L'enfer est pour les héros

In 1944, in France, Pvt. John Reese (Steve McQueen) is assigned for a platoon close to the front. He is a very experienced, but also rebel and neurotic soldier, who lost his ranked position due to his behavior, questioning orders and authority. His platoon joins other army companies in the front, and they are left in only six men to hold up their position against a great quantity of Germans soldiers for a couple of days. They use their experience and many tricks to cheat the enemy, pretending they are in a larger number. This black and white movie of war is a very tense, claustrophobic and full of action. Steve McQueen has an excellent performance, as usual, as well as the rest of the cast and direction. This film is highly indicated for fans of action movie of war. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): `O Inferno é Para Heróis' (`The Hell is for Heroes')

This World War II film is one of the finest I have seen. It features an allstar cast, great direction, a great script and compelling performances.

Steve McQueen plays an American soldiers who thrives on combat. He gets busted from squad leader to Private when he crashes a jeep. His squad gets sent to the front lines, where he clashes with by-the-book Sergeant Larkin (Harry Guardino). Problems are made worse when the Company pulls out, leaving Larkin's squad to cover a huge section of the front lines. In order to succeed, they trick the Germans in various ways to make them think they're a much larger unit.

The film features a powerful central performance by Steve McQueen. While his lines are short and to the point, his facial expressions and movements are just as important. He makes a very convincing front-line soldier, doing a lot of things many other front-line-combat themed war movies of the time (TO HELL AND BACK, etc) leave out.

Supporting McQueen are Bobby Darin, James Coburn, and Mike Kellin all very young. Their characters were unique at the time but may seem a bit chliched and two-dimensional if you've seen a lot of war pictures.

Also lending a hand if Bob Newhart as a bumbling typist who ends up getting commandeered to help hold the front line position. His telephone monlogue scene is a classic and he makes a very believable scared-stiff REMF, just like Jeremy Davies as Cpl. Upham in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN.

The battle scenes were obviously filmed on a tight budget but are very authentic appearing. They involve soldiers bleeding profusely and screaming in agony -- not something you see in older war films.

All in all, a very well done, realistic and very believable war film. It was apparently based on a true incident.

The DVD is of high quality. It is finally in letterbox format, about a 1.78:1 ratio. The video quality is superb. The sound is mono but very good mono; quite rich. Also included is a widescreen but scratchy and grainy trailer.

I enjoy and admire HELL IS FOR HEROES so much that I am using it as a model for my own WWII home video, BATTLEGROUND.

A must must-see for Steve McQueen fans. Understrength American platoon tries to hold the line against entrenched Germans in 1944 France. Hard-working cast rises above shoe-string production values. Then-present and future stars include Harry Guardino, James Coburn and personal favorite Nick Adams. Despite lack of glitzy special effects, this has the best "feel" of any war film I've ever seen. McQueen shines as Private Reese, an efficient killer sabotaged only by his own unwillingness to follow orders. Subdued Parker plays very effectively against McQueen's intensity, and Newhart adds some humor to grim story line. Highly recommended.

WWII drama film dealing with a frontline American infantry squad as they battled their way across Europe . This movie's opening prologue is represented by segments of a speech by President John F. Kennedy . A single maneuver by a squad of GIs in retaliation against the force of the German Siegfried line. While most of the men withdraw from their positions taking on a German pillbox at the far side of a mine-field, half a dozen men are left to protect a wide front. By various ruses, they manage to convince the Germans that a large force is still holding the position by pretending they are more powerful and larger that they really are . As the small squadron is forced to hold off a German attack suffering several dangers , risks and deaths . Reese joins a group of weary GIs unexpectedly ordered back into the line Siegfried and when the main platoon returns, he is threatened with court-martial .

World War II film where the drama centers around the diverse characters and on the attack about a well-defensed pillbox . With mud-splattered realism, the show offered character studies of men striving to maintain their own humanity , and heroism in the midst of a world torn by war . Impressive as well as surprising climax final , plenty of action and intensity . Very good acting by Steve McQueen as a degraded soldier who leads two of the men in an unauthorized and unsuccessful attack . Steve McQueen did not socialize with the rest of cast because his character was anti-social and alienated himself from the rest of the squad . In fact , a columnist visiting the set commented on Steve McQueen's irascible temperament by noting that McQueen seemed to be his own worst enemy. Furthermore , Steve McQueen and Bobby Darin did not get along during filming . Support cast is frankly excellent such as Fess Parker as Sgt. Pike , Harry Guardino as Sgt. Larkin , James Coburn as Cpl. Henshaw , Nick Adams as Homer Janeczek , Mike Kellin as Pvt. Kolinsky and a young Bob Newhart's feature-film debut as Pvt. Driscoll who even interpolates a variation on one of his phone monologues into the tale . Director Don Siegel did not want to shoot the scene where Bob Newhart's character has a fake telephone conversation with "headquarters" to fool the Germans listening through a microphone planted in the US bunker, believing that it had no place in the story , he was overruled by the studio, however .

Screenwriter Robert Pirosh was originally set to direct the film but after repeated clashes with star Steve McQueen he was replaced with Don Siegel ; Pirosh's script featured many blackly comedic scenes but most of them were not filmed, as Siegel wanted to make the film more dramatic. Robert Pirosh was a Master Sergeant during World War II, serving with the 320th Regiment, 35th Division. He fought in the Battle of the Bulge, at Ardennes and in the Rhineland. He commanded a unit in Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge was awarded a Bronze Star. Pirosh directed a classic war film titled ¨Go for broke¨and wrote ¨Battleground¨ , ¨A Gathering of Eagles¨ and ¨Combat¨TV series . The motion picture was well directed by Donald Siegel . His first feature as a director was 1946's The Verdict (1946). He made his reputation in the early and mid-'50s with a series of tightly made, expertly crafted, tough but intelligent "B" pictures , among them : The Lineup (1958), Riot in Cell Block 11 (1954), Invasion of the body snatchers (1956)), then graduated to major "A" films in the 1960s and early 1970s. He made several "side trips" to television, mostly as a producer . Siegel directed what is generally considered to be Elvis Presley's best picture, Flamingo Star (1960). All of Eastwood's later Western and his ¨Dirty Harry¨ movies owe a considerable debt to Sergio Leone and Donald Siegel . As Donald directed Eastwood in various films , such as : Coogan's bluff , The beguiled , Dirty Harry , Escape from Alcatraz. He had a long professional relationship and personal friendship with Clint Eastwood . This Hard Hitting WWII Action Film has a high rating : Above average , well worth watching.

Steve McQueen's character of Reese is not the jock he played in the Great Escape nor is he Jake Thurlow a rule bender,but whose's found his home in the U.S.Navy of the 1920's. No Reese is a stone cold killer a front line ideal who gets in trouble because in the rear like probably in his civilian life there are too many rules issued by and for the protection of soft bellied fools. He has survived like Fess Parker's Sgt.Pike, a man who knows him and if not a friend in the service buddy/Beery/Gable manner of war movies,understands him. Pike knows that Reese though a leader is not a workaday type who will listen recommend and obey. Reese is a loner living on borrowed time. North Africa,Sicily,Italy maybe were where he campaigned with a dwindling amount of men he came in with still alive. A bullet or shell,or mine,or tank treads is waiting on the next wooded hill, or valley or village to end it for him. There is no Longest Day comrades in arms in a worthy cause emotion emanating from Reese and squad mates. There is no grander vision for them then earning a front line soldiers highest decoration - survival. The German bunker is the squatting beast of War waiting to feed and it does on the Mike Kellin character, the attacking company, Steve McQueen's now Ahab like Reese who must destroy the beast at the cost of his life, and the bunkers' anonymous defenders-inmates while the beast battered partially in flames still consumes GIs and Wehrmact landers indiscriminately. Rock solid war film.