Assaut final

I saw this under one of its many titles, "Hell River", and was pretty unimpressed. It has a few things going for it--for one thing the photography is quite crisp, unlike many 1970s Euro-made WW 2 "epics", which tended to be either washed-out or muddy--and the music is at least appropriate and doesn't drown out or overwhelm what's on screen--but there are a lot more cons than pro's. The performances aren't particularly good, especially Adam West, wildly miscast as a Nazi officer; he is stiff as a board, has no chemistry or connection with anyone in the cast and slips in and out of an embarrassingly bad German accent. Rod Taylor is stalwart as usual, but he's simply too old to play an action hero. Xenia Gratsos, here billed as "Brioni Farrell", matches West's wooden acting and is rather plain-looking to boot. The plethora of action scenes are done in a very by-the-numbers fashion and tend to be unrealistic, i.e., when the partisans attack a German armored column the Germans are mowed down by the dozens but only a very few partisans fall, despite the Germans opening up with everything they had.

All in all it's not as bad as a lot of the cheap WW 2 crapfests the Italians ground out like sausages in the 1960s and 1970a--my God, what a tsunami of stinkers they were--but it's nothing to write home about. Watchable, to a degree, but not memorable.

As with the Italians, the Yugoslav film industry made quite a few WWII movies, always detailing the struggles of the "Partisans". Like THE BATTLE OF NERETVA, this tells of a major German offensive to erradicate the enemy and their struggles against the invaders.

It's 1941, and the Partisans are on their own. Marko (Rod Taylor), fresh from an education in America, returns to his homeland and discovers how brutal the Nazis really are. Instead of returning to the States, he stays in Yugoslavia and organizes a resistance movement. On the other side, we have Captain Kohler (Adam West, of all people) who discovers that his childhood sweetheart, Anna (Brioni Farrell aka Xenia Gratsos) is among the Jews he's transporting to the POW camp. Marko's men attack the boat, and Anna helps Kohler escape. She's taken by the partisans, though, and soon finds herself in love with Marko. The rest of the movie involves partisan encounters with Kohler's troops, culminating at a huge river battle a few months later.

This movie boasts a pretty decent international cast. Rod Taylor is pretty good -- but way too old -- as the vengeful Marko. Adam West makes a pretty good adversary, although his German accent fluctuates and is just as bad as Brando's in THE YOUNG LIONS. Peter Carsten (BATTLE OF THE EAGLES) has a large role as a tough, ruthless German Panzer officer. Branko Plesa, also of BATTLE OF THE EAGLES, appears a few times as a German General. Bata Zivojinovic plays Marko's old friend, who leads the partisans but really has little meat to his character. Brioni Farrell is great and beautiful, too.

The combat scenes are all very well done. They involve tanks (more modern, though, but any tank is a good tank), era-accurate fighter planes, extras and a lot of big explosions. The cinematography is wonderful and gives the movie a very bleak look. The musical score often doesn't fit the movie, but I liked it anyway.

Overall, not too high above average, but one of the best Partisan films I've seen so far. Worth renting, even buying, for an entertaining 100 minutes. The video from White Knight looks incredibly good, just as good as any MGM release of an older movie, especially considering that it was released in the early 1980s. 6/10 overall.

Expected better with a cast including Rod Taylor and Adam West. The film seemed to lack a script or direction. Slow paced. It was watchable, just not very good.

This is exactly the sort of war movie most buffs envision when they hear "Yugoslavian War Movie". Sure, for every good bigger-budget war movie like "Neretva" or "Sutjeska" that the Yugoslavs turned out, they made about 10 awful, cheap ones. This goes in the latter category, with poor acting, badly directed action scenes, unrealistic and un-scary villain, and poverty-row equipment and effects.

The first indication is the poor quality opening scene when partisans attack a German riverboat. The confused and bewildered Germans put up little fight and Adam West (totally unbelievable as a German officer) escapes to reap his vengeance. His later idiotic ski-troop attack is one of the worst, most one-sided action scenes in war movie history. I don't think the Germans even attempted to sneak up on the Partisans, much less actually wound or kill any of them.

The final action scene has a lot of the expected sledgehammer Yugo propaganda with a motley crew of barely armed freedom fighters beating back wave after wave of German tanks and soldiers. Sure, they had high morale and eventually won out due to overwhelming numbers (and Soviet intervention) but this movie makes it look like 30 Germans died for every 1 Partisan. Yeah right.

Right down there with "BOMB AT 10:10" and "BATTLE OF THE EAGLES".

In 1941 Yugoslavia . Partisans and Nazi army fight in the hardest , most tragic and greatest battles of Yugoslavia , WWII.At the beginning of the film Partisans attack a German riverboat with a lot of Jews held by the cruel Nazis , there a German officer , Adam West , escapes thanks to a beautiful Jew , Xenia Gratsos . Adam getaways to carry out a merciless vengeance . Later on , Partisans attack other regiments without warning that lead to tragic losses the Germans , which infuriates the German commandant Peter Carsten , as he executes massacres , and punitive expeditions against innocent population . Partisans led by Rod Taylor counterattack which will lead to the utter failure of his partisan followers . After that , the partisans are ambushed during their retreat to Bosnia . At the end the Yugoslav partisans and Nazis battle it out a place called Hell River , taking place the major offensives .

Average WWII movie with decent but really miscast actors , rudimentary effects and it involves tanks, arms , ammunition , and fighter planes . It displays breathtaking battles with big explosions , chaos , hell , suffering , mayhem , fates , heroic deaths and a cast of thousands . An enough budget war movie lost continuity with US cut and bad edition . Confused and bewildered movie with poor action , though it has some spectacular as well as noisy fights , regularly made battle scenes , unrealistic developing , poverty-row equipment and a lot of of the German armored vehicles are really American , as the planes shown are not actually German planes but U P47S. Yugoslavia army provided soldier-extras , costumes , weapons , fighter planes , tanks , trucks and other vehicles they had access to . It includes a silly ski-troopers attack in which the German soldiers are ridiculously killed and a large line of tanks rolling through a ruined and debris-strewn village . It stars some known actors , such as Rod Taylor as an aging partisan against two nasty German officers : Adam West and Peter Carsten .

It packs an atmospheric cinematography and a passable soundtrack, though it often doesn't fit the action .The motion picture released on TV as Hell River and also titled Battle of Belgrado was middlingly directed by Stole Jankovic. The film belongs to a motley group of Yugoslav movies made in the 70s about WWI and WWII with big budget , international stars and produced during Josip Broz Tito dictatorship , such as "Battle of Neretva river" by Veljko Bulajic with Yul Brynner, Franco Nero , Orson Welles , Sylva Koscina ; " Veliki transport" or "Mission Heroes" by Bulajic with James Franciscus , Steve Railsback , Edward Albert, Helmut Berger; " The day that shook the world" or "Sarajevo" with Maximilian Schell , Christopher Plummer , Florinda BolKan ; and "Sutjeska" by Stipe Delic with Richard Burton plating dictator Tito , Irene Papas , this film was made for the 30th anniversary of this battle and considered to be the most expansive movie in the history of the Yugoslav cinema.