The Night of the Generals (1967)

User Rating:

7.3/10   

Director:

Anatole Litvak

Writers:

Joseph Kessel (adapted for the screen by) and
Paul Dehn (adapted for the screen by) ...

Release Date:

24 February 1967 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Mystery | Thriller | War

Tagline:

A unique manhunt across the capitals of Europe... across three decades up to today!

Plot:

The murder of a prostitute in Nazi occupied Warsaw draws Wehrmacht Major Grau into an investigation...

Plot Keywords:

Warsaw | General | Prostitute | Murder | Paris

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Peter O'Toole	...	General Tanz
Omar Sharif	...	Major Grau
Tom Courtenay	...	Corporal Hartmann
Donald Pleasence	...	General Kahlenberge
Joanna Pettet	...	Ulrike
Philippe Noiret	...	Inspector Morand
Charles Gray	...	General von Seidlitz-Gabler
Coral Browne	...	Eleanore von Seidlitz-Gabler
John Gregson	...	Colonel Sandauer
Nigel Stock	...	Otto
Christopher Plummer	...	Field Marshal Rommel
Juliette Gréco	...	Juliette (as Juliette Greco)
Yves Brainville	...	Liesowski
Sacha Pitoëff	...	Doctor (as Sacha Pitoeff)
Charles Millot	...	Wionczek

Also Known As:

La nuit des généraux (France)
Tank Force (Philippines: English title)

Runtime:

148 min

Country:

UK | France

Language:

English | Italian | Spanish | French

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Iceland:16 | Norway:16 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Spain:18 | Sweden:15 | UK:A (original rating) (cut) | USA:PG | West Germany:16 | UK:15 | Netherlands:MG6

Filming Locations:

Hamburg, Germany

Company:

Horizon Pictures (II)

Trivia:

The character of General Tanz was influenced by the career and reputation of real life Panzer officer Joachim Peiper, the youngest man in the Nazi Army to be make the rank of full colonel (SS-Standartenführer, the direct SS equivalent to an Oberst or full colonel in the German army). Peiper -- a protégé of 'Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler', the head of the Schutzstaffel (SS) and the second most powerful man in Germany after Adolf Hitler -- was promoted to the ran at the age of 29. It was Peiper's unit of the Waffen-SS, Kampfgruppe Peiper of the 1st SS Division, Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler (German for "Adolf Hitler's Bodyguard Regiment") that was responsible for the Malmedy massacre of American prisoners depicted in the earlier film Battle of the Bulge (1965) (where a character directly based on Peiper was played by Robert Shaw. After the War, he was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to death. The sentence was commuted by the American Occupation Force as the trial had been fraught with illegalities, and he served only 11 years in prison, despite having perpetrated war-crimes on both the Eastern and Western fronts. Peiper -- who was still living at the time the film was shot -- was assassinated at his home in France, likely by French communists, in 1967, the year the movie was released.

Goofs:

Factual errors: General Tanz is portrayed as having commanded the Nibelungen division of the Waffen SS and later attends a reunion with banners/shields saying it was founded in 1940. However, the Nibelungen was formed barely one month before the end of the war in 1945.

Quotes:

Major Grau: That maniac is blowing up half the city!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Taxidi sta Kythira (1984)

Soundtrack:

ALTE KAMERADEN (OLD COMRADES)

Dramas in the drama

"Night of the generals" is big Anglo-French production of 1966, which talks about dramatic facts in a dramatic period (World War II). Two prostitutes are assassinated (in Poland and in France respectively) by a mysterious killer. A colonel of the German army (Omar Sharif) investigates and suspects three generals -two of them (Charles Gray and Donald Pleasence) are involved in a plot to kill Hitler, the other one (Peter O'Toole) is the most crazy and dangerous-. Twenty years later the same French inspector (Philippe Noiret) who helped Sharif in the inquiry faces another case of a murdered prostitute, the crime is executed in the same way as the previous ones...

This film is excellent. With a supercast (O'Toole, Sharif, Pleasence, Gray, Courtenay, Noiret) director Anatole Litvak directs a classic, a masterpiece. This film, maybe, is not as famous and as remembered as it should be... It deserves to be rediscovered, thanks to the recent DVD release.