The Eagle Has Landed (1976) - film review

Following an attempt to kidnap Mussolini, Hitler hits upon the idea of abducting the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and thereby changing the course of the war in Europe.  Himmler requests that a study be undertaken to test the feasibility of such a plan.  This task falls to Oberst Radl, who is initially very sceptical about the success of the operation.  When he learns that Churchill will shortly be visiting a remote village on the coast of Norfolk, Radl realises that Hitler’s insane scheme may work after all.  He recruits an IRA supporter, Liam Devlin, and highly decorated paratrooper Oberst Kurt Steiner to lead a Nazi strike force disguised as Polish soldiers.  Everything goes as planned until one of the German soldiers reveals he is wearing a Nazi uniform beneath his Polish uniform when he attempts to save a girl from being killed by a watermill.  Their cover blown, Steiner and his men round up the villagers and hold them in the village church.  The vicar’s sister, Pamela, manages to get word of the Nazis’ arrival to an American army unit stationed in the vicinity.  Determined to win the day single-handedly, Colonel Pitt leads an all-out assault on the German troops, only to get most of his soldiers killed.  Oberst Steiner is not a man who is easily defeated...

John Sturges ended his long and distinguished film career with this long and pretty undistinguished war time drama.  Even though he had acquired a reputation as one of America’s leading filmmakers – best known for such enduring classics as Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957), The Magnificent Seven (1960) and The Great Escape (1963) - Sturges grew tired of directing towards the end of his career and put little enthusiasm into his work.  This caused particular problems during the filming of The Eagle Has Landed since the lead actor Michael Caine was deeply unhappy to work for someone whose heart was not in his job.  Caine’s concerns are vindicated by the fact that whilst this film is competently made it doesn’t have anything like the impact and grandeur of Sturges’ earlier work.  

Despite the director’s obvious lack of enthusiasm and the fanciful plot (which stretches credibility a little too far), The Eagle Has Landed still manages to be a compelling wartime yarn, benefiting from a highly respectable cast and some meticulously staged action sequences.  Admittedly things get off to a slow start, with some scripting deficiencies and wooden characterisation all too apparent in the first half, but once the pace has picked up and the main characters have established themselves the spectator is hooked.  The German soldiers are portrayed more convincingly than in many previous war films, showing a human side that we rarely see, whilst the British and American characters come across far less sympathetically.  Definitely not a masterpiece, but the utterly daft plot and Michael Caine’s inimitable portrayal of a German officer make the film an enjoyable diversion for a wet afternoon, if nothing else.

© filmsdefrance.com 2009

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