IMDb > Tobruk (1967)
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Overview

User Rating:
6.2/10   683 votes
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Down 12% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Arthur Hiller
Writer:
Leo Gordon (written by)
Contact:
View company contact information for Tobruk on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
7 February 1967 (USA) more
Genre:
War | Drama more
Tagline:
83 men started the mission! Only 4 survived! more
Plot:
September 1942 - With Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps on the march through Egypt, a British special forces unit... more | add synopsis
Plot Keywords:
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Awards:
Nominated for Oscar. more
User Comments:
Not the Real Story of Tobruk more (21 total)

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Rock Hudson ... Maj. Donald Craig

George Peppard ... Capt. Kurt Bergman
Nigel Green ... Col. John Harker
Guy Stockwell ... Lt. Max Mohnfeld
Jack Watson ... Sgt. Maj. Jack Tyne
Norman Rossington ... Alfie
Percy Herbert ... Dolan
Liam Redmond ... Henry Portman
Heidy Hunt ... Cheryl Portman
Leo Gordon ... Sgt. Krug
Robert Wolders ... Corporal Bruckner
Anthony Ashdown ... Lt. Boyden
Curt Lowens ... German Colonel
Rico Cattani ... Cpl. Stuhler (as Henry Rico Cattani)
Peter Coe ... Tuareg Chieftain
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Additional Details

Parents Guide:
Add content advisory for parents
Runtime:
107 min
Country:
USA
Language:
English | German | Italian | Arabic
Color:
Color (Technicolor)
Aspect Ratio:
2.35 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono (Westrex Recording System)
Certification:
Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Norway:15 | Norway:16 (1967) | Sweden:15 | UK:A (original rating) | UK:PG (video rating) (1988)
Filming Locations:
Almería, Andalucía, Spain more
Company:
Gibraltar Productions more

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
Rock Hudson replaced Laurence Harvey. more
Goofs:
Revealing mistakes: When Capt. Bergman attacks and kills the sentry, blood is visible on his right (knife) hand before he stabs the sentry. more
Quotes:
Alfie: I never did trust 'em. Once a Jerry, always a Jerry.
Dolan: Once a thief, always a thief, That right Alfie?
more
Movie Connections:
Edited into Raid on Rommel (1971) more

FAQ

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User Comments

   (Comment on this title)
7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful.
Not the Real Story of Tobruk, 17 September 2006
6/10
Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

The Longest Day started a trend in Hollywood to have big all star cast productions showing with documentary accuracy good accounts of some of the major events of World War II. Other such films like this would be Patton, MacArthur, Midway, and A Bridge Too Far. Note I do not include The Battle of the Bulge in this list.

The seesaw struggle for Tobruk would make a great film as the key port city on the North African coast passes from Axis to Allied hands a few times over the 1940-1942 period. But if you're looking for a factional account of that story, this ain't it.

What it's about is an allied raid on the fuel bunkers at Tobruk that keep Rommel's panzers going. The idea is that a group of Jewish soldiers who like Paul Newman in Exodus fought in the British army and these are German Jews, led by George Peppard, with appropriate accents and language will disguise themselves as Nazi soldiers. They will escort British 'prisoners' into Tobruk led by Colonel Nigel Green who will blow up the fuel dumps along with a combined naval and air assault. Along for the ride is Rock Hudson, a Canadian major who dreamed up the idea.

Well at least they didn't make Rock an American since there no American soldiers in that part of Africa at all. But Canada has always been handy if you want to cast a name American movie star in a British locale. Fortunately it fits the plot situation here.

There's action enough for those who like that as I do. But the most interesting part about Tobruk is the relationships between the German Jews and the British. Hudson is the outsider here so he does see both points of view. There is some garden variety anti-Semitism among the British, but it's also tempered with the fact that as Nigel Green puts it, he and others served in Palestine before war in Europe broke out.

Nevertheless as Peppard puts it for the first time Jews are acting like a people since the days of Rome. They are going home to where they started post World War II, to Israel before that was a name of a nation. Anyone who wants to start trouble can find them there. Sad to say a whole lot of people have wanted to start trouble for their own reasons.

So much battle footage was filmed for Tobruk that four years later it got used in another vastly inferior film, Raid on Rommel.

Not a great film Tobruk, but entertaining enough. But hopefully the real whole story of Tobruk will be told.

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Message Boards

Discuss this movie with other users on IMDb message board for Tobruk (1967)
Recent Posts (updated daily)User
Goofs rex-116
Is this movie available on dvd? rudnert
Raid on Rommel is made with Tobruk sequences! michaudjp
Comic Relief Pearsey
Official r2 Spanish DVD The_Khazi
Widescreen? SgtSlaughter
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