Sam Peckinpah's (The Wild Bunch/The Getaway) 1977 war effort starring Oscar winner James Coburn & Oscar winner Maximillian Schell. Framed as a tale of some German troops during WWII as Coburn & his troop battle the Russians as they make their way to safety at their bunker. Once there Schell emerges as their new commander, a strident martinet, who barely knows how to shoot his pistol but quick to order Coburn to get back into the field in a futile effort to stave off the Russian forces which during one skirmish finds Coburn hospitalized to recuperate from some wounds. Once back in the war arena, Coburn & his ragtag crew have to don Russian garb to cross enemy lines to make it back home w/disastrous results as their own men open fire on them before the Russians overwhelm them. W/the action at Peckinpah's usual excellence, it's disheartening for me (since this is essentially the last film of his which I never saw) that the screenplay falls into such mundane, muddy fashion making this fighting man's journey opaque w/Coburn left adrift by the scenario. Especially since we would have Sam Fuller's masterful The Big Red One three years later (which followed a similar trajectory from the American side of the armed forces w/a scene where Lee Marvin also ends up in hospital during a segment) which did a similar story so much better. Also wasted here are James Mason & the late, great David Warner as fellow German soldiers.
Review of Cross of Iron
