Le cheval de bois

Playing out as a sort of pre runner to The Great Escape some 13 years later, this smashing little British film plays it straight with no thrills and dare do well overkill. First part of the movie is the set up and subsequent escape of our protagonists, whilst the second part concentrates on their survival whilst on the run as they try to reach Sweden. The film relies on pure characters with simple, effective, and yes, believable dialogue to carry it thru, and it achieves its aims handsomely. No little amount of suspense keeps the film ticking along, and as an adventure story it works perfectly for the time frame it adheres to, so a big thumbs to the film that may well be the first of its type? 7/10

The British stiff upper lip way of filming POW escape movies is evident here, since this is a low-key telling of how three men escaped from a German prison camp right in front of their captors by using the age-old device of a Trojan Horse in the guise of gym equipment.

LEO GENN, ANTHONY STEEL and David TOMLINSON are the men who conspire to use a vaulting mechanism as a means of escape. The first part of the film deals with the tension that mounts as the escape is prepared by tunneling to the escape point far from the men's barracks. The second half of the story follows their escape route as they hide from German authorities in order to escape to Denmark and then to safety in Sweden.

All of it is told in crisp, no frills fashion and in the very understated British style of filmmaking, vastly different from the way the subject matter would have been treated in an American film. Particularly impressive are the sequences where Genn and Steel must rely on their own wit and abilities to deceive the enemy after their escape from camp.

Tension mounts toward a satisfying ending. All told, an excellent British film that tells a true story without a lot of false bravado.

While thinking of "The Great Escape" I allowed my mind to wander back to this little gem of a movie from my childhood. I had read and re-read the autobiographical novel from 1949 which inspired it, and when it came to the only cinema (we never used that word then , actually) in town that showed "foreign" films, I was first in line to buy my ticket.

As someone brought up on wartime newsreels and propaganda films during WWII, I had an avid interest in exploring the realities of that conflict as reflected in the memoirs and stories of men who were there in person. That extended later to a keen willingness over the years to buy any book on the subject, and eventually to read the equally compelling novels of Hans Helmut Kirst and Erich Maria Remarque, which provided an even deeper sensibility. The movie versions, however, were unlike this one in that they rarely delivered the goods.

The medium of black-and-white film has never been served so well as it was in those years. I have never seen any technicolor version of war that seems as authentic as do the deep chiaroscuros of films like "The Wooden Horse." If it is true that we are destined always to be captive to the images of our childhood, then I confess it freely.

And there will never be another the likes of Leo Genn as the emblematic British war hero on film. Not even Sir Alec.

Excellent P.O.W. adventure, adapted by Eric Williams from his own book (a paperback copy of which forms part of my father's library) that was inspired by true events; it may well be the first film of its kind and, therefore, has a lot to answer for – not just similarly stiff-upper-lipped examples such as ALBERT, R.N. (1953; which I'll be watching presently), THE COLDITZ STORY (1955) and DANGER WITHIN (1959) but higher-profile releases from the other side of the Atlantic, namely STALAG 17 (1953) and THE GREAT ESCAPE (1963). This, then, sets the basis pretty solidly: British soldiers interned in a German camp devise an ingenious plan of escape, borrowing a page from Greek legend – burrowing from under a vaulting horse used during physical exercise and in full view of their captors! Actually, the film is neatly split into two halves: the first deals with the slow process of digging the tunnel, culminating in the escape itself, while the latter stages depict their fortunes outside the camp as they try to make it to neutral Sweden. Typically of these British films, the cast showcases several established (Leo Genn), current (Anthony Steel) and up-and-coming (Peter Finch, David Tomlinson and Bill Travers) stars, to say nothing of innumerable reliable character actors (Anthony Dawson, Bryan Forbes, Michael Goodliffe and Walter Gotell). The three leads/escapees are Genn, Steel and Tomlinson: while the first two stick together, the latter goes his own way – only to run into the others on reaching safety. As can be expected, the narrative involves plenty of suspense and excitement; as with most male-centered P.O.W. sagas, too, female interest is kept to the barest minimum. Director Lee didn't have a lengthy career – with this and the somewhat similar (albeit with a change of both setting and viewpoint) A TOWN LIKE ALICE (1956) his most noteworthy achievements – but he certainly milked every gripping situation in this case (even if, reportedly, delays in filming saw Lee quitting his post prematurely…leaving producer Ian Dalrymple with the task of tying up loose ends!). Anyway, worth special mention is the exquisite lighting (particularly during night-time sequences) throughout.

The Wooden Horse was one of the first "great" escape stories from World War II, telling the true story of Eric Williams and others in their escape from Stalag-Lufft III in October of 1943. I really like this film, but had to by it on VHS from Amazon in England and get it transferred from PAL format in the U.S. I read the book when I was in hight school, after having seen a portion of the film in the early 60's on T.V. The taunt drama of Peter and John trying to escape from Germany during the war is more realistic than the treck of the escapes portrayed in the Great Escape. This film is a lost treasure, that should be made more available to American audiences.