The Great Escape (1963)

Movie: The Great Escape (1963)

“Based on a true story, a group of allied escape artist type prisoners of war are all put in an ‘escape proof’ camp. Their leader decides to try to take out several hundred all at once. The first half of the film is played for comedy as the prisoners mostly outwit their jailers to dig the escape tunnel. The second half is high adventure as they use boats and trains and planes to get out of occupied Europe. Written by John Vogel {jlvogel@comcast.net}”

• Director: John Sturges
• Release Date: 4 July 1963 (USA)
• Run Time: 172 min
• Country: USA
• Genre: Action , Adventure , Drama , History , Thriller , War

Tagline: put a fence in front of these men…and they'll climb it…

Trivia: Donald Pleasence’s character was based partly on London-born John Cordwell, later a Chicago architect and then proprietor of the Red Lion Pub on the city’s N. Lincoln Avenue. Cordwell died in 1999. Stories about him and the Red Lion are told from various points of view in the collection “Tales from the Red Lion” (Chicago: Twilight Tales, 2007, ISBN 0977985623).

Goofs: Factual errors: Bartlett asks for 30 feet of rope in the tunnel, but the tunnel is 30 feet underground and 20 feet from the woods, so they would have needed at least 50 feet of rope.