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Fresh and Exciting

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

The premise of this film just does not work. Why would nazis care about a murdered prostitute? They were mass-murdering poles in the upper class to make "Lebensraum" from the first advance into Poland. They killed over 10,000 upper class poles and buried them in shallow graves around the countryside to make room for the expected influx of aryans. The whole idea of anyone caring about a dead whore among the nazis is ridiculous!

The Night of the Generals is a 1960s favorite of mine, even if it is just for the talent and the cinematography. Alas, today, because of a few production errors, as it stands, this one is the answer to the trivia question: "What film reunited 'Lawrence of Arabia' co-stars Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif?" This film has about every Sixties icon that could be shoved in a Wehrmacht uniform - Peter O'Toole, Tom Courtenay Omar Sharif, Charles Grey, Christopher Plummer, Donald Pleasance, Nigel Stock, etc. It only lacks Derren Nesbitt, Jeremy Kemp and James Mason (along with real German Karl Michael Vogler) to have rounded up the majority of European male stock of actors who could fill out a German uniform. The setting of Warsaw showed these guys were bad Germans, and few movies are set in World War II Warsaw, even though it is as easy as taking a back lot and making it look further run down. Involving some of the Generals in the actual July 1944 plot to kill Hitler - hence the name "The Night of the Generals" - gives the film depth (but pads it for about half an hour). The "who done it" in wartime was a great plot touch. The color, the psychology used with O'Toole's character of General Tanz gives the movie a touch of learned discourse. And murdering prostitutes gave it as close to SEX, boobs and legs as could be done in 1966, when the film was lensed. *** SPOILER *** And here's where it makes the viewer hate it: O'Toole literally kills the movie, the audience and Sharif's Major Grau when he guns down Omar in a climatic confrontation and with about 20 minutes left for dates and viewers to squirm their seats. It was as if Holmes were torn apart by the Baskerville hounds on the moors. Sharif as Grau was everyman. He is even likable as a German pressed into wartime service because he was a policeman in civilian life and was needed for the war effort. Everybody loves the detective cop. But O'Toole simply, dispassionately guns him down. It is a cheap shock for the audience, but the act destroys the one person the viewer identified with. I mean there may have been a few fellows in 1967 Rio or Caracas who were pulling for the Generals, but those guys were not the money paying target audience. Spend two hours building a character and then gun him down, and the audience will hate the movie. They did, and they still do. Well, a guy who was an enlisted man in 1967 Vietnam said they showed this movie to the soldiers and it was sort of popular for the girls,the sex killing and the fact a few generals sort of get it. This could be remade today. Throw out the bit about killing Hitler, make it a straight psycho general with common hang ups and keep Grau ALIVE until after the war when he brings justice to Tanz, and it would work. It could even work with some sort of anti moral twist ending, such as Grau killing Tanz and keeping the cycle of violence open. But it CANNOT work with the hero figure murdered before the closing act. So, great film if you like 1960s talent and faux psychology. If you like straight murder mysteries or simple crime plots - SKIP IT.

Anatole Litvak made some fairly decent films - Mayerling, The Snake Pit, The Deep Blue Sea - without bringing a 'signature' to bear so that he remains something of a journeyman director. The Night Of The Generals is certainly watchable despite slightly bizarre casting - at one end you have the great Philippe Noiret, at the other the mahogany John Gregson. It begins as a thriller with an element of mystery inasmuch as we have to guess just which of three possible suspects - all generals in the German army - was frightened by Jack The Ripper as a child, but unaccountably Litvak drops the mystery element around Reel 8 at which point he shows the Peter O'Toole character to be a certifiable psycho-sociopath but the flaw in the ointment is that at no time is any explanation offered for O'Toole's behaviour. It remains watchable by virtue of good casting and good location footage but may not stand up to further viewings.

The Night of the Generals is directed by Anatole Litvak and written by Paul Dehn, Joseph Kessel & Gore Vidal, based on the novel of the same name written by Hans Hellmut Kirst. It stars Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif, Tom Courtenay, Donald Pleasence, Charles Gray, Joanna Pettet & Philippe Noiret. Maurice Jarre scores the music and Henri Decae photographs it. Distributed by Columbia Pictures it's a Technicolor and Panavision production, with the primary location for the shoot being Warsaw, Poland. Plot centres around the hunt for a serial killer of prostitutes during the second World War, with the evidence pointing to it being a General in the German army. Nazi officer Major Grau (Sharif) is the man taxed with flushing out the madman.Is it comedy, drama or an in depth character study of Nazi evility? Perhaps all three? Either way, The Night of the Generals is an acquired taste and a film that's hard to recommend with any great confidence. With a big budget and an international cast of numbers, the makers intended to take the bite of Kirst's novel and blend it with grandiose characterisations: I mean the Hitler assassination plot is in the mix somewhere. What follows, dragged out over a far too long 150 minutes, is a film dotted with moments of class, punctured by moments of borderline camp comedy. Some of the dialogue is very precious, but again at times some discussions beggar belief. It's such a shame that a production with much going for it, such as the sets, location, photography, source material and cast, ultimately runs out as a collage of good intentions & bad ideas. Still, it is fun to watch, which in a film containing savagery and deprivation, probably gives you the best idea of how to approach the film.O'Toole is an absolute riot, playing it insane and pompously dandy, his performance alone is worth getting the numb backside for. But was it meant to be played that way? Rumours suggest that O'Toole was mortified about the behaviour of producer Sam Spiegel, particularly towards Litvak. So Pete, bless him, decided to totally have fun with the role, and he did, and in the process raises laughs aplenty. Sharif, Pleasence and Gray (woo hoo, Blofeld's R Us) manage to keep straight faces long enough to earn their money, while Technicolor beauty comes in the form of Pettet & Véronique Vendell. There's even some cameos to look out for, notably Christopher Plummer as Rommel. The rest either come and go without great impact, or in the case of Courtenay, just look star struck around O'Toole.If come the end you remember the nastiness within or a great action sequence? (whoosh those flamethrowers), then the film has in part done its job. If, however, you still find yourself giggling at O'Toole's hysterics? Then it most likely has not? Lest of course that was the intention.......5/10