Fuga Para a Vitória

This is the antithesis to the "chick-flick" and up there with the great "male bonding" cameraderie movies such as "great Escape" and "The Man Who Would Be King", and let's not exclude "The Longest Yard". Best scene by far in the movie is Pele's jaw-dropping upside-down kick, followed by Max Von Sydow's sportsmanlike and awestruck applause, followed by glares of hatred from his German brethren. I can guarantee you that that scene is worth the price of the admission(video rental) alone. As far as the non-soccer star cast goes, Michael Caine more than compensates for Sylvester Stallone, and the rest do a credible job, with highest marks to Von Sydow as a 'good guy' on the other side.

Many people have passed negative comments about this film.If you study it closely, though, you will notice many positive and original scenes.

The football is not exaggerated like many other sporting Movies.

I first saw it when it was released in 1981/82 and thought it was very good. As a War film it is only average, but as a Football spectacle it is very interesting. The fact that the makers used real life footballers, including the great man himself "Pele" is original. We are actually seeing first class football players do their stuff in a controlled Movie enviroment... Heck some of them even try to act!

I think Michael Caine and Sly would have enjoyed making this Movie.

The message from the Movie is that Football is a game which is understood by everyone and will always be played under any circumstances. It is the Universal game and always will be!

This movie is part of my childhood. My older brother was obsessed - to say the least - with this movie, and we used to watch it every week or so. I must have seen it about a hundred times. Pelé, Ardiles, Bob Moore... No football fan can miss this movie. Is it any good? I don't think it's very good, but this is one of those movies that really made part of my life and i can never forget it. Until today - i haven't seen the movie in several years - i can recall many of the dialogs, and a lot of the situations of the game. Brazil was eliminated in 1982's world cup after an epic game against Italy - one of the most profound traumas in Brazilian football history, an event that made Brazil to change it's game style - the art football - to a more pragmatic and tactical style. Somehow this movie reminds me of that golden period of Brazilian football.

If the part where the football match takes place was omitted, "Victory" would be a "5 stars out of 10" film. The reason is that although it features two very good actors (Michael Caine - Max von Sydow), there is not much to stand out: A rather incredulous WW2 plot, an average acting (what could you expect from professional footballers or from Stallone?), and a simply decent direction, produce an average result. Thankfully, there is more than that, as I will explain in more detail later.

"Victory" is about some inmates in a WW2 prison camp, who have a passion for soccer. Captain J. Colby (Caine), a former footballer, is the leading figure in the camp matches that take place. One day, he is spotted by football-fan Major Steiner (Max von Sydow) who proposes him the idea of organizing a match between allied POWs vs. Germans. Colby agrees, as he believes this will be a great morale-booster and a chance for better prison conditions for those involved; however, more senior inmates are skeptical, as they believe this will be a propaganda stunt for the Germans. In the end, they also concur but only after they have convinced the team's goalie Capt. Hatch (Stallone) to arrange the team's escape during the match. The difficulty is that both Colby and his team are more interested in this game than in their freedom, so they are hesitant on what they should finally do...

As I said, the movie is just watchable during its first part. And yet, when we start to watch the Allied - Germans match, things get much better: We watch terrific football from stars such as Pele, Ardiles, and Bobby Moore, with scenes such as Pele's goal being memorable to all sports fans. Of course, if you are not into soccer, then perhaps you won't get that excited (although the spectacle can be exciting for non-fans, too). But if you like the King of Sports, then you will certainly enjoy this film. 7/10.

The script of this unusual war/escape movie was nothing special, and neither was the acting. Not surprising about the latter since half the performers weren't actually experienced actors. However I loved every minute of it, and thought it was great fun and terrific entertainment. Of course there are those who won't quite see it that way and will dismiss it out of hand. And they'd be perfectly sane to do so. Everything about "Victory" (aka "Escape to Victory" in the UK) says it's one to leave well alone.

Even if you disregard the lack of aesthetic qualities, and tut-tut over the reality of it all, it's worth watching if only to see again a few of the great past-masters of what the Brits like to call "the beautiful game" (i.e. soccer). And Sylvester Stallone as a goalkeeper is something to behold.

As far as escape stories go this is about as original as they get, but even here it's possible to see plundering from other story lines, i.e "The Great Escape", "The Password is Courage", "Albert RN", to name but three, and as at least one reviewer has pointed out, the music is extremely reminiscent of the first one.

One of my favourites snippets is that of the Nazi sports commentator, portrayed by Anton Diffring, that stalwart of war movies, broadcasting his gramophone record of enthusiastic crowd applause, when in "reality" the whole stadium was as quiet as the grave.

I think this is one of those rare occasions, if taken in the right vein, when a bad movie can be a crowd pleaser. Forget the war pundits, the realists and the purists. Just enjoy the movie for what it is. Tremendous fun!