The other Great Escape?

I saw a film that, like the Great Escape (1963), was based on the Paul Brickhill book. It was a British production with no actors I recognized. Curiously, it was made at about the same time as the famous one. I can't find the name of this film anywhere. Can anyone help?

There are only two other movies based on Brickhill's books, but neither recount the mass escape from Stalag Luft III. The others, released years before The Great Escape, were The Dam Busters and Reach for the Sky.

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I've heard of those, but they are not the one. The movie in question has essentially all the same elements as the Great Escape, right down to the tunnels named Tom, Dick, and Harry. There were a few additional scenes as well. In one, the prisoners are being transported by train and manage to cause a munitions train they pass to catch on fire and explode. The tone is a little more lighthearted than the Great Escape, if that's possible in a prisoner of war movie.
Perhaps the movie in question was not released in theaters? I saw it on a cable movie channel while living in France. It clearly dated from the 50s or 60s.

I think it is either the 1955 The Colditz Story or the 1972-1974 television mini series Colditz the Undefeated. Never heard of either one, but it is also a true story about a different escape organized by British POWs.

Here is a scene from the 1955 movie, but this doesn't involve the organized escape(s). The most recognizable actor is John Mills. The 1970s TV series is on youtube or some of it. There was also a later TV mini series.

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I don't think it has the train scene you describe. From an IMDb user review:

Before The Great Escape, there was this Pow (Prisoner of War) escape film based on true events, from director Guy Hamilton (Goldfinger, Live and Let Die). The story sees many soldiers from Britain, France, Poland and other countries involved in World War II placed into Colditz castle, used by Nazis to hold the "bad boys", those who regularly attempted escape from other camps. There are more guards outnumbering the prisoners, and some were political with very strict monitoring. Anyway, the story sees Pat Reid (Sir John Mills) creating all sorts of escape routes and plans, including a tunnel, under the theatre stage, jumping over the fence, and dressing as Nazis, and these are what keep you interested. Also starring Eric Portman as Colonel Richmond, Christopher Rhodes as 'Mac' McGill, Lionel Jeffries as Harry Tyler,Frederick Valk as Kommandant, Bryan Forbes as Jimmy Winslow, Ian Carmichael as Robin Cartwright, Anton Diffring as Fischer and Ludwik Lawinski as Franz Josef. It was nominated the BAFTAs for Best British Film and Best Film from any Source. Sir John Mills was number 38 on The 50 Greatest British Actors, and the film was number 94 on The 100 Greatest War Films. Very good!

Are you talking about Von Ryan's Express?

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Looks very good, but it is not either of these. It was set (mainly) in Stalag Luft III, definitely not Colditz Castle. The plots are so nearly identical that either it was a remake of the famous 1963 film, or the other way around. It's hard to imagine either that a low budget remake would be produced after the big Hollywood version's success, or that the cheaper film would not be acknowledged in discussions of the blockbuster. Perhaps they were under production simultaneously (like "Dangerous Liasons" and "Valmont" several years back), and the starless British version more or less disappeared?

You didn't see what you think you saw. The Great Escape is the only movie based on that book. There is not a previous version. Unless you're confusing it with the 1988 TV movie, The Great Escape II, which was a ficticious sequel.

This is the only other movie set in that camp.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043147/



This can't be your movie, The problem with your description is you said it was more comical than The Great Escape. That was not the British style in the 1950s for war movies. They were in a low-key dramatic style. A possibility is you're either mixing movies together or The Great Escape is often shown on television in two parts because it is long and you thought you were watching a different movie.

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That (The Wooden Horse) has to be the film. I've even seen it too but I didn't connect it as being the same prison, and I also don't remember any pyrotechnics involving a train, but it's probably my Alzheimer's.

I personally think he is mixing The Great Escape together with Von Ryan's Express.

I appreciate all of these suggestions, but it turns out I don't have Alzheimer's. I have seen the 1963 film several times. I know it very well. That's how I recognized all the similar plot elements. I have also seen Von Ryan's Express a couple of times, once recently. Neither Steve McQueen nor Frank Sinatra was in this film. However, The Wooden Horse sounds like it is it. I'll have to rent it and see. It may not be based on the Paul Brickhill book, but it has the same setting (Stalag Luft III), the tunnel, a distraction (vaulting horse vs. chorus), distance to tunnel, disposal of dirt, etc.

BTW: I didn't say comical, just lighthearted. Not Hogan's Heroes, but with a few moments of whimsy.

Thank you all for solving this vexing mystery!

Looking more carefully at the user reviews, one mentions there is some humor and the escape apparently occurred while the digging of the three tunnels named Tom, Dick, and Harry was happening. Apparently, this was a separate earlier escape not part of what we all know (which was historically inaccurate since the Americans didn't have much to do with it). I didn't mean to suggest by using the word comical it was like Hogan's Heroes. I was thinking like Dirty Dozen, which has a lot of humor until the climax in the German villa.

Yes, the reviews suggest that both of these escape attempts were more or less true. It does make the German guards seem a little like Sgt. Schulz... though I'm sure that was far from the case. But seriously, why situate a prison camp where tunneling is this easy?

I enjoyed Wooden Horse and recommend it.

It's not The Wooden Horse!

It's this one, not set at that camp, but they ripped off the climax from The Great Escape. The tone is defintely comic and was made the previous year as you said. I also visit a Britsh movie site and today someone asked for movies about British POWs and I realized this had to be what you were talking about. It has the train sequence you mentioned. It is in the trailer.



From the imdb user review (and makes the same mistake you did thinking it was based on The Great Escape):

Made one year earlier than The Great Escape, The Password is Courage uses the same story but viewed from a different perspective. The Great Escape revolved around a mass break out and all the different characters who helped in their own ways. The Password is Courage looks at it from one man's point of view, Sergeant Major Charles Coward, played perfectly by Dirk Bogarde. It is a much more light hearted view of his imprisonment in a POW camp and his efforts to escape and cause the Nazis as much trouble as possible (including the hilarious burning down of an entire lumber yard). It may not have the range of actors and characters of The Great Escape but for anyone who enjoyed that movie, should definitely see this as well. Even those people who find war movies boring should just give this film a try. 9/10


Just to clarify, this is about a real person, but he was never at the camp where "the great escape" occurred, but they added it to the movie for the climax. That is why it never showed up on any of the searches. That part of the story isn't true, they have the escape happening at a different camp, one that wasn't exclusively for officers.

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Fantastic. This must be it. Thanks!