Breakout (1975)

A bush pilot is hired for $50,000 to go to Mexico to free an innocent prisoner.

Director:

Tom Gries

Writers:

Howard B. Kreitsek (screenplay), Marc Norman (screenplay)

Stars:

Charles Bronson, Robert Duvall, Jill Ireland

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Charles Bronson	...	Nick Colton
Robert Duvall	...	Jay Wagner
Jill Ireland	...	Ann Wagner
Randy Quaid	...	Hawk Hawkins
Sheree North	...	Myrna
Jorge Moreno	...	Sosa
Emilio Fernández	...	J.V. (as Emilio Fernandez)
Paul Mantee	...	Telegraphist
Alan Vint	...	Harve
Alejandro Rey	...	Sanchez
William B. White	...	2nd Officer (as Will B. White)
Roy Jenson	...	Spencer
Sidney Clute	...	Henderson
Chalo González	...	Border Guard (as Chalo Gonzalez)
Antonio Tarruella	...	1st Prison Guard

Storyline

Jay Wagner is framed by the mob and sent to prison in Mexico. His wife, Ann tries to get him out. She then turns to bush pilot Nick Colton for help. And Colton is all to eager to do it. But the men who framed Jay will do what they have to make sure he doesn't escape.

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Plot Keywords:

bush pilot | pilot | mexico | prison | escape | 

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Taglines:

Sentenced to 28 years in prison for a crime he never committed. Only two things can get him out - A lot of money and Charles Bronson!

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Drama

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Certificate:

PG

Details

Official Sites:

Sony Movie Channel [United States]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

7 March 1975 (West Germany)

Also Known As:

Der Mann ohne Nerven

Filming Locations:

Fort de Bellegarde, Le Perthus, France

Box Office

Budget:

$1,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Every frame of film for "Breakout" was shot on an actual location carefully dressed to simulate the setting where, according to the fictional story, the action happened. Thus, bush pilot Charles Bronson's run-down airfield located, according to the screenplay, in Texas was actually Hawkins' Airport near Lancaster, California. It was made realistically Texan by truckloads of Fuller's Earth, tumbleweed, and sagebrush activated by off-camera wind machines.

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Goofs

In the helicopter training scene, Charles Bronson is suddenly wearing sunglasses when less than a second before he was not.

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Quotes

Spencer: Goddamn it you come popping in here to borrow my wife... She ain't a lawnmower!
Nick Colton: You're right Spence, and I admit I was outta line before. I don't know where the hell I got the guts to ask your lady to pose as a whore. But I swear to you, this time it's nothing.
Spencer: What do want her to do?

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Connections

Referenced in The First Nudie Musical (1976)

User Reviews

Charles Bronson breaks all the rules and still comes out a winner

In a rare show of his comedic talents as well as having more lines of dialog to read then in his last two or three films put together Charles Bronson as crackerjack pilot Nick Colton is really enjoying himself in the movie "Breakout". Together with his wife, in real life, Jill Ireland as Ann Wagner the wife in the film who's husband Jay, Robert Duvell,Nick Bronson is out to rescue Jay from a brutal Mexican prison.

Jay was framed by non-other then his grandfather Harris Wagner, John Huston, who together with his silent partners in the fruit and transportation business The CIA. Wagner feels that Jays free spirited and revolutionary ideas are a treat to the future of his company and has Jay arrested in Satiago Chile for a murder in Mexico some 2,000 or so miles away. Thrown before a Mexican kangaroo court, with a paid-off judge presiding, Jay's guilt despite the illogic fact that he can't be at two places at the same time, Mexico & Chile,is a forgone conclusion and he's sent up the river for 28 years in a castle-like Mexican prison.

Nick hired by Ann to rescue her husband is stifled by Jays sleazy grandpa Harris Wagner who Ann, unknowing that he had her husband set up, is totally trustful of. Nick realizing that the best way to get Jay freed is to do it by air and to keep the plan only to himself and his fellow rescuers Hawk Hawkins & Myrna, Randy Quaid & Sheree North, which leads to the exciting final. Nick not only rescues Jay but also finds out who that lousy creep Cable, Paul Mantee, really is by him making sure, for Harris and the CIA, that his rescue of Jay falls flat on it's face. Cable is to murder Ann's husband if he ever makes it back to the USA, where the Mexican police can't touch him.

Charles Bronson as Nick Colton and wife Jill Ireland as Ann Wagner really touch off sparks in all their scenes together even though Jill isn't married to him in the movie and they have no romantic scenes in the film at all. Nick's trying to learn how to fly a helicopter didn't go that well at all at the start of his lessons from helicopter pilot Harve, Alan Vint. Later when he took off by himself, Harve felt that the rescue attempt was to dangerous, with only three flying lessons under his belt had even Herve surprised and shocked at just how good he was at the controls.

Tense action when Nick tries to land and then rescue the very sick Jay Wagner who escapes from the prison hospital with the help of fellow prisoner Sosa, Jorge Moreno. Sosa who ironically was part of the frame-up that put Jay there in the first place may have gotten guilt feelings about what he did to Jay.

Some really great stunts in the movie with a man falling some 100 feet from a helicopter straight through the roof of a house, with what looked like nothing to break his fall. Later at the airport across the border in Texas at the end of the movie one of the baddies is sliced to pieces, by an oncoming jumbo passenger plane, as if he were a roll of salami.