Pluskylang Great Film overall

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

bkoganbing For reasons I can't explain The Victors seems to have disappeared from circulation. Lucky I got to see it on YouTube for the first time in over 40 years. Probably for the first time since V-J Day an American World War II film showed some of our GIs as less than noble characters.The Victors follows a platoon of GIs from Sicily to post war Berlin in one case. The main players are George Peppard and George Hamilton and their sergeant Eli Wallach. All three turn in sterling performances and Wallach should have gotten consideration for an Oscar. Some of the others in the cast are Vincent Edwards, James Mitchum, Peter Fonda and playing a special role based on Private Eddie Slovik is Michael Callan.Unlike other war films this has a substantial female cast showing the women of Italy, France and then Germany struggling to survive in war torn countries. Melina Mercouri plays a French club owner who seduces Peppard into bed and black market. Senta Berger and Elke Sommer play a pair of German sisters who are milking their occupiers for the necessities and a few luxuries both American and Russian. Romy Schneider plays a young French girl with a talent for music and reluctant entertaining.Soldiers pretty much behave as these guys do for thousands of years. Their battle deeds may be heroic, but they have their needs that deeds don't quite satisfy unless you get a charge out of killing.Screenwriter Carl Foreman directed as well as wrote the screenplay adapted from a British novel. These same characters were British in the book. Novice director Foreman got great results from his ensemble cast.We should all hope this comes out on DVD soon.

raven_1-1 This is a truly excellent film and is perhaps the greatest American war film ever made; a soldier's version of The Cruel Sea, where the relentless frightfulness of the war grinds down the participants humanity to a degree they never imagined possible.Too many war films portray some inane gung-ho spirit (any John Wayne film; Where Eagles Dare) or too much manufactured pathos (e.g. any John Wayne film; Saving Private Ryan)to be truly saddening; but The Victors really tears at the heart and mind when showing how ordinary people (soldiers and civilians) are emotionally damaged by the war (e.g. the dog scenes or the violinist's actions that starts the erosion of George Hamilton's basic decency)and we care about their fate or cry at what they become (actually I only felt tears for the final dog scene, but really identified emotionally with Hamilton when he saw the violinist with the oafish soldier).The viewer is given no easy consolation by characters dying to save others or marrying that desolate woman, and will emerge from the film a little sadder, but wiser. I cannot recommend this film too highly.As an amusing (ish) and friendly aside, I have worked out how manufacturers of American helmets could have saved manufacturing costs! How? Easy.......just dispense with the chin straps because no American soldier ever appears to use them in any film I have ever seen and the helmet stays on under all and any conditions!!!

johnnie0168 This movie is an excellent example of a how a mediocre cast can produce an outstanding movie in the hands of the right director. To get performances like this from the likes of George Peppard, George Hamilton, Michael Callan and Vince Edwards is a great testament to the skills of Carl Foreman. Throw in outstanding screen writing (also Foreman) and one could argue that this movie is pretty much the work of one man. It is a starkly realistic war movie that neither glorifies nor condemns war, but only makes a statement of those involved in it. Basically a series of vignettes, separate but intertwining stories of a group of men in Europe. The loves and the hates, the frailties and strengths, the deceiving and the deceived - the gamut of emotions making up the human condition are all part of this underrated masterpiece. In this way it should - unlike your typical war movie - appeal to women every bit as much as men.

inspire_wisdom This war film was very great for one thing a)It shows the contribution of Indians(sub-continent) and African soldiers from the British Army and African-Americans fighting for freedom of Europe in World War 2.My grand-uncle from Nigria(West Africa) fought with the British Army as an African in North Africa and Southern Italy.I thank the film director of this great film for showing these minor characters and the historical truth of World War 2 whereby other races from Africa and Asia contributed to Europe's freedom.Most of the Western Nations intellectuals have swept the contributions of black and Indians in World War 2 under the carpet.To prove my facts visit southern Italy and especially the old people of the southern Italian towns and they will tell you the number of black and Indian peoples that gave their life trying to free their towns from the Nazis.