With the Allies rapidly approaching Paris, the general in charge of the city is issued with orders by his Führer to prepare plans to destroy the city. Fortunately, von Choltitz (Gert Fröbe) is not convinced that in the face of imminent defeat, this is the right thing to do - so he obeys, but in a rather lacklustre and half-hearted fashion. Meantime, scenting victory, the resistance are starting to make their own plans to seize control of increasingly larger parts of the city ready for the arrival of George Patton's American troops. René Clément has assembled a pretty stellar cast here with Jean-Paul Belmondo, Charles Boyer, Leslie Caron, Alain Delon - a veritable who's who of French cinema supported by brief cameos from Kirk Douglas and Glenn Ford. The problem for me is with the pace of the thing. It's not just that it's fractionally shy of three hours long, it's that it tries to tell the story in too bitty a fashion. We dart about the chronology and geography just a bit too often for the story to have much cohesion and there are simply too many characters for us to keep up with - a little like "The Longest Day" from 1962. It serves as a useful piece of propaganda, though, illustrating that it was to the French that the Nazis surrendered and that they were poised to ease into the civilian government of France as soon as the Swastika fell. As is always the case, the best history is always written by the winners - so I'm not sure just how accurate this is, but at least we know who emerges victorious in the end.
The story centres on a group of teenagers street cast in their neighbourhood and selected to play in a feature film during the summer. The film tells the story of this film shoot and of the connections that will be formed during it.
The story of German minority members who, after escaping from Wehrmacht, form a partisan unit named "Ernst Thalmann" in eastern Croatia. The focus is a family whose members fight on different sides of the barricade.
During World War II, a squad of five American soldiers become lost in Tunisia and are killed one by one in fights with German units. Finally only one man, Private Russo, is left, in the midst of a mine field, together with a German officer, locked in a stalemate. Russo has water, while the German claims to have a map revealing the mine positions. So Russo agrees to swap water for the map, but the German officer tries to double-cross him. This was Burt Topper's debut film, made on 16mm on weekends together with some friends in Indio, California. It was also Wally Campo's debut film, as well as script supervisor Joyce King's.
Irena Sendler is a Catholic social worker who has sympathized with the Jews since her childhood, when her physician father died of typhus contracted while treating poor Jewish patients. When she initially proposes saving Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto, her idea is met with skepticism by fellow workers, her parish priest, and even her own mother Janina.
Ever since she broke up with Nigel, Lena soldiers on through life as best she can with her two kids. She valiantly overcomes the obstacles put in her way. But she has yet to confront the worst of them: Her unstoppable family has decided, by any means necessary, to make her happy.
After handing in a report on the treatment of Chinese colonial labor, Kaji is offered the post of labor chief at a large mining operation in Manchuria, which also grants him exemption from military service. He accepts, and moves to Manchuria with his newly-wed wife Michiko, but when he tries to put his ideas of more humane treatment into practice, he finds himself at odds with scheming officials, cruel foremen, and the military police.
Oscar François de Jarjayes was born female, but her father insisted she be raised as a boy as he had no sons. She becomes the captain of the guards at Versailles under King Louis XVI and Marie Antonette. Her privileged, noble life comes under fire as she discovers the hard life of the poor people of France. She is caught up in the French Revolution, and must choose between her loyalty and love.
Living through the air raids of the German Luftwaffe in 1940, a little boy, Paul, tries to explain to himself what’s happening to the city during the nights he’s taking shelter down in the London Underground.
Mexican American Rodolfo P. Hernandez faced death along the 38th parallel, earning a Congressional Medal of Honor for valor during the Korean War. A story of heroism, perseverance and service, Hernandez proved that even in the most dire circumstances a wounded soldier can accomplish his mission and go on to greater service as a veteran.