Darryl F. Zanuck's movie poster - 1962
I admit, I wasn't expecting the film to be shot in black & white. Both the above poster and the DVD cover are both in colour. However, I think the monochrome worked. The greater part of the movie had no musical background - just occasionally it was heard, for instance as the Allied ships came through the mist. This made it even more impressive. Far too often, music (usually too loud) ruins rather than enhances scenes - the heavy rain was music enough. Another positive, was that the film showed how both sides - Germans and Allies - approached and reacted to events. As for the acting, there was very little need for it! The story-line was enough; in fact, all the best acting came from the German side.
One has got too used to seeing a military-dressed John Wayne, going through the same motions. It was pleasing to spot some of the other actors - Kenneth More in a frightful beard, Sean Connery lumbering up the beachhead, Richard Todd being plucky, Richard Burton trying out his vocal chords (but with the good line: my worries about the Few is that we keep getting fewer.) and Robert Mitchum being the tough guy. It certainly had a huge international ensemble cast: others involved were Henry Fonda, Peter Lawford, Jeffrey Hunter, Stuart Whitman, Rod Steiger, Leo Genn, Curt Jürgens, George Segal, Robert Wagner and Paul Anka. Fonda, Genn, More, Steiger and Todd had seen action as servicemen in the real war - Wayne had not.
Without the useful subtitles, the viewer would soon have got totally confused amongst the many individuals who flashed across the screen in the first half hour. Even then, it was a lost cause trying to remember which German general was which! The multiple scenes documenting the 5-6 June invasion hours were very well done. These included the French Resistance (with the only woman of any importance involved) and the blowing up of a train; the glider landings; the parachute drops - especially the catastrophic results of landing in Sainte-Mère-Ėglise; the U.S. Rangers Assault Group's assault on the Pointe du Hoc; the straffing of the beach by the two Luftwaffe pilots; and the French nuns ignoring the bullets to reach the Allies and nurse them.
The film won two Academy Awards and was nominated for three others. At $10 million dollars, it was the most expensive black and white film up to that time.
2016 DVD
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