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.

Another low rent WW2 epic made in Yugoslavia with a largely local cast and crew, propped up by a couple of big Hollywood names. HELL RIVER is the condensed version of a four part TV movie entitled PARTIZANI, and it simply isn't very good. The direction is weak, the action sequences feel like stock footage although they're not, and Hollywood offers much slicker, more professionally made war films than this one.

Saying that, HELL RIVER isn't the worst of its type. Some of the imagery is pretty good, like the line of tanks rolling through a debris-strewn township, and the producers certainly get their money's worth from the WW2-era weapons, costumes, and vehicles they have access to. I've always enjoyed Rod Taylor's acting performances and he doesn't disappoint here either, although he does seem to have aged very rapidly in the space of just a decade. Adam West is as wooden as ever and struggles in one of his most miscast roles as a Nazi officer. There's action a-plenty, but it all feels rather repetitive and, like the whole film, a bit of a waste of time.

In murrica, it's hell hill. In yugoslavia, it's partizani. The partisans! A period piece, during world war two. Yugoslavs have formed a resistance, to fight back against the nazis. Rod taylor (time machine, the birds) is marko, head of the resistance group. Adam west (batman!) is kohler, the german soldier who keeps facing marko in battle. Anna had been close to kohler before he was pressed into service, but now finds herself fighting with the yugoslav locals. Wins and losses on both sides. Then, it's a showdown at the river. Directed by stole jankovic. Now showing on the tubi channel. Not sure why it's rated so low on imdb, but it's not so bad!

I consider my taste in movies to be quite traditional (i like stuff like Lord of the Rings), yet i have completely enjoyed the two biggest Yugoslavian war films, The Battle of Neretva and this. Partizani is a big scale war adventure about Serbian partisans and Nazis exchanging blows in 1941.

A triangle drama between the rebel leader (Rod Taylor), a reluctant nazi (Adam West) and an upper class chick (Brioni Farrell) is woven into the story, but it never gets in the way of the action. And there is plenty of it, involving planes and tanks. The equipment is unfortunately wrong, but the tanks manage to look a bit Wehrmacht.

I really liked Rod Taylor in this movie, he is aged but not tired. He carries the simple warrior role with his charisma. Adam West is more wooden but adequate, and Brioni Farrell is competent and never annoying. The musical score, involving a bit of Mikis Theodorakis, is good and sentimental in an Ennio Morricone way.

This is a high class, big budget film that shouldn't disappoint any friend of war adventure. Better than mediocre Hollywood, and one of the best to ever come out of continental Europe.

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.