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''The Great Escape'' is a 1963 British World War II epic film by DeLuxe Color based on an escape by British Commonwealth prisoners of war from a German POW camp during World War II, starring Steve McQueen, James Garner and Richard Attenborough filmed in Panavision. The film is based on Paul Brickhill's 1950 book of the same name, a non-fiction first-hand account of the mass escape from Stalag Luft III in Sagan (now Żagań, Poland), in the province of Lower Silesia, Nazi Germany. The characters are based on real men, and in some cases are composites of several men. However, many details of the actual escape attempt were changed for the film, and the role of American personnel in both the planning and the escape was largely fabricated. ''The Great Escape'' was made by the Mirisch Company, released by United Artists, and produced and directed by John Sturges. The film had its Royal World Premiere at the Odeon Leicester Square in London's West End on 20 June 1963. ==Plot== In 1943, having expended enormous resources on recapturing escaped Allied prisoners of war (POWs), the Germans move the most determined to a new, high-security prisoner of war camp. The commandant, Luftwaffe Colonel von Luger (Hannes Messemer), tells the senior British officer, Group Captain Ramsey (James Donald), "There will be no escapes from this camp." Von Luger points out the various features of the new camp designed to prevent escape, as well as the perks the prisoners will receive as an incentive not to try. After several failed escape attempts on the first day, the POWs settle into life at the prison camp. Meanwhile, Gestapo and SD agents bring RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett (Richard Attenborough) to the camp. Known as "Big X", Bartlett is introduced as the principal organiser of escapes. As Kuhn (Hans Reiser) leaves, he warns Bartlett that if he escapes again, he will be shot. However, locked up with "every escape artist in Germany", Bartlett immediately plans the greatest escape attempted, with tunnels for breaking out 250 prisoners, to the point that as many troops and resources as possible will be wasted on finding POWs instead of being used on the front line. The prisoners work on three tunnels simultaneously, calling them "Tom", "Dick", and "Harry". Teams are organised to support the effort. Flight Lieutenant Robert Hendley (James Garner), an American in the RAF, is "the scrounger" who finds needed materials, from a camera to clothes and identity cards. Australian Flying Officer Louis Sedgwick (James Coburn), "the manufacturer," makes tools for digging and bellows for pumping air into the tunnels. Flight Lieutenants Danny Valinski (Charles Bronson) and William "Willie" Dickes (John Leyton) are "the tunnel kings" in charge of digging the tunnels. Flight Lieutenant Andrew MacDonald (Gordon Jackson) acts as intelligence provider and Bartlett's second-in-command. Lieutenant Commander Eric Ashley-Pitt (David McCallum) of the Royal Navy devises a method of spreading soil from the tunnels over the camp, under the guards' noses. Flight Lieutenant Griffith (Robert Desmond) acts as "the tailor", creating civilian outfits from scavenged cloth. Forgery is handled by Flight Lieutenant Colin Blythe (Donald Pleasence), who becomes nearly blind due to progressive myopia caused by intricate work by candlelight. Blythe is neither an aviator nor navigator. He is an Adjutant General Corps RAF officer, working in aerial reconnaissance interpretation. He reads and speaks German fluently, and has both taught and learned an intimate knowledge of the “paper trail” (forms, passes, identity cards), needed by anyone and everyone who would seek to travel, or obtain food or shelter, at any distance greater than a few miles, or outside of a local neighborhood, in wartime Germany or German occupied Europe. Although Blythe is clearly no traditional airman or soldier, Hendley, his roommate, becomes deeply impressed with his loyalty, devotion to duty, and his fearless tenacity in applying himself to the waging of war against the Nazis (he had “stowed away” aboard an RAF bomber for an actual raid as a machine gunner, which was shot down over Germany). Hendley takes it upon himself to be Blythe's guide in the escape. USAAF Captain Virgil Hilts (Steve McQueen), the "Cooler King", irritates guards with frequent escape attempts and general irreverence. Hilts and RAF Flying Officer Archibald Ives (Angus Lennie) conceive of an escape attempt through a short tunnel at a blind spot right near the edge of the camp, a proposal which is accepted by Bartlett on the grounds that vetoing every independent escape attempt would raise suspicion of the collective escape attempt being planned. However, Hilts and Ives are caught and returned to the 'cooler'. Upon release from the cooler, Bartlett requests that Hilts use his next escape attempt as an opportunity for surveillance for the other prisoners; Hilts turns down Bartlett's request but assists the prisoners as a scrounger. Meanwhile, Hendley forms a friendship with German guard Werner, which he exploits on several occasions to smuggle documents and other items of importance to the prisoners. Soon, Bartlett orders "Dick" and "Harry" to be shut down, as "Tom" is closest to completion. While the POWs enjoy a 4th of July celebration arranged by the three Americans, the guards discover "Tom". The mood drops to despair and Ives, hit hardest, walks in a daze to the barbed wire that surrounds the camp and climbs it in view of guards; Hilts runs to stop him but is too late, and Ives is shot dead near the top of the fence. The prisoners switch their efforts to "Harry", and Hilts agrees to reconnoitre outside the camp and allows himself to be recaptured. The information he brings back is used to create maps showing the nearest town and railway station. The last part of the tunnel is completed on the night of the escape, but it proves to be twenty feet short of the woods. Knowing that there are no other options, Bartlett orders the escape to continue, and Hilts improvises a signal system to allow the prisoners to move between patrol sweeps. Danny, having spent much of his time in the tunnel and barely surviving multiple cave-ins, develops claustrophobia and nearly refuses to go, but is helped along by Willie. 76 prisoners manage to escape: however, due to his impatience, Griffith is discovered while exiting the tunnel and the completion of the escape effort is thwarted. After attempts to reach neutral Switzerland, Sweden, and Spain, almost all the POWs are recaptured or killed. Hendley and Blythe steal an aircraft to fly over the Swiss border, but the engine fails and they crash-land. Soldiers arrive and Blythe, his eyesight damaged, stands and is shot. Hendley surrenders and is captured as Blythe dies. When Bartlett is identified in a crowded railway station by Gestapo agent Kuhn, Ashley-Pitt overpowers and shoots him with his own gun to allow Bartlett and MacDonald to slip away, and is killed by soldiers while attempting to escape. Bartlett and MacDonald are later caught while boarding a bus after MacDonald blunders by replying to a suspicious Gestapo agent who wishes them "Good luck" in English. Hilts steals a motorcycle and is pursued by German soldiers, jumps a first-line barbed wire fence at the German-Swiss border and drives on to the Neutral Zone, but becomes entangled in the second line of the barbed fence and is captured. Three truckloads of recaptured POWs go down a country road and split off in three directions. One truck, containing Bartlett, MacDonald, Cavendish, Haynes, and others, stops in a field and the POWs are told to get out and "stretch their legs", They are shot dead. In all, 50 escapees are murdered. Hendley and nine others are returned to the camp. Von Luger is relieved of command of the prison camp by the SS for failing to prevent the breakout. Only three make it to safety: Danny and Willie steal a rowboat and proceed downriver to the Baltic coast, where they sneak aboard a Swedish merchant ship, while Sedgwick slips through the countryside on a stolen bicycle before hiding aboard a freight train to France, where he is guided by the Resistance to Spain. Hilts is returned to the camp alone and taken back to the cooler. Lieutenant Goff (Jud Taylor), one of the Americans, gets Hilts's baseball and glove and throws it to him when Hilts and his guards pass by. The guard locks him in his cell and walks away, but momentarily pauses when he hears the familiar sound of Hilts bouncing his baseball against a cell wall. The film ends with the caption "This picture is dedicated to the fifty." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Great Escape (film)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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