Castle Keep (1969)

User Rating:

6.2/10   

Director:

Sydney Pollack

Writers:

William Eastlake (novel)
Daniel Taradash (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

October 1969 (Austria)

Genre:

War | Drama

Tagline:

A 10th-Century castle...a 20th-Century war...and the outspoken novel come to life on the screen!

Plot:

During the Battle of the Bulge, an anachronistic count shelters a ragtag squad of Americans in his isolated castle hoping they will defend it against the advancing Germans.

Plot Keywords:

Castle | Battle Of The Bulge | Count | Pacifist | Drawbridge

Cast

Burt Lancaster	...	Maj. Abraham Falconer
Patrick O'Neal	...	Capt. Lionel Beckman
Jean-Pierre Aumont	...	The Count of Maldorais
Peter Falk	...	Sgt. Rossi
Astrid Heeren	...	Therese
Scott Wilson	...	Cpl. Clearboy
Tony Bill	...	Lt. Amberjack
Al Freeman Jr.	...	Pvt. Allistair Piersall Benjamin
James Patterson	...	Elk
Bruce Dern	...	Lt. Billy Byron Bix
Michael Conrad	...	Sgt. DeVaca
Caterina Boratto	...	Red Queen
Elizabeth Teissier	...	Red Queen Girl
Anne Marie Moskovenko	...	Red Queen Girl
Marja Allanen	...	Red Queen Girl

Runtime:

105 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (35 mm prints) | 70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints)

Certification:

Iceland:16 | Singapore:NC-16 | Argentina:18 | Norway:16 | Australia:M | West Germany:16 (f) | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Yugoslavia

Company:

Filmways Pictures

Trivia:

Burt Lancaster wore a patch over a good right eye for his character. Peter Falk, having lost his right eye at age 3, wore a glass eye.

Goofs:

Continuity: Just prior to riding to the summer house, the major was on his horse and had his gold leaf on his helmet. When dismounted and examining the ground for tracks, the majors' leaf was missing.

Quotes:

Lt. Billy Byron Bix: [leading singing]
Sfc. Rossie Baker: Hey, you're waking everybody up! Go back to your outfit!
Lt. Billy Byron Bix: [singing subsides] Excuse me?
Sfc. Rossie Baker: You're waking everybody up, go back to your outfit.
Lt. Billy Byron Bix: We have no outfit. We've withdrawn. We don't believe in fighting.
Sfc. Rossie Baker: Well who believes in fighting?
Lt. Billy Byron Bix: We believe in God. That frightens you, doesn't it? All you believe in is fornication, and killing.
Sfc. Rossie Baker: What?
Lt. Billy Byron Bix: We're conscientious objectors!
Sfc. Rossie Baker: You mean, you conscientiously object to fornicating?
[...]

Movie Connections:

Featured in The Last Detail (1973)

weird little WWII film

I'm not sure I know how to begin to describe this but I'll give it a shot anyway. A bunch of solders, basically "walking wounded", come across a member of the aristocracy in Belgium, out riding his horse, and are invited by the man to come stay at his castle. Little does he know what he's bringing down upon himself but the men take up residence in the castle and make it their base of operations. Their leader (Lancaster) takes up residence in the bed with the Count's wife, niece, whoever she is. Peter Falk takes up residence in the bakery of the nearby town, as he was a baker back in the US and the baker's husband appears to have gone away. There is a young man called Private Benjamin who is a writer who is busily taking notes to write his book called "Castle Keep". Overall, none of these men would win any prizes in the Mental Health Sweepstakes. The dialog and scenarios are rather strange and surreal and in some ways this reminds me of "Catch 22" but this came first and the comparison is merely that they're both strange and surreal war films. I'm not really much for war films and while this one doesn't overly seem like one until the last part it's well done and several notches to the left of "left field". I guess this could be described as a black comedy but it's more surreal than anything, I guess. 7 out of 10, not your basic war film, but what exactly, is hard to say.