Watch The Dirty Dozen For Free

Powerful

Nice effects though.

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

There have been plenty of films about small groups of soldiers pitted against superior forces or given special training to achieve a seemingly impossible task. And many of those films involved ragtag misfits given a chance to avoid far worse ends than death in battle.But "The Dirty Dozen" is notable for its less biased portrayal of Americans at war. Unlike the war films produced during WWII, "The Dirty Dozen" paints both sides of the conflict with the brush of realism. We see American soldiers commit crimes and act out of malice.Another notable aspect of the film is that one of the dozen was portrayed by Jim Brown, active NFL running back. As an Ohio native and a fan of Brown (and the Cleveland Browns), it was novel to see the athlete--certainly one of the best athletes of all time and the best running back ever by most accounts--on the big screen.The story, which portrays the hellish nature of war, including the slaughter of noncombatants, still has a humorous side. The dozen, who are recruited for a mission behind the German lines, have no respect for authority or discipline. Their recruiter (Lee Marvin) uses novel ways to gain their respect and to convince them that he values them as men and soldiers. On one occasion, he imports prostitutes into the training camp for their entertainment. And the men display cleverness and outside-the-box thinking (something most soldiers have drilled out of them) to prove their mettle and earn the chance to attempt the mission.As in detailed bank heists, Marvin trains his men thoroughly and tests them repeatedly. But things never go exactly as planned. During the mission, they have to be creative.In an odd way, this film probably appeals to those who like films of wartime and those who possess more anti-war sentiments. The all-star cast is largely responsible, though the story is certainly engaging.

Understand this: in WW2 (and today) there was no shortage of elite, well-trained and disciplined commandos willing to risk life and limb to go on suicidal missions. So under no circumstance would it be necessary to send a dozen men from a military prison, who were either condemned to execution or sentenced to lengthy prison term at hard labor, on a mission to go behind enemy lines on the eve of DDay to try and kill as many officers as possible of the German high command, enjoying R&R in a French château.However, this contrived premise becomes the hook that elevates TDD above another WW2 action movie. I actually find the first 2/3 of the movie dealing with the assembly of the unit and how Lee Marvin as Maj. Reisman trains them to be a crack and cohesive combat unit more interesting than the actual mission. It's an excellent cast. Marvin was at his peak, having recently had a couple brilliant roles, 1 dramatic as an alcoholic in "Ship of Fools" and the other as a drunken gunfighter in the comedy, "Cat Ballou." In TDD Marvin gets to do his tough guy personification again, but he shows a wonderful touch of wryly delivering comedic lines. TDD has a superb cast playing the Army brass and the prisoners. Ernest Borgnine gives a good low key performance as the general who concocted this plan, as does George Kennedy as his aide. Robert Ryan is the arrogant and pompous Col. Breed who despises Maj. Reisman. Richard Jaeckel gives another top notch performance as the MP Sgt who has to assist Reisman in keeping order, while the vastly underrated Ralph Meeker has a great bit as an Army shrink who analyzes the misfits.At the heart of this are the "Dozen" the convicts who will be expected to pull of this mission or die trying to even have a shot at clemency. Actually for the audience we only really get to know 6 of them. Bronson and Clint Walker were good soldiers who ended up on death row, Bronson after he fragged a cowardly officer and Walker after he lost his temper and killed a man with a punch. Football great Jim Brown made his initial movie appearance, waiting to die after killing a racist who wanted to castrate him. His adversary among the prisoners becomes Telly Savalas as Pvt. Maggot, truly a psychotic and racist killer. Donald Sutherland gives a good comedic bit as a rather dim-witted soldier, while the great John Cassavetes delivers perhaps the stand out performance of the 12 as Franco, a low level ex-Chicago mobster, sentenced to death after a penny ante holdup went astray. Franco ends up becoming sort of the ex post facto leader of the 12 as they eventually become an efficient killing machine.One of those flicks that is fun to continually watch, if nothing else for one of the truly great movie casts of all time.

Over forty years and this movie continues to thrill and entertain. I have seen it several times. If you like the war film genre or just exciting action with ironic humor then you MUST make time to see the original Dirty Dozen.wow, I need ten linesCharles Bronson, Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Jim Brown, Telly SavalisIf you are a young person then you might want to watch these actors - greats in their time. The movie does lack a significant female lead but that was typical for the times.

The Dirty Dozen (1967) [8] Lee Marvin stars as "Major Reisman" who has displeased his superiors so much that he is put in charge of a secret mission to parachute behind enemy lines to kill German officers vacationing at a château in France. If that wasn't bad enough, all of his soldiers are hardened criminals of the worst sort who are coerced by the chance that they may be given a parole. Now as implausible as this movie really is I must admit that it offers plenty of entertainment value due in large part to an all-star cast which includes Charles Bronson (as "Joseph Wladislaw"), Clint Walker ("Samson Posey"), Jim Brown ("Robert Jefferson"), Donald Sutherland ("Vernon Pinkley"), Ernest Borgnine ("General Worden"), George Kennedy ("Major Max Armbruster") along with the aforementioned Lee Marvin. Yet with all of these mentioned I thought Telly Savalas deserved special recognition for his performance as the psychotic pervert "Archer Maggott" which really stood out. In any case, this was a big movie back in the 60's and those who might be interested in this type of film should definitely check it out. I rate it as definitely above average.