Great Escape

Having cadaverous enormous resources on recapturing Allied prisoners of war (POWs), the Germans move the most located to a new, high-security prisoner of war camp. The commandant, Luftwaffe Colonel von Luger, tells the senior British officer, Group Capt Ramsey, in that respect leave alone be no explodes from this camp. Ramsey replies that it is their duty to try to escape. later on several(prenominal) failed escape attempts on the first day, the POWs settle into the prison camp. Gestapo and SS cistrons bring Squadron loss leader Roger bartlett (RAF) to the camp and deliver him to von Luger.Known as Big X, bartlett is the principal organizer of escapes and Gestapo agent Kuhn orders that he be kept below the most restrictive permanent security confinement, which Col. von Luger, disgusted by the Nazis and the SS, still makes a note of, treating the command with complete contempt. As Kuhn leaves, he warns Bartlett that if he escapes again, he will be shot. Bartlett is and then set with the rest of the POWs, rather than the restrictive holding that Gestapo agent Kuhn had demanded. Locked up with each escape artist in Germany, Bartlett immediately plans the greatest escape attemptedtunnels for breaking out 250 prisoners.The intent is to confuse, confound and harass the rival to the point that as many troops and resources as possible will be wasted on finding POWs instead of being utilise on the front line. Teams argon organized to tunnel, make civilian clothing, regulate documents, procure contraband materials, and prevent guards from discovering their work. public life lieutenant Hendley, an American in the RAF, is the scrounger who finds what the others need, from a camera to clothes and identity cards. Australian quick ships officer Louis Sedgwick, the manuf shapeurer, makes tools such as picks for digging and bellows for pumping air into the tunnels.Flight Lieutenant Danny Velinski and William Willie Dickes are the tunnel kings in charge of making the tunnels. Eric Ashley-Pitt of the purplish Navy devises a method of hiding bags in the prisoners trousers and spread malicious gossip from the tunnels over the camp, under the guards noses. Forgery is handled by Flight Lieutenant Colin Blythe, who becomes to the highest degree blind from intricate work by candlelight. Hendley takes it upon himself to be Blythes guide in the escape. The prisoners work on triad tunnels simultaneously, Tom, Dick and chivvy. Work on Harry and Dick is stopped so that more work can be performed on Tom. The work noise is covered by the prisoner sing led by Flt Lt Cavendish. USAAF Captain Virgil Hilts, The Cooler King, irritates guards with frequent escape attempts and wise behavior. While in the cooler, he befriends a young RAF Flying Officer named Archibald Ives, and the two strike up a plan to escape they are caught while attempting it and returned to the cooler. The experience seems to take a toll especially on Ives, who is close to an emotional breakdown from his time in captivity.While the British POWs enjoy a 4th of July celebration organized by the three Americans, the guards discover tunnel Tom. The mood drops to disappointment and pushes Ives over the edge. He is haggard to the barbed wire that surrounds the camp and, in a final act of desperation, climbs it in view of guards. Hilts runs to stop him but is too late, and Ives is machine-gunned dead more or less the top of the fence. The prisoners switch their efforts to Harry. Hilts, aggrieved by the loss of his friend, agrees to change his plan and scout outside the camp and allow himself to be recaptured.The information he brings keystone is used to create maps showing the nearest town and railway station. stop of the real Harry tunnel (on the other side of the road) showing how it doesnt filter the cover of the trees Entrance of the tunnel Harry showing scale of outdo to far end of tunnel The last part of the tunnel is accurate on the night of the escape, but is 20 feet short of woods which are to provide cover. Danny nearly snaps from claustrophobia and delays those behind him, but is helped by Willie. Seventy-six escape.After attempts to reach neutral Switzerland, Sweden, and Spain, almost all the POWs are recaptured or killed. Hendley and Blythe drop off an airplane to fly over the Swiss border, but the engine fails and they crash-land. Soldiers arrive. Blythe, his sightedness damaged, stands and is shot. Hendley waves and shouts dont shoot, and is captured as Blythe dies. Cavendish, having hitched a ride in a truck, is captured at a checkpoint, discovering another POW, Haynes, captured in his German soldier disguise. Bartlett is acknowledge in a crowded railroad station by Gestapo agent Kuhn.Another escapee, Ashley-Pitt, sacrifices himself when he kills Kuhn with Kuhns own gun, and soldiers then shoot and kill him. In the commotion, Bartlett and MacDonald slip away but they are caught while embarkment a bus after M acDonald blunders by replying in English to a suspicious Gestapo agent who wishes them Good luck. Hilts steals a motorcycle, is pursued by German soldiers, jumps a barbed wire fence but becomes entangle in another and is captured, he escapes execution as a spot by showing them the airforce label on his shirt.Three truckloads of captured POWs go down a country road and split off in three directions. One truck, containing Bartlett, MacDonald, Cavendish, Haynes and others, stops in a field and the POWs are told to get out and stretch their legs. They are shot dead. In all, liter escapees are murdered. Hendley and nine others are returned to the camp. Von Luger is relieved of command of the prison camp and is driven away by the SS for failing to prevent the breakout. just now three make it to safety. Danny and Willie steal a rowboat and proceed downriver to the Baltic coast, where they board a Swedish merchant ship.Sedgwick steals a bicycle, then rides hidden in a freight train bo xcar to France, where he is guide by the Resistance to Spain. Hilts is brought back alone to the camp and taken to the cooler. Lieutenant Goff, one of the Americans, gets Hiltss baseball and glove and throws it to him when Hilts and his guards pass by. The guard locks him in his prison cell and walks away, but momentarily pauses when he hears the familiar sound of Hilts bouncing his baseball against a cell wall. The film ends with this scene, under the caption,