Raid On Rommel Details

A good story from its era

Richard Burton stars in this all out action drama in the desert during the Second World War.

It moves along at a steady pace, but is showing signs of its age. Older viewers will probably enjoy it more than the younger that have become used to more sophisticated acting, storylines and special effects.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Remains Rearranged for Remake!

One would have to appreciate that this film was originally made for TV and that its Director was in his mid-Seventies when he made it.

Henry Hathaway Directed some very good films, most of the best being Westerns, because he cut his teeth on that Genre. Indeed one of his best movies was 'True Grit' which earned John 'Duke' Wayne his long awaited OSCAR for Best Actor.

Regrettably though, Hathaway tended to make his other categories of films a la western and I believe that a combination of tired Director, difficult leading man, average story and a low budget reliance on the sweepings of the cutting room floor from Tobruk, contributed to making this a below average WWII Action Movie.

I shall leave the viewer to spot the errors and inconsistencies, there are plenty of them and although they are more difficult to spot on DVD you can pause, rewind and double check if you are sad enough.

Richard Burton lacked the style and pace that he had displayed in 'Where Eagles Dare', maybe he was missing Clint, but his performance was well below his ability. This is a pity because some of his fellow actors such as Wolfgang Preiss (Rommel), Karl Otto-Alberty (Hauptman Schroeder), Clinton Greyn (Maj Tarkington) and Christopher Cary (Cpl Merrihew) were excellent in their roles and deserved more opportunities than the script gave them.

Therefore I was disappointed that a film which should have had so much promise, ended up like a 'six-pack' with the plastic hold it together thingy missing.

The use of the wrong fighting equipment can be excused when you have a ripping plot and even the use of previous movies footage is not fatal, but this was not Hathaway's finest hour and thirty nine minutes.

However, by hiring the DVD it saved spending £4 or £5 to have this sad example of desert warfare sitting on the shelf.