KELLY'S HEROES

'''Kelly's Heroes''' is an offbeat 1970 war film about a group of enterprising World War II American soldiers from the 35th Infantry Division. Directed by Brian G. Hutton, who also directed the 1968 WW II drama ''Where Eagles Dare'', the film is virtually a who's who of Hollywood at that time — in addition to Clint Eastwood and Donald Sutherland, it starred Telly Savalas, Don Rickles, Carroll O'Connor and Harry Dean Stanton with smaller parts by actors such as Gavin MacLeod and Stuart Margolin who would later become famous on television. The screenplay was written by highly-respected British film and television writer Troy Kennedy Martin.

Contents

Synopsis

Comments

Production

Musical score

Translations

External links

Synopsis

During World War II, Kelly (Eastwood), a former lieutenant demoted to private as a scapegoat, captures a German colonel in Intelligence and gets him drunk to try to get information. Before he is killed by an assaulting German tank, the drunken prisoner of war blurts out an interesting tidbit: there is a cache of 14,000 gold bars stored in a bank vault 30 miles behind enemy lines.
Kelly recruits a group of soldiers on R&R to sneak off and steal it. They include a skeptical master sergeant, "Big Joe" (Savalas); a greedy and opportunistic supply sergeant, "Crapgame" (Rickles); a proto-hippie Sherman tank commander, "Oddball" (Sutherland); and a number of stereotypical "grunts." The men are presented as competent, if weary veterans; their motivations are more cynical and self-serving than patriotic.
The obvious antagonists are the Germans. However, it quickly becomes clear that the motley band's own superior officers are just as much an obstacle if not more so. When intercepted radio messages of the unauthorized private enterprise raid are brought to the attention of gung-ho American Major General Colt (O'Connor), he misinterprets them as communications between inspired soldiers and rushes to the front line to meet the spear-heading units.
Kelly's men race to reach the French town before their own army. There, they find it defended by three formidable Tiger I tanks with infantry support. The Americans are able to handle all, but one Tiger in front of the bank itself. Ironically, it is the cooperation of the tank commander (Karl-Otto Alberty) that proves vital to achieving their goal. Powerless to defeat the armored behemoth, Kelly gains the German officer's assistance by offering him and his crew a share of the riches. They load up the gold and go their separate ways, just in time to avoid meeting the still-clueless Colt.

Comments

''Kelly's Heroes'' stands out from many earlier and contemporary war films in both its cynical tone and mixed conflict, as well as in its technical detail.
There is a great deal of comedy and satire in the film, including a nod to Eastwood's spaghetti westerns in a standoff with a Tiger tank — a virtual remake of the close of ''The Good, the Bad and the Ugly'' — right down to the musical score takeoff. This film was produced and released during the Vietnam War, and in the same climate as ''M
★ A
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★ H''.

Production

The movie was filmed in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, in regions which are now the independent countries of Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia. This was done mostly because earnings from showings of previous movies in Yugoslavia couldn't be taken out of the country, but could be used to fund the production.
The U.S. troops wear the insignia of the US 35th Infantry Division. The division actually was in action around Nancy in France in September of 1944. The film also uses authentic M4 Sherman tanks, while most other contemporary war films, for example ''Patton'', employed too-modern M48 tanks. Such technical details as machine guns and entrenching tools are also remarkably accurate. The three Tiger I Tanks used in the film were actually adapted ex-Soviet Army T-34 tanks, converted in great detail by specialists of the Yugoslav army for the movie ''The Battle of Neretva''.
Although he does not appear in the credits, future director John Landis worked as a production assistant. He also appeared in the movie, dressed as a nun. During the shooting of the picture in Yugoslavia, he wrote the first draft of what would eventually become ''An American Werewolf in London''.

Musical score

The main musical theme of the movie (at both beginning and end) is "Burning Bridges," sung by The Mike Curb Congregation with music by Lalo Schifrin. There is also a casual rendition of the music in the background near the middle of the movie.

Translations

★ Serbian: ''Злато за одважне'' оr ''Ратници''

★ Croatian: ''Kellyjevi junaci''

★ French: ''De l'or pour les braves''

★ Danish: ''Kellys Helte''

★ Polish: ''Złoto dla zuchwałych''

★ Spanish: ''Los Violentos de Kelly''

★ Swedish: ''Kellys Hjältar''

★ German: ''Stosstrupp Gold''

★ Norwegian: ''Kelly og kamerater i krigen''/''Kellys Helter''

★ Hungarian: ''Kelly hősei''

★ Italian: ''I Guerrieri''

External links

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★ in Serbia (In movie Major General Colt O'Conor headquarters)