A classic

Since it is considered a classic, I was really eager to check this flick. Honestly, I'm not really familiar with Billy Wilder's work but I have fortunately managed to watch a few of his movies lately ('The Apartment', 'Some Like It Hot', 'The Seven Year Itch', 'Sabrina', 'Sunset Blvd.') and this movie was easily of one of his best. The first striking thing about this movie is its introduction when the voice-over tell you that they had never made a flick about a POW camp before. I don't know if it was indeed true but, personally, it was indeed the oldest I have seen so far (for example, 'The Bridge on the River Kwai' came soon after in 1957 and 'The Great Escape' in 1967). What I enjoyed the most was that the main character played by William Holden was not some hot-headed macho hero like Steve McQueen in 'The Great Escape'. No, he was a smart but really selfish con-artist looking only for his own interests and there was not a single moment when he suddenly had a change of conscience and became heroic, even at the end, he seemed mostly concerned about saving his ass. The other characters were not too bad but a little too stereotypical in my opinion and I was a little bothered that too many German characters spoke English fluently but it was something inherent in Hollywood back then and it still is nowaydays. Still, I liked the solid directing by Wilder, the tone and this main character so I really enjoyed this flick which has inspired all the similar movies that came afterwards about the same subject. To conclude, it is a really good movie, a classic, and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

8/10