Escape en Atenas

It's really tough to make a comedy out of a POW movie, and it's even tougher to make the most predominant Nazi character likable. Somehow, Escape to Athena manages to do both.

Elliott Gould and Stephanie Powers are American entertainers, taken to the famous Stalag 17 prison camp, where veteran residents David Niven, Sonny Bono, and Richard Roundtree show them the ropes. It turns out, the gang is only pretending to behave and cozy up to their captors; they're involved in a secret plot to liberate the camp, with outside help from Telly Savalas and Claudia Cardinale. By far, my favorite part of the movie is when Elliott and Stephanie arrive. They walk past some prisoners outside in the fenced yard, and Elliott gives a double-take to William Holden. "You're still here?" he asks, referencing Bill's Oscar-winning performance in 1953's Stalag 17.

Even though the movie can feel a little strange at times-Roger Moore plays a Nazi and he frequently jokes around with the POWs, and he treats Stephanie like a girlfriend instead of a prisoner-it's actually pretty good. There are some tense moments when the gang takes steps in their master plan of escape, and there are some pretty cute moments of camaraderie. If this type of quirky comedy appeals to you, you'll probably like it. It's not one I'll watch over and over again, but I did enjoy it.

Films about the Second World War were highly popular in the British cinema throughout the fifties and sixties, but by the time "Escape to Athena" was made at the end of the seventies the genre was beginning to run out of steam. The film could be described as a sort of "Guns of Navarone" meets "Colditz". Like the former, it is set on a German-occupied Greek island, and like the latter it concerns the attempts of a group of Allied prisoners to escape from a prisoner of war camp. The prisoners, however, are not merely concerned with escaping. They also plan to make a raid on a nearby monastery in order to loot a collection of priceless Byzantine golden plates. The local Greek Resistance are also interested in the monastery, because the Nazis are using it as a base for the V2 rockets with which they hope to defeat any Allied attempt to liberate the island.

One unusual thing about the film is that it features a "good German", although both the noun and the adjective need to be given a fairly wide definition. Major Otto Hecht, the commandant of the prison camp, is Viennese by birth, and therefore only German by virtue of the 1938 Anschluss between Germany and Austria. In civilian life he was an antique dealer, and he is not above using his military position to loot antiquities which he ships to relatives in Switzerland, hoping to sell them at a profit after the war. In wartime, however, embezzlement of this nature is a minor offence compared with the other crimes of the Nazis, and the comparatively liberal Hecht is repelled by the brutality of some of his comrades such as the fanatical SS Major Volkmann (played by Anthony Valentine who had played a very similar role in the early seventies British TV serial "Colditz"), and has no difficulties about throwing his lot in with the prisoners he is supposedly guarding.

The other characters are something of a mixed bunch. We have David Niven going through the motions as an upper-class English archaeologist, Telly Savalas as a Resistance leader, Richard Roundtree as a black American POW and Sonny Bono as an Italian marooned on the wrong side after his country switched sides in the war. The war film is normally a male-dominated genre, although this one has rather more glamour than normal, with Claudia Cardinale as a Greek prostitute and Stefanie Powers as a swimmer turned actress (presumably based on Esther Williams), one of two American entertainers captured by the Germans, the other being Elliott Gould's Jewish comedian.

It was a surprise to see Roger Moore playing something other than an Englishman, although it must be said that he does not make a convincing German. This film came halfway through his reign as 007, and he sounds much the same as he did when playing James Bond, making only the most perfunctory attempt at a foreign accent. As in some of his less successful Bond films he just seems content to stroll through the film without putting any great effort. To be fair, however, the same could be said of most of the rest of the cast. One wonders if they signed up merely in order to spend a few months in the Greek sunshine. Niven, for example, too old in his late sixties to be taking a leading role in an action film like this, seems even more laid-back than Moore.

If the cast seem uninspired, that is possibly because they are dealing with a very uninspiring script. The film's occasional attempts to blend humour with action (mostly involving Gould's character) tend to fall flat. "Escape to Athena" is very much an average war adventure, or even a below average war adventure, with little to set it apart from all the other indifferent war films that had appeared on both sides of the Atlantic over the preceding few decades. 4/10

I happened across this film at a used video sale, saw the cast list and immediately bought it. I mean, Sonny Bono AND Richard Roundtree? Cosmotos did a bang up job of translating the James Bond formula to the 1940's (though with the ocassional anachronism -- the word "groovy," Bono's haircut). And what a motorcycle chase! I'm not a chase fan, but this one is on par with some of the greats. Just enough stuff to keep the jaded fan amazed.

Roger Moore is the Austrian commandant of a German POW camp located in the Grecian Isles in Escape to Athena. He's got a couple of favorites among the prisoners, an Italian cook in Sonny Bono, an archaeologist in David Niven and a black GI magician in Richard Roundtree. In addition USO entertainers Elliott Gould and Stefanie Powers are shot down in their transport plane and become Moore's prisoners.

Moore really hasn't got his heart in the commandant business. He's an antique dealer in civilian life and he relishes the assignment only because of the location where he's also involved in Adolph Hitler's looting of Greek antiquities of which there are many in that area. Niven and company aid him because if they didn't they'd be in the hands of the SS. STill they want there freedom.

Which they get when they join with resistance leader Telly Savalas and his mistress, bordello madam Claudia Cardinale. It's rumored there's a lot of hidden loot in a monastery on a nearby hill, whatever Moore hasn't taken for his own private stock for after the war. But Savalas is interested in some prototype V2 rockets located there.

Escape to Athena mixes the plot elements of The Guns of Navarone and Topkapi, but they're not stirred too well. The scenery is quite nice and I'm sure the prospect of some paid time in the Aegean Sea might have been a big inducement for all these people signing on for the movie.

As he was involved with Stefanie Powers at the time, William Holden gets a small unbilled cameo in a brief scene with Elliott Gould. As it turns out Moore's Prison Camp is also Stalag XVII. That might have been part of the package for Stefanie to go to Greece.

It was also plain dumb to make Richard Roundtree a black GI. Americans were not involved in that theater, let alone black soldiers. Now if they had made his character be part of the African colonial troops of the British Empire, it would have made more sense. Then again we couldn't have heard Roundtree call a German soldier a 'cool cat'.

The action sequences are done well enough, but the cast here just collected their paychecks and walked through the parts.

This WWII movie takes place on somewhere in Greek islands during 1944 , a misfit prisoners group(a stoic David Niven,a two-fisted Richard Roundtree, among them) are scheming escape from the concentration camp and at the same time the robbing in an Ortodox monastery at the top of the island's mountain. At the bunch appear a distinguished David Niven(whose son David Niven Jr is producer), an Italian cook(Sonny Bono), a member of the Greek Resistance(Telly Savalas), a prostitute( beautiful Claudia Cardinale) and among Nazis are a former Viennese art merchant(likable Roger Moore) and a cruel Nazi(Anthony Valentine).The gentleman Nazi officer Moore is stuck with the outfit of goof-offs as they search for the Greek treasure.

Basically an amusing action filled /wartime/and comedy set during WWII. It's a crossover among the rogue soldiers from ¨The Kelly's heroes(Brian G Hutton)¨, the getaway from ¨The great escape(John Sturges)¨ and the humor included in ¨Hogan's heroes¨ taking parts here and there. This wartime picture which is short in realism instead we have far-fetched but moving blow up, shoot'em up, fighting , it should please most adventure-action-comedy buffs.Middling screenplay by the prestigious Edward Anhalt.Some characters aren't credible in 1944 setting , neither the Nais soldiers dressed in black when parade along with the secret German rocket installation.Roger Moore is miscast as an Nazi official and Elliott Gould as a hippie-alike sound embarrassing. Cameo by William Holden as prisoner smoking a cigar in prison camp and he appears uncredited. Luminous and shimmer photography by Gilbert Taylor. Stirring and military musical score by Lalo Schifrin. This improbable motion picture is professionally directed by George Pan Cosmatos. Although the movie has some aspects a little tough to take , this caper film still has its moments.This large-scale and lavishly produced pic attempts a bemusing atmosphere with regular results.