
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Dubbed, Full Screen, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English, French, Spanish
• Subtitled in: Dutch, English, French, German, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish
• Dubbed in: Italian, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 172 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
The Great Escape image of Steve McQueen (as "The Cooler King") astride his motorcycle has entered silver-screen iconography, alongside Brando on his bike from The Wild One. Based on a true story about a group of POWs who mount a daring breakout from a supposedly inescapable Nazi prison camp, this rousing and suspenseful World War II epic features an all-star cast, including James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, and David McCallum. --Jim Emerson

Amazon.co.uk Review
A stirring example of courage and the indomitable human spirit, for many John Sturges' The Great Escape is both the definitive World War II drama and the nonpareil prison escape movie. Featuring an unequalled ensemble cast in a rivetingly authentic true-life scenario set to Elmer Bernstein's admirable music (who writes contrapuntal march themes these days?), this picture is both a template for subsequent action-adventure movies and one of the last glories of Golden Age Hollywood. Reunited with the director who made him a star in The Magnificent Seven Steve McQueen gives a career-defining performance as the laconic Hilts, the baseball-loving, motorbike-riding "Cooler King". The rest of the all-male Anglo-American cast--Dickie Attenborough, Donald Pleasance, James Garner, Charles Bronson, David McCallum, James Coburn and Gordon Jackson--make the most of their meaty roles (though you have to forgive Coburn his Australian accent).

Closely based on Paul Brickhill's book, the various escape attempts, scrounging, forging and ferreting activities are authentically realised thanks also to the presence on set of technical advisor Wally Flood, one of the original tunnel-digging POWs. Sturges orchestrates the climactic mass break out with total conviction, giving us both high action and very poignant human drama. Without trivialising the grim reality, The Great Escape thrillingly celebrates the heroism of men who never gave up the fight.

On the DVD: The Great Escape special edition is indeed a special event. The anamorphic 2.35:1 picture is good if a tad grainy, and the remastered Dolby 5.1 soundtrack is a fitting vehicle for Elmer Bernstein's magnificent contribution. Accompanying the feature there's a reasonable cut-and-paste group commentary culled from interviews with various cast and crew, plus text trivia captions about the actors and the real-life camp.

The second disc features a first-rate Granada TV documentary from 2001, "The Untold Story", which tells of both the escape itself and the subsequent post-war search for the Gestapo officers who butchered 50 of the 76 escapees. This has an appendix of further valuable interviews with survivors, and there's also an American making-of documentary, "Heroes Underground", which is good though annoyingly divided into separate chapters and featuring non-anamorphic clips from the film. Perhaps best of all though is the 25-minute life of American POW David Jones, "The Real Virgil Hilts", whose career both during and after the war is extraordinary and inspirational. A classic movie finally gets the DVD treatment it merits.--Mark Walker

Special Features
4:3 Full Frame
2.35 Wide Screen
French\German\Italian\Spanish
English\German
English
Region 2
Mono English French German Italian Spanish
Mono
Return To The Great Escape Making Of Documentary
Original USTheatrical Trailer
Booklet
Interactive Menu
Chapter Search
Dutch\English\French\German\ Norwegian\Polish\Portuguese\Spanish

Customer Reviews

THE BEST OF ALL TIME....................................................
This must be the greatest war film of all time. The cast is the best of the best and though three hours long, it flies and never bores.
There is something realistic and naive about the film and our feelings go out to these desperate men who are trying to outwit the German war machine in order to return home.
The most memorable part of the film will be the motorcycle chase. Steve McQueen excels as the dissident American who spends much of his time in the cooler because of his numerous excape attempts. I particularly liked James Garner as the scrounger.
There is not one menber of the cast who did not rise to great heights.
A marvellous film which I never tire of watching.

This film is realistic.
I have noticed that there a small amount of reviews that comment on the realism of the film, quick word in your ear. The camp in the film was guarded by the Luftwaffe (german airforce), most of the camp consisted airforce personal RAF ect ect. This is how the Luftwaffe treated the prisoners, showing some respect for the captors.

Quite possibly the most perfect audience picture ever made
The Great Escape may be nearly three hours long, but it moves like clockwork and holds its audience completely. There is always something happening, often with much wit and sometimes touching sentiment that avoids mawkishness. There is one remarkably bad piece of construction, following a genuinely moving death scene with McQueen's motorbike jump, but otherwise the film is perfectly constructed. Elmer Bernstein's score is one of his best, and with considerably more range and variety than you remember adds much to the proceedings.

If it seems a bit dubious making an entertainment out of one of the grimmest episodes of WW2 - 50 of the recaptured prisoners of the genuine mass escape from a German prisoner of war camp were murdered - the darker elements are not ignored, but despite being very effectively handled do tend to get swamped by the sheer exuberance of the film. It now seems particularly curious to that the impossible motorbike jump, while still a great moment, seems so much more underplayed and credible than the increasingly spectacular and cartoonish CGi action sequences of modern action films.

The cast are all outstanding. In Steve McQueen's `Cooler King' we can see the origins of Indiana Jones, the hero as eternal loser. Garner's wonderfully resourceful scrounger and his touching friendship with Donald Pleasance's near-blind forger make perhaps an even bigger impression. Bronson too is very appealing, with all the dry humour and warmth that two decades of working with Michael Winner has managed to knock out of him still intact. However, it must be said that Coburn's Aussie arc-scent is enough to make you grateful he hardly said anything in The Magnificent Seven.

The film is just brimming with familiar faces, from the stars to British war movie stalwart Gordon Jackson and the equally omnipresent Karl Otto Alberty ("Your German is very good. I hear also your French. Your hands - UP!"). Don't remember him? He fought in the 'Battle of the Bulge,' planned the 'Battle of Britain' and had a memorable showdown with Clint Eastwood as a tank commander in Kelly's Heroes. Only Sam Kydd is missing. With so much to enjoy and remember, The Great Escape is quite possibly the most perfect audience movie ever made.