The Eagle has Landed (1976)

I found the DVD for this film hanging about the house; no doubt it arrived uninvited with a Sunday newspaper.  Since I was certain that I must have seen it once upon a time but equally certain that I could remember nothing about it (something to do with my blind spot on war films), I popped it in and spent a relatively painless 130 minutes viewing World War II from the German point of view -- well sort of.  Based on the first novel by Jack Higgins, Robert Duvall sporting a idiotic German accent decides to send a crack force to kidnap Churchill while he is having some R & R in Norfolk; this wheeze is approved of by Donald's Pleasence's Himmler, but only if it is successful.  Who do they get to carry out the plot to reverse the war (they are aware that they are already losing) but disgraced officer Michael Caine (sporting a far more pukka British accent than his norm) and his faithful squad of soldiers.  They are all facing court martial and disgrace for supporting Caine when he attempts to protect a young Jewish girl who is being transported (this shows that Caine is really a good and honourable guy despite being German), but they can redeem themselves by taking on this mission.  Also involved is Donald Sutherland's roguish Irishman who is in on it for the dough to donate to the cause.

So they all end up in scenic Norfolk where they mix with Jean Marsh's embittered local (the English slaughtered her mother in South Africa), John Standing's local catholic priest, and young lass Jenny Agutter who falls for the cad Sutherland.  Wearing German uniforms under their disguise as training Polish airmen (Caine has insisted upon this), their true identity is discovered when one of the soldiers saves a local youngster who has fallen into the mill race, but Caine and Co. perservere with their goal.  The local American base is headed by an idiotic Larry Hagman who has no battle experience and who gets most of his battalion killed by his ineptitude, so that it is left to Treat Williams (!) and some other anonymous Yanks to save the day.  Even when all of his men are no longer available, the determined Caine carries on.  It is not spoiling anything to tell you that Churchill was not kidnapped or murdered.  The final verdict: something of a potboiler from what was probably an exciting novel, but no worse than many boys' own type tales.

Tags: Michael Caine