Hell Is For Heroes

Rating:
Summary: Great
Review:

Rating:
Summary: For Hollywood, War is usually Heck, not Hell
Review: "Hell is for Heroes" is an entertaining movie that should be viewed in comparison to other WWII films of the era.
This movie is an important link between the cheesy propaganda films of the 50's ("To Hell and Back"), and the fatalistic films of the late 60's ("Anzio").
There are light hearted characters (played by Bobby Darin and Bob Newhart), as well as surly, serious ones (played by Steve McQueen and Harry Guardiano). There are comical battle scenes (a blanket thrown up in the air to draw German machine gun fire) and tragic battle scenes (James Coburn getting killed in a minefield).
The movie was filmed in California among oak trees, but it is done in B&W which hides and filters much of the cheap scenery. However, the location does lend the movie to a "made-for-tv" feeling.

Rating:
Summary: "You show up on the line.....I'll blow your head off."
Review: 4.5 stars. This is the sort of War film I wish they would make more often. Where the story centers around a platoon of characters, all of which are memorable with depth of individual character. A movie with the same type of ensemble acting in a War film is Olver Stone's "Platoon." The fact that this particular film predates "Platoon" by 24 years is remarkable. This is a story about a small, 6-man platoon left to hold a mile-wide stretch of ragged countryside until reinforcements arrive; but there is no telling if or when they will. It's that sort of tension that is held all the way to the explosive finale. But it's the journey that makes this film worthwhile. The entire cast is excellent, with Steve McQueen heading the list with another of his under-appreciated performances. He is one of those rare types that is a movie-star that can act; it's the ones who can do both who become legendary. The plotting in this film is also noteworthy, with ingenious ideas and interesting characters joined together to hold the line. The script is both sharp and intense. There were a couple of extreme moments, one of which I actually exclaimed aloud. However, there are two reasons why I just can't give this film 5 stars. The first happens in the final, climactic battle, where many of the extras fall over (shot dead) so badly and with such fake screaming that I was crestfallen. All the scenes leading up to the end are well-done and authentic, so it was a let-down to see mediocrity of any kind, particularly during the climax. The second and last thing I didn't like was the splicing of real War footage in with the final assault. All the voices are obviously dubbed, which was another moment to shake my head in dismay. There are some great moments during that last battle, so take my criticism with a grain of proverbial salt. "Hell is for Heroes" is nearly a great film, if not for those two inconsistencies. This film has great acting, a solid script with more humor and intelligence than I would have imagined, and another legendary turn by Steve McQueen. I should mention that I first saw this on VHS, then later rented it on DVD. The transfer to DVD is pristine, and the sound quality is excellent. Take it easy.

Rating:
Summary: "You show up on the line.....I'll blow your head off."
Review: 4.5 stars. This is the sort of War film I wish they would make more often. Where the story centers around a platoon of characters, all of which are memorable with depth of individual character. A movie with the same type of ensemble acting in a War film is Olver Stone's "Platoon." The fact that this particular film predates "Platoon" by 24 years is remarkable. This is a story about a small, 6-man platoon left to hold a mile-wide stretch of ragged countryside until reinforcements arrive; but there is no telling if or when they will. It's that sort of tension that is held all the way to the explosive finale. But it's the journey that makes this film worthwhile. The entire cast is excellent, with Steve McQueen heading the list with another of his under-appreciated performances. He is one of those rare types that is a movie-star that can act; it's the ones who can do both who become legendary. The plotting in this film is also noteworthy, with ingenious ideas and interesting characters joined together to hold the line. The script is both sharp and intense. There were a couple of extreme moments, one of which I actually exclaimed aloud. However, there are two reasons why I just can't give this film 5 stars. The first happens in the final, climactic battle, where many of the extras fall over (shot dead) so badly and with such fake screaming that I was crestfallen. All the scenes leading up to the end are well-done and authentic, so it was a let-down to see mediocrity of any kind, particularly during the climax. The second and last thing I didn't like was the splicing of real War footage in with the final assault. All the voices are obviously dubbed, which was another moment to shake my head in dismay. There are some great moments during that last battle, so take my criticism with a grain of proverbial salt. "Hell is for Heroes" is nearly a great film, if not for those two inconsistencies. This film has great acting, a solid script with more humor and intelligence than I would have imagined, and another legendary turn by Steve McQueen. I should mention that I first saw this on VHS, then later rented it on DVD. The transfer to DVD is pristine, and the sound quality is excellent. Take it easy.

Rating:
Summary: Bobby Darin shines in this above average war drama
Review: A taught film with an unusual "life contiues" ending, Hell Is For Heroes is able to rise above the level of many war films, particularliy those of the "buddies against all costs" genre. Steve McQueen is his solid self, James Coburn turns in an impressive early performance and Bob Newhart makes his debut in an excellently played supporting role. The real gem to be found in this film however, is the often overlooked acting talents of Bobby Darin, who for those out of the loop did later garner an Oscar nomination in Captain Newman M.D. An excellent performance which manages to showcase his ability to handle humor, drama, and action with realism and ease. All in all, an above average war flick with a taught, well paced story, solid cast and unique finish. Hats off to Bobby Darin!

Rating:
Summary: Reviewer Kevin R. Austra was convinced
Review: Austra's film review was right on the button with one exception. He wrote "Filming took place on an Army training range complete with rows of ersatz dragons teeth left over from World War Two obstacle training (Some of rows of these aging California concrete replicas survive to this day)."

Well, judging from his background, Austra knows his way around the military, but Paramount Pictures' Art Department fooled him. Hell Is For Heroes exterior scenes were filmed in northern California on land owned by a doctor in Cottonwood, 19 miles south of Redding. The interior shots were filmed on the Paramount studio lot in Hollywood. If you're asking how I know, I was one of the film's stuntmen... the German soldier in a fox hole that James Coburn set afire with his flame thrower.

Rating:
Summary: epic WWII drama
Review: For those War movie buffs who liked Saving Private Ryan, Full Metal Jacket, Apocolypse Now, dont miss this 1962 brilliantly written and acted combat film. The dark cinematography and symbolism have been overlooked by some critics, who have focused mostly on McQueens great portrayal of the burned out Reese. If your old enough to remember the tv series Combat, this movie stands like the movie pilot for that series. Combat scenes are as grim as anything in Saving Private Ryan.........

Rating:
Summary: Taut Combat Drama
Review: From Don (Dirty Harry, The Shootist) Segal comes this engaging World War II combat drama with an all star cast including Steve McQueen, Harry Guardino, James Coburn, Bobby Darin (!), Bob Newhart, LQ Jones and Nick (`Godzilla vs. Monster Zero') Adams.

The story begins when a squad of combat-weary GI's is sent back to the front and then left behind by the rest of the Company to defend an insignifigant portion of the Siegfried Line. Then the Germans decide it is not so insignifigant after all. The hook is the diminutive squad must convince the company of Wermacht soldiers that they are facing a much larger force. They employ a variety of illusions to keep up the charade (James Coburn runs a backfiring jeep in low gear in a circle to make the Germans think they have a tank, Bob Newhart sits in a pillbox making up radio traffic, and they string up rocks in empty ammo cans to make it sound like troop movement), but eventually the Germans begin to figure it out. The only thing left for them to do is hit the enemy hard and without warning to discourage their advance until the company returns.

This is an engrossing small scale drama with some intense action (despite a liberal use of wartime stock footage, mostly of artillery crews, to give us a sense of place) - the scene where the German patrol charges McQueen's foxhole with fixed bayonets is pretty desperate, with McQueen resorting to throwing his helmet to beat down their advance!

Without a doubt this movie is carried by the skillful gritty direction of Segal and an awesome cast. McQueen comes on strong and early as the grizzled vet busted down from Master Sergeant for trying to run down a colonel with his jeep. Little details hint toward a bloody and intriguing past - he favors a captive Schweisser German machinegun and keeps a butcher knife strapped to his hip. This is just about the toughest I've ever seen him. Guardino as the Sarge is paternal, Newhart endearing as an inexperienced typist who stumbles onto the squad and gets his jeep requisitioned, and Nick Adams is pretty authentic as a Polish D.P. desperate to prove his worth and go back to America with the squad - I didn't even know it was him till the credits rolled. James Coburn is reserved as a tinkering engineer, and Bobby Darin is fine too as a profit-minded procurer. All the cast gives standout performances, never once blurring as individuals in my mind - which makes the impact of some of their deaths all the more real and shocking.

Little details about the movie help to sell it - the toilet seat hung on the base wall as a frame for a picture of Der Fuherer, Newhart talking into a radio-phone with the severed chord dangling there, and that nerve-wracking night crawl through the minefield! Plus, what a climax! Great movie.

Rating:
Summary: McQueen Brings It To Life
Review: Gritty realism and a riveting performance by Steve McQueen highlight the World War II action/drama "Hell Is For Heroes," directed by Don Siegel. The setting is France, 1944, and American troops are spread thin across a sector of the Siegfried Line. When heavy action in another area precipitates troop movement, a squad of six men is left behind to hold the position until reinforcements arrive, which means a day or maybe two of making the Germans believe they are actually up to strength with a full complement of men. Not an easy task, but like the man said, war is hell. With Sergeant Larkin (Harry Guardino) in charge, and left to their own devices for survival, the men of the 2nd Squad dig in for what just may be the longest night of their lives. And for some, it will prove to be not only the longest, but their last. In the shadow of a murderous pill box held by the enemy, the soldiers make their stand and add yet another footnote to another chapter in the history of the eternal struggle for freedom.

Filmed in stark black&white, Siegel's film succinctly captures the fatal brutality of war, in terms perhaps not as graphic, but every bit as effectively as Steve Spielberg would do some thirty-six years later with his monumental film "Saving Private Ryan." Siegel may not have had the special effects in 1961 that Spielberg had at his disposal in 1998, but he did have an excellent screenplay (by Robert Pirosh and Richard Carr) from which to work. He tells his story in a direct, unromanticized way that maintains the focus and conveys the sense of urgency of the moment, through which he builds the tension and suspense that makes the peril of the situation immediate and real. Siegel had two predominant elements going for him that helped him achieve success with this venture: One was an instinctive knowledge of what works and how to deliver it; but most of all, he had Steve McQueen to sell it.

McQueen plays Pvt. John Reese, a veteran soldier who transfers into this particular outfit on the very day they are ordered to the front line. And that's just the way Reese wants it. When he reports for duty (three days late), he runs into Sergeant Pike (Fess Parker), who had served with him in another campaign. It's late evening, and the troops are assembling at an old church outside of town that now serves as a makeshift barracks; Pike sees Reese and asks him how he is. "Thirsty," Reese replies. "Town's off limits," Pike tells him. The very next scene shows Reese walking into town and finding what appears to be the only bar on a lonely street. Stepping up to the counter, Reese asks the bartender (a woman) for a bottle. "One pack or two?" he asks. "We aren't allow to serve soldiers--" she says. "Two," he replies, and setting the cigarettes on the counter, he walks around and takes a bottle. And now, without a doubt, we know exactly who and what Reese is; the personification of the iconoclastic loner, embodied to perfection in the form of Steve McQueen.

By all accounts, McQueen was not only a tough guy on screen, but in real life as well; tough meaning that he was always up for a challenge of any kind, and determined to live by his own set of rules, no matter what the cost. But he was a complex individual, and that was but one side of his true persona. To play Reese, McQueen went to that dark, stoic side of himself, exaggerated it, and the result was one of the most intense characters he ever created. Reese is a force of one, adamant and relentless, single-minded and fatalistic. At the moment he's on the Siegfried Line, but for him it's just another battle in a war he's been waging with life since the day he was born. And he knows deep down that it's a war he's never going to win; it's just a matter of time before his hand plays out, and being on the line is just as good a place as any. For him, it's not a matter of options, but of inevitability. It's an exemplary performance, and one for which McQueen never received the acclaim he was due, which unfortunately was not an isolated instance in his career. There was Vin in "The Magnificent Seven," Frank Bullitt in "Bullitt" and Tom Horn in "Tom Horn," as well. And that's but a sample of the work he did for which he never received enough recognition. His only real acknowledgement came with his creation of Jake Holman in "The Sand Pebbles," a role for which he was nominated and should have received the Oscar for Best Actor. But Reese was one of his first, and one of his best.

The supporting cast includes Bobby Darin (Corby), James Coburn (Henshaw), Mike Kellin (Kolinsky), Joseph Hoover (Captain Loomis), Bill Mullikin (Cumberly), Nick Adams (Homer) and Bob Newhart in his film debut as Pvt. Driscoll. Hard-hitting and with unforgiving realism, "Hell Is For Heroes," though on a smaller scale, perhaps, than Spielberg's "Ryan," is one of the most effective and memorable war films ever made; Siegel gave it direction and focus, McQueen brought it to life. And it's quite simply one of the best of it's kind you'll ever see.

Rating:
Summary: More than a war movie.
Review: Hell is for Heroes is for beyond every other war movie ever made. It is, in fact, the ultimate war movie. There never has been, and probably never will be its equal.
The use of Bob Newheart as a displaced clerk typist is pure genius. He symbolizes everything that Kurt Vonnegut tried to express in Slaughterhouse 5. So much of war is just confused, out of place guys.
James Coburn, a genuine war hero, allowing himself to be depicted as barbacued, screaming, by his own flame thrower should leave one feeling nothing less than humbled by this offering of genuinwe combat illumination.
And finally, MacQueen. I am sorry for those who don't get it, but it sucks to die saving a world that has treated you like crap
, but that is what a good number of American heroes have done.
Hell is for Heroes.