The Colditz Story

The Colditz Story (1955)
Director: Guy Hamilton

"The Colditz story" is a true story. I have read the book of the same title, written by Patrick Reid, a British escapee. It really is an amazing story, and I have been always partial to movies about prison breaks. The movie claims that more people escaped from this “escape proof” POW camp than in all the other POW camps combined (I don't think that is realistic, but an impressive claim nonetheless).

George Roy Hill the director of “The Sting” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” once said “The Audiences love how-to”. It’s true. People watching movies like to see how things are done; all the details. I think that was one of the key elements that this film was missing. The escapes are amazing but we don’t get to see much about them. The POWs sneak out at night dressed like German guards but where did they get the materials for the uniforms? How long did it take to make the uniforms? Did they make them at all or did they steal them? Its such a great story you just feel a little in the dark when you aren’t given any details. One of the most famous escapes involved sneaking into the German quarters through a hole in the theater floor which led into the ceiling of a dentist office. From there they dressed up like German soldiers and just marched out the front door. The plan was ingenious, but it is filmed in such a way that the viewers don’t know that. The movie takes all the details for granted, thinking perhaps that they aren’t important or that the audience wouldn’t be interested. In doing this, you rob the story of all the suspense and drama. Instead of thinking "oh no are they going to get caught?" as they are stealing materials to make German uniforms, we cut straight to the POWs dressed as Germans trying to get out the gate; all suspense that could have been is successfully eliminated with this technique. That is really what set “The Great Escape” apart from this movie (besides a stellar cast and an amazing director). It showed the escape attempts in all their gritty details and it is a much more compelling film because of that.

The characters could be confused quite easily, and about 1/3 of the dialog was foreign but not subtitled. Other than that I suppose this was a fine movie, but I couldn’t get past the seeming laziness of the storytelling.

My rating: 3 out of 5

Side note: one of the escape attempts that was not covered in the movie involved building a glider and flying out of Colditz from the chapel roof. I am not making that up; they actually built one but the war ended before the glider was completely finished; its sad they never got to use it. Its just too awesome an idea not to mention in this review.