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In 1943, having expended enormous resources on recapturing escaped Allied POWs, the Germans move those POWs under their
senior British officer, Group Captain Ramsey, most determined to escape to a new, high-security prisoner of war camp under
the supervision of Luftwaffe Colonel von Luger. Meanwhile, Gestapo agents Kuhn and Preissen and SS Lieutenant Dietrich
bring RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett to the camp. Known as "Big X", Bartlett is introduced as the principal escape
organiser. As Kuhn leaves, he warns Bartlett that if he escapes again, he will be shot. Bartlett remains defiant and
immediately plans the greatest escape ever attempted, with tunnels to break out 250 prisoners.
The POWs organise into teams. Flight Lieutenant Robert Hendley is "the scrounger" who finds needed materials, from a
camera to clothes and identity cards. Australian Flying Officer Louis Sedgwick, "the manufacturer", makes tools like
picks for digging and bellows for pumping air into the tunnels. Flight Lieutenants Danny Velinski and William "Willie"
Dickes are "the tunnel kings" in charge of the digging. Flight Lieutenant Andrew MacDonald acts as intelligence provider
and Bartlett's second-in-command. Lieutenant Commander Eric Ashley-Pitt of the Royal Navy devises a method of spreading
soil from the tunnels over the camp, under the guards' noses. Flight Lieutenant Griffith acts as "the tailor", creating
civilian outfits from scavenged cloth. Forgery is handled by Flight Lieutenant Colin Blythe. The prisoners work on three
tunnels simultaneously, calling them "Tom", "Dick", and "Harry".
USAAF Captain Virgil Hilts, the "Cooler King", irritates guards with frequent escape attempts and irreverence. Hilts and
his Scottish friend, RAF Flying Officer Archibald "Archie" Ives, conceive an escape attempt through a short tunnel at a
blind spot 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 planned collective escape attempt. 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 to
reconnoiter the area immediately surrounding the camp; Hilts turns down Bartlett's request but does assist the prisoners
as a scrounger. Meanwhile, Hendley forms a friendship with German guard Werner, which he exploits to smuggle documents
and other items of importance to the prisoners. Soon, Bartlett orders "Dick" and "Harry" to be sealed off, as "Tom" is
closest to completion. While the POWs enjoy a 4th of July celebration arranged by the three Americans in the camp, the
guards discover "Tom". The mood drops to despair, and Ives frantically climbs the barbed wire surrounding the camp, to be
shot dead. The prisoners switch their efforts to "Harry", and Hilts agrees to reconnoiter outside the camp and allow himself
to be recaptured. The information he brings back is used to create maps to guide the escapees. Blythe becomes nearly blind
due to progressive myopia caused by intricate work by candlelight; Hendley takes it upon himself to be Blythe's guide in
the escape.
The last part of the tunnel is completed on the scheduled night, but it proves to be twenty feet short of the woods. Knowing
there are no other options, Bartlett orders the escape to go ahead, and Hilts improvises a rope signal system to allow them to
exit the tunnel between sweeps of the guards on patrol. Seventy-six prisoners escape, aided by an air-raid blackout: once back
on the rope, however, Griffith impatiently exits the tunnel in view of the guards, and the escape is discovered.
After attempts to reach neutral Switzerland, Sweden, or Spain, almost all the POWs are recaptured or killed. Hendley and
Blythe steal a plane to fly over the Swiss border, but the engine fails, and they crash-land. Soldiers surround them and
Blythe, his eyesight damaged, stands and is shot. As he dies, he thanks Hendley for getting him out. When Bartlett is
recognized in a railway station by Kuhn, Ashley-Pitt rushes Kuhn and shoots him, but is killed while attempting to flee.
The resulting confusion allows Bartlett and MacDonald to slip away, but they are later caught as well. Hilts steals a
motorcycle at a checkpoint and is pursued by German soldiers. He jumps a first-line barbed wire fence at the German-Swiss
border; but before he's able to jump the second-line fence, the motorcycle is shot, causing him to become entangled in
the bigger, second line of the fence and be captured.
Three truckloads of recaptured POWs are driven down a country road and split off in three directions. The trucks stop in a
field, and the POWs, which include Bartlett, MacDonald, Cavendish and Haynes, are told to get out to "stretch their legs".
The prisoners are shot dead under the pretense that they were trying to escape. In all, 50 escapees are murdered; Hendley
and 10 others are returned to the camp. Only three POWs make it to safety: Danny and Willie steal a rowboat and proceed
downriver to the Baltic coast, where they board a Swedish merchant ship. Sedgwick makes it to France, where he is guided
by the Resistance to Spain. Hilts is returned to the camp and taken back to the cooler, just as Von Luger is relieved of
command of the camp by SS Lieutenant Steinach, with the indication that he will be executed for having failed to prevent
the breakout. The film closes with a caption reading, "This picture is dedicated to the fifty".
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Starring ... |
Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson,
James Donald, James Coburn
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Director: John Sturges
Producer: John Sturges
Released - July 4, 1963
Length - 172 minutes
Music Composer: Elmer Bernstein
Movie Distributed by United Artists
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