Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
Henry Fonda | ... | Lt. Col. Dan Kiley | |
Robert Shaw | ... | Col. Hessler | |
Robert Ryan | ... | Gen. Grey | |
Dana Andrews | ... | Col. Pritchard | |
George Montgomery | ... | Sgt. Duquesne | |
Pier Angeli | ... | Louise | |
Barbara Werle | ... | Elena | |
Charles Bronson | ... | Wolenski | |
Hans Christian Blech | ... | Conrad | |
Werner Peters | ... | Gen. Kohler | |
James MacArthur | ... | Lt. Weaver | |
Karl-Otto Alberty | ... | Von Diepel (as Karl Otto Alberty) | |
Telly Savalas | ... | Sgt. Guffy | |
Steve Rowland | ... | Eddy | |
Robert Woods | ... | Joe - Kiley's Pilot |
In the winter of 1944, the Allied Armies stand ready to invade Germany at the coming of a New Year. To prevent this occurrence, Hitler orders an all out offensive to re-take French territory and capture the major port city of Antwerp. "The Battle of the Bulge" shows this conflict from the perspective of an American intelligence officer as well as from a German Panzer Commander. Written by Anthony Hughes <husnock31@hotmail.com>
Let's pretend this movie has nothing to do with the battle in Belgium, winter 1944. The movie is only bad if you associate it too much with the real life events, but if you focus on the amazing line-up of actors, special effects, soundtrack, and battle sequences, it becomes a very interesting and entertaining World War II movie. Although compared to more realistic war movies like Patton, this film serves no real educational value. To me it seems like a WWII fan-fiction of some sort, like a "what-if" scenario. The movie would have probably been ridiculed a lot less if it was titled something different (anything but The Battle of the Bulge), therefore people would just assume it's some sort of war sci-fi movie.
Don't let the title fool you; There's only a few things in the whole movie which actually relate to the Ardennes 1944 (i.e., the snow battles, unexpected German spearheads, General McAuliffe & the "nuts" letter, locations in Malmedy, etc.), meanwhile there's no mention of Patton's relief of Bastogne, which was the the event most people associate with the real battle of the bulge in the first place.
Check this movie out if you'd like to see something different from factual movies. It's a small break from reality, and portrayed in a seemingly fictional (but real, technically) campaign in WWII. It's also a great movie if you like all-star casts and A list actors.