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Escape To Victory is a rare and groundbreaking film that successfully combines the genres of sports and wartime drama. The inclusion of real-life professional footballers adds authenticity and credibility to the film's sports action. The film features iconic players such as Pelé, Bobby Moore, and Ossie Ardiles, who deliver impressive performances and contribute to the film's enduring legacy.

Escape To Victory's footballers are made up of many real-life professional players who added authenticity to the war-set sports story from John Huston. Based on Zoltán Fábri's iconic Two Halves In Hell, Escape To Victory focuses on a group of Allied prisoners of war including Sylvester Stallone's Robert Hatch, who are forced to play a rigged exhibition match of football against a German propaganda team - all the while plotting their escape from a Pow camp. Escape To Victory garnered great attention upon its release in 1981, owing in no...

Exclusive: Joseph Fiennes has scored a winner with playwright James Graham’s knockout stage play Dear England, which will transfer from London’s National Theatre to the West End in the fall.

The play is an uplifting dramatization of Gareth Southgate’s inspirational leadership of the England’s men’s soccer team and has garnered strong reviews.

Dear England will run at the Cameron Mackintosh-owned Prince Edward Theatre in Soho, London for a 14-week season from October 9. National Theatre Productions is producing.

Fiennes will transfer with the drama. He has been praised for capturing Southgate’s determination to reignite the England team’s pride, plus the sense that the bloke’s a darn good egg. England stars such as captain Harry Kane and Raheem Sterling are also played in the show by actors.

Joseph Fiennes portrays Gareth Southgate in Dear England at National Theatre.

From Oliver Stone’s Platoon to John Ford’s They Were Expendable, some of the greatest war movies ever made were the work of filmmakers who actually served in the military. The 400 Blows director François Truffaut famously said that it’s impossible to make an anti-war film (via the BBC), because the inherent spectacle of cinema means that any war movie will inevitably glamorize warfare. However, cinematic portrayals of war are a lot more accurate when they’re helmed by a director who’s actually fought in a warzone and lived through the horrors of war.

There are plenty of terrific filmmakers with a military background who drew on that background to create a realistic war movie. U.S. Army veteran Joseph Sargent directed a great biopic of General of the Army Douglas MacArthur. U.S. Army Air Forces veteran Robert Altman satirized the Korean War in his hit dark comedy M*A*S*H.

While too much time is spent on 1966 and all that Matthew Lorenzo’s profile draws out a hitherto unseen vulnerable side to the striker turned insurance salesman

The current flood of football documentaries shows no sign of abating; the recognition certain teams and individuals enjoy means that it’s not likely to any time soon. Geoff Hurst, the hat-trick hero of the 1966 World Cup final, is no doubt a natural subject for the “legacy” strand of these things: along with the likes of Jack Charlton, Bobby Moore and Bobby Robson, Hurst stands for a misty-eyed idea of Proper Football, when men were gods on the pitch and ordinary semi-dwelling blokes off it.

Hurst was all this and more, even if this profile focuses, football-wise at least, on that three-goal game at the expense of almost everything else. (Though that title might need a bit of nudging since Kylian Mbappé pulled...

Brazilian football legend Pelé passed away at the age of 82 on December 29, 2022. The sad news came less than two weeks after Lionel Messi held aloft the trophy at the Qatar 2022 Word Cup, eliminating any doubt that he deserves his place in the conversation about who is the greatest footballer of all time. Yet for some, the Emir's insistence on honoring the Argentine captain with the traditional bisht was an unwelcome reminder of the controversial venue for the tournament, while his compatriot Diego Maradona's legacy will always be tainted by the "Hand of God." Meanwhile, Pelé remains synonymous with the world's favorite sport at its most exuberant and uninhibited.Although it's been over 50 years since he last played for the Seleção, Pelé in the brilliant gold and blue of Brazil at the 1970 World Cup, embracing a teammate and punching the air with joy, is one of football's most iconic images.

New Delhi, Dec 30 (Ians) Arguably the greatest player to play football, Edson Arantes do Nascimento, aka Pele (82), breathed his last at a Sao Paulo hospital on Thursday after losing a prolonged battle against cancer.

The three-time World Cup winner had a colon tumour removed in September 2021 and neither his family, nor doctors, specified whether it had spread to other organs. He was recently under ‘elevated care’ related to kidney and cardiac dysfunction.

Portuguese soccer great Cristiano Ronaldo paid a heart-touching tribute to the ‘Black Pearl’, soon after the news of his demise was madepublic.

Taking to his Instagram handle, Ronaldo wrote: “My deep condolences to all of Brazil, and in particular to the family of Edson Arantes do Nascimento. A mere ‘goodbye’ to the eternal King Pele will never be enough to express the pain that the entire football world is currently embracing.

“An inspiration to so many millions, a reference yesterday,...

World Cup Icons have arrived, with the World Cup taking center stage in FIFA 23's Ultimate Team. Several promotions have been running in the second season of FIFA 23, such as World Cup Stories. Icons in FIFA are legendary star players that are seen as the rarest cards that can be found in the game. With the World Cup taking place mid-season for the first time, World Cup Icon can be packed and added to players' main Ultimate Teams.

Not all FIFA 23 Icon are receiving World Cup versions, but most legendary stars do feature in the promotion. World Cup icons have been released in teams every week throughout the World Cup, with the final ones expected to be released ahead of the World Cup final. While most cards in the promotion are available to open in packs, others can be found by completing objectives, finishing SBCs, or collecting FIFA 23 World Cup Swaps tokens.

Escape to Victory didn't set the world alight on its initial release in 1981, but as the decades have ticked on the film has firmly cemented itself as a cult favourite among fans of film and football.

Now, this potent mix of The Great Escape and underdog sports tale is in line for a remake with Edge of Tomorrow's Doug Liman at the helm. Liman will surely play it straight in the redo, but the original film featured a glorious mix of big movie stars of the day (Sylvester Stallone, Michael Caine), ageing football icons who'd taken a paycheque in the Us (Pelé) and Ipswich Town players (hey, they were big in the '80s!).

With that in mind, Digital Spy has picked a brand new Victory 2014 starting XI ready for 90 minutes of life-or-death football. Fyi, we're playing 4-4-2 - the Nazis might overrun us in midfield but we're old school!

Open thread: Are any current players good enough to rub shoulders with Hollywood on the big screen? Tell what you think below

• Hollywood plans Escape to Victory remake to capitalise on World Cup

Ah, Escape to Victory. Not, perhaps, the film of which director John Huston was most proud, but an entirely satisfactory method of whiling away a dull Sunday afternoon. Plus, of course, the chance to see a sprinkling of assorted football legends (and some not so legendary) trying to mix it with the acting pros.

Much attention, not surprisingly, was focused on the absurdity of Sylvester Stallone on the same football pitch as Pelé, Bobby Moore, Osvaldo Ardiles et al. However, football hipsters approvingly noted the presence of several members of the highly-rated Ipswich side of the late 70s and early 80s: John Wark, Russell Osman, Kevin O'Callaghan, Laurie Sivell and Robin Turner.

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Edge of Tomorrow director Doug Liman is in talks with Warner Bros to remake Escape to Victory.

Gavin O'Conner, the writer-director of Warrior, in on board to pen the script for the new version, which has been described as a cross between The Monuments Men and hockey film Miracle by The Hollywood Reporter.

The 1981 original, known simply as Victory in the Us, centred on a group of Allied prisoners of war who took part in a football match against a German team.

John Huston's film was loosely inspired by the 'Death Match', a mythologised game between former professional footballers from Dynamo Kyiv and Lokomotyv Kyiv, and a side of German air defence artillery.

Escape to Victory was a modest box office hit in the early '80s but has since grown to cult status thanks to its eclectic cast and repeat TV showings.

Sylvester Stallone and Michael Caine...

For his next movie to follow Edge Of Tomorrow, Doug Liman is already in active development on the Tom Clancy videogame adaptation Splinter Cell, which has Tom Hardy attached to star. That's only one of several projects that Liman has on the boil, however, and he may just have added another to the list. With the World Cup in full swing, it seems appropriate that he's in talks to direct Victory, a remake of the WWII football favourite Escape To Victory.The original film, made in 1981, involves a group of POWs using a propaganda footie match with their German captors as an escape opportunity, with some help from the French Resistance tunnelling in from the sewers outside the Paris ground. John Huston directed, and the film is much loved and remembered for its unusual onscreen mix of actors and professional footballers: Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone co-star with Bobby Moore and Pele.

Even the best football movies struggle to capture the sport's drama on film. The worst (and there are many) are truly abysmal

Why has cinema found football to be such a tricky customer? Football scenes in film and television are traditionally very awkward affairs, with the "defenders" tip-toeing nervously around the "attackers" as they advance, the goal finally coming via the sort of impractical flying volley you just never see on a real pitch. It's clearly very difficult to let someone score a script-dictated goal while pretending to try to stop them but, at the same time, trying not to look like you're pretending to try to stop them. Perhaps they teach it at Rada, who knows?

Furthermore, filmmakers have the challenge of adding a fictional big-screen gloss to what is already an overwhelmingly camera-friendly and consistently dramatic spectacle in its own right. Real-life football already has its own "script...

The acting legends head to the BBC's Football Focus to apply their collective soothsaying to this week's fixtures, with some odd predictions

Sylvester Stallone may have kicked his way to freedom in Escape to Victory, and De Niro briefly fielded a charity team for his Tribeca Film Festival in 2012, but two of Hollywood's biggest hitters have shown they still have a long way to go before they understand the beautiful game.

The two filmed an interview for BBC One's Football Focus, in which they predicted the results of the weekend's fixtures. There are some interesting choices. Tottenham may have lost to Arsenal last week, but are still riding high following the departure of Andre Villa-Boas and decisive defeats of Manchester United and Stoke – but Sly and Bobby have them down to lose at home to Crystal Palace, who lie third from bottom in the Premiership. Man City are predicted to lose to Newcastle,...

With Bullet to the Head Sylvester Stallone has done what his action movie compadre did recently with The Last Stand. He has reinvented himself, post-Expendables, in his own image. That is the action hero persona which thrived in the 80s, was tempered in the decade following as the unease surrounding the relentless violence inherent in the films grew, and then through an almost self-parodic journey ended with the battle royale supercast of The Expendables.

With Arnie’s The Last Stand and Stallone’s Bullet to the Head the action hero is back and what is refreshing is that the advancing years of the two stars is no barrier, indeed is in some way integral to the characters.

The two actors will forever be linked to several of their more prominent roles. Their names will immediately conjure up the actors in the various films; The Terminator, Rocky Balboa, Conan, John Rambo and so on.

Vinnie Jones is enlisting his soccer pals Wayne Rooney and David Beckham for a remake of 'Escape to Victory'. The 'X-Men' actor has long been interested in working on a reimagining of the 1981 war film featuring former soccer aces Bobby Moore and Ossie Ardiles, and has now got David Beckham and fellow British star Wayne Rooney as potential stars in a new project. A source said: "It wasn't the best movie ever but was tremendously popular and is a cult classic. A version with today's top players would be a guaranteed smash hit." Portuguese soccer star and model Cristiano Ronaldo is also wanted by 46-year-old Vinnie for a role in the film. Sir Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone also starred in the original movie - known only as 'Victory' in North America - which told the tale of a group of Allied prisoners of war escaping a German...

Sports-star-turned-actor Vinnie Jones is combining his two talents - he is planning a big-budget remake of cult soccer movie "Escape to Victory". Jones was a top professional soccer player in his native Britain before he built a Hollywood film career after retiring from the sport.

Now, he hopes to use his contacts within the game to lure star players including David Beckham, French ace Thierry Henry, and Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo to join his next project. The "Snatch" actor is eying a remake of 1981 movie "Escape to Victory", which starred Michael Caine and an array of top soccer players - including Brazilian Pele and former England captain Bobby Moore - as World War II prisoners of war (POWs) who take part in a propaganda-led football match.

Jones aims to update the film by setting it in Afghanistan or Iraq - and hopes interest in the remake will rocket after the soccer...

VInnie Jones has apparently signed to star in an update of football movie Escape to Victory. The star reportedly hopes to persuade soccer players David Beckham, Thierry Henry, Cristiano Ronaldo, Rio Ferdinand and Lionel Messi to appear in the project. Last month, reports claimed that Jones was planning to work on a remake of the 1981 football war film. The original starred Michael Caine and a number of footballers, including Brazilian Pele and former England captain Bobby Moore, as World War II prisoners of war who take part in a match. Jones is said to want (more)...

Sports-star-turned-actor Vinnie Jones is combining his two talents - he is planning a big-budget remake of cult soccer movie Escape To Victory.

Jones was a top professional soccer player in his native Britain before he built a Hollywood film career after retiring from the sport.

Now, he hopes to use his contacts within the game to lure star players including David Beckham, French ace Thierry Henry, and Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo to join his next project.

The Snatch actor is eyeing a remake of 1981 movie Escape To Victory, which starred Michael Caine and an array of top soccer players - including Brazilian Pele and former England captain Bobby Moore - as World War II prisoners of war (POWs) who take part in a propaganda-led football match.

Jones aims to update the film by setting it in Afghanistan or Iraq - and hopes interest in the remake will rocket after the soccer World Cup in South Africa in the summer.

In his column for British magazine Loaded, Jones writes: "We're in pre-production, and I'm in the process of buying the rights to the title off Paramount films, so hopefully you'll be able to see it in cinemas by Christmas. I'll be in it, of course, but I'll also be producing it, which is more exciting.

"The names being bandied around include Henry, Rio (Ferdinand), Beckham, Wayne Rooney, Ronaldo, and (Lionel) Messi. I can tell you that I've approached some of the biggest names in (the) world (of) soccer... Is Beckham going to be involved? I certainly hope so."

And Jones has even devised a plan to accommodate Beckham's Achilles tendon injury, which ruled him out of the World Cup.

He adds, "If Becks agrees, we'll write it into the film that the enemy crock (hurt) him, because he wouldn't be fit for filming."...

So Vinnie Jones is planning a remake of the cult football film Escape to Victory. Oh yeah?

Time now for another edition of Inside the Hacks' Studio, which this week features the Sun and cinema's Vinnie Jones, who was recently placed an encouraging third in Celebrity Big Brother (behind Jordan's current bloke and one of her exes).

The Sun never tires of playing up Vinnie's dream transfer from top-flight footballer to top-flight movie star – feel free to insert your own sarcastic air quotes – and the way the paper tells it to their readers, he is one of Hollywood's biggest fishes. Indeed, if you subscribed to their vision of Vinnie's A-list La lifestyle, you'd imagine him playing dawn tennis with David Geffen before an egg-white omelette power breakfast with Mr Spielberg, instead of driving himself to the set of whatever low-rent straight-to-dvd release is pencilled in this month.

In return,...

Former footballer Jones tips Beckham for a supporting role in an as-yet-unconfirmed remake of the rousing 1981 classic

Featuring a young Sylvester Stallone alongside Michael Caine and a cavalcade of cameos from famous footballers, the original 1981 version of Escape to Victory is also known for featuring some of the hammiest performances ever seen on the big screen. Now footballer-turned-actor Vinnie Jones is planning a remake, starring himself and David Beckham, reports The Sun.

According to the newspaper, Jones hopes to involve Beckham in order to take advantage of the former England captain's fame in the Us. The footballer would slip into the boots of predecessor Bobby Moore, who played Terry Brady in the original, if producers in La give the movie the green light.

Escape to Victory was widely panned by the critics upon release, and bombed in the Us, where it was known simply as Victory. Amongst its cast were former Brazil striker Pelé,...

Vinnie Jones wants to remake the 1981 football war film Escape To Victory, say tabloid reports. According to The Sun, the Celebrity Big Brother star wants David Beckham cast in the role of Terry Brady, played in the original by Bobby Moore. The original plot followed the story of Allied prisoners of war who take on a German football team while in a prison camp during World War II. It starred Sir Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone, while footballers Pele, Ossie (more)...

David Beckham is set to star in a remake of 'Escape to Victory'. The 34-year-old soccer player is being lined up by soccer player-turned-actor Vinnie Jones for a role in a reinterpretation of the 1981 film, which starred Sylvester Stallone and Sir Michael Caine. The original movie featured a number famous soccer stars, including Pele - who is widely regarded as the best player of all-time - Ossie Ardiles and the late World Cup-winning England captain Bobby Moore, and was widely panned when it was released. A source said: ''The original soccer players' acting skills were very wooden. This time many players ..

Actor Vinnie Jones will star in a remake of director John Huston's WWII feature "Escape To Victory", alongside David Beckham as legendary soccer player 'Bobby Moore'.

Retitled "Victory" for its 1981 North American release, the original film starred Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone as Allied prisoners of war, interned in a German camp, who team up with other prisoners to take on the enemy in a public, propaganda soccer match. Despite losing half-way through the game, the prisoners refuse to go through with a pre-arranged escape plan after one of the players delivers the classic line: "We can win this..."

In addition to Moore, the film also stars football greats Osvaldo Ardiles, Kazimierz Deyna, Paul Van Himst and Pelé. Ipswich Town F.C. players appearing in the film include John Wark, Russell Osman, Laurie Sivell, Robin Turner and Kevin O'Callaghan.

Huston's film was based on the 1961 Hungarian feature...