Cross of Iron (1977)
Genre: War / Drama
Duration: 132 minuten / 119 minuten (ingekorte Amerikaanse versie)
Alternative title: Steiner - Das Eiserne Kreuz
Country:
United Kingdom / West Germany
Directed by: Sam Peckinpah
Stars: James Coburn, Maximilian Schell and James Mason
IMDb score:
7,4 (31.464)
Releasedate: 29 January 1977
Cross of Iron plot
"Captain Stransky, you are the rest of my platoon"
The film is about a disillusioned German platoon on the Eastern Front with Steiner (Coburn) as the epitome of the utter idiocy of war. Accompanied by a sharply contrasting children's choir and gruesome slides, an orgy of plastic violence unfolds from which each individual soldier tries to escape in his own way.
Actors and actresses
Unteroffizier / Feldwebel Rolf Steiner
Hauptmann Stransky
Oberst Brandt
Hauptmann Kiesel
Unteroffizier Krüger
Gefreiter Kern
Leutnant Treibig
Anselm
Schütze Maag
Unteroffizier Schnurrbart
Reviews & comments
blurp194
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- 5564 messages
- 4238 votes
A sort of icon of the times.
Cross of Iron actually shows like no other film the idiocy of the war, as caused by the soldiers themselves. There is of course the more obvious category of idiocy that is caused by politics, but that is less relevant here.
The story is as thin as a beer mat. In the 1970s you had something called 'war books', sort of pocketbooks of about 40 or 50 pages, which you could buy at the cigar store, I believe - for a few cents, literally. With titles like 'The Cursed Commander', 'The Last Bridge', or, yes, 'The Iron Cross'. Such a booklet seems to have been used for the script of the film, and there is really not more in it than in such a book.
The strength of the film also lies in something else. The rather recognizable hand of Peckinpah - brutal, bloody, low production values you could say. And sloppy mounted. It is all part of it, and it is also somewhat indicative of the time. But also the stereotypical role of James Coburn. As an icon in itself, and the hero from the war book through and through. One-dimensional, but also with all the qualities we like to see in a hero.
And then something extra. Because not everything our hero does is immediately clear, there is still something to interpret and think about. Perhaps that is what makes this film something special after all.
Translated from Dutch · View original
knusse stoel
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- 3298 messages
- 4379 votes
James Coburn, the sympathetic actor, stars here as Steiner, a German corporal who eventually becomes a sergeant major in the German army of occupation in Russia during WWII. He and his men are allowed to experience how idiotic a war is and that in fact no one benefits from it, only a few people who themselves do not know what the battlefield entails and are proud when a piece of ground is conquered with human lives.
A fine film in the war film genre, it is a pity that the people do not speak their own language, so German and Russian and that after three quarters of the film the story is rushed too quickly.
I also found the ending a bit strange.
Hence a 7, otherwise I would have given an 8.
Translated from Dutch · View originalPre- and sequels
Steiner - Das Eiserne Kreuz, 2. Teil
1979
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