ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½

Explore the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½
This page has been archived and is no longer updated. Find out more about page archiving.

28 October 2014
GloucestershireGloucestershire

ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½page
»









Sites near Gloucestershire







Related ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Sites


Ìý

Contact Us

The Big Red One: The Reconstruction
15The Big Red One: The Reconstruction (2005)

updated 23 April 2005
reviewer's rating
4 out of 5
Reviewed by Matthew Leyland


Director
Sam Fuller
Writer
Sam Fuller
Stars
Lee Marvin
Mark Hamill
Robert Carradine
Bobby Di Cicco
Kelly Ward
Length
156 minutes
Distributor
BFI
Cinema
29 April 2005
Country
USA
Genre
Action
War
Drama
Classic


"This is fictional life based on factual death": so begins The Big Red One, writer/director Sam Fuller's classic semi-autobiographical account of his WWII tour of duty with the US First Infantry. Originally released in 1980, it's been reconstructed here with 40 additional minutes of footage, fleshing out the experiences of veteran sergeant Lee Marvin and his men, including Griff (Mark Hamill, armed with a rifle instead of a lightsaber) and Zab (Fuller's screen surrogate, played by John Carradine).

These characters aren't your typical war-movie heroes, dazzling us with their derring-do. They're first and foremost survivors, slogging from one incident to the next through North Africa, Sicily, the D-Day landings, and the Falkenau death camp. Yet this bunch of ordinary GI Joes remains vivid. Marvin's stoney-faced portrait of authority commands the screen (even though we learn next to nothing about the nameless sarge), while it's still fascinating to see Hamill wrestle with the dark side of the force's mission: learn to kill, or be killed.

"SOME EPISODES ARE JAW-DROPPERS"

Made for only $4 million, this is an episodic epic, slow-paced and dealing with inactivity as much as action. But the intimacy of Fuller's focus makes this one of the most truthful takes on the realities of combat. And besides, some of those episodes are jaw-droppers: the loony-bin shoot-out, for example, or the Omaha Beach sequence, which holds its own against Saving Private Ryan (despite the differences in age and budget). Like Spielberg's Oscar-winner, this deserves a place in the frontline of World War II flicks - especially in its fuller version.

Find out more about "The Big Red One: The Reconstruction" at



The ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ is not responsible for the content of external websites

Ìý

bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
Get YOUR event listed
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
The Review Archive
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
bullet
CONTACT US

ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Gloucestershire
London Road
Gloucester
GL1 1SW

Telephone (website only):
+44 (0)1452 308585

e-mail:
gloucestershire@bbc.co.uk





About the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ | Help | Terms of Use | Privacy & Cookies Policy
Ìý