Director : Richard Attenborough
Country : UK
Release Date : 1969
Duration : 138 mins
Language : English
Subtitles : No
WINNER : GOLDEN GLOBE (1970) FOR BEST ENGLISH LANGUAGE FOREIGN FILM
A star-studded extravaganza (Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson, John Gielgud, Vanessa Redgrave, Maggie Smith, John Mills, Dirk Bogarde etc etc) about World War I based on the stage musical of the same name, portraying the “Game of War”, and focusing mainly on the members of the Smith family who enlist to fight at the front. Much of the action in the movie revolves around the words of the marching songs of the soldiers, and many scenes portray some of the more famous (and infamous) incidents of the war, including the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand and the Christmas meeting between British and German soldiers in no-man’s-land. Prescient, timeless and still relevant today.
“It is an elaborately staged tableau, a dazzling use of the camera to achieve essentially theatrical effects. And judged on that basis, Richard Attenborough has given us a breath-taking evening.“ (Roger Ebert – Chicago Sun-Times)