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Colonel Von Luger: Are all American officers so ill-mannered?

Hilts: Yeah, about ninety-nine percent.

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Mistakes

When Bartlett is on the run in the town a car containing Germans pulls up near him. Bartlett stops on the pavement but in the next shot he is standing in the middle of the road. See more...

Trivia

David McCallum, whose character is killed at the railway station while trying to escape, says that his daughter Sophie has never been able to watch this movie, "Because she cannot stand the thought of seeing her father shot." See more...

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The Great Escape (1963)

Directed by John Sturges, starring Charles Bronson, David McCallum, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Steve McQueen (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure, Drama, History, Thriller, War

The Great Escape mistakes

Mistake Visible crew/equipment: The first time Hilts (Steve McQueen) is locked up, you can clearly see the edge of the wall, and to the left a stage hand moving.

Mistake Continuity: Check out the memorable scene when Hendley and Blythe, trying to reach Switzerland in a stolen training aircraft, fly over marvellous Castle Neuschwanstein. According to Hendley, they've almost made it, just 20 minutes of flight and one mountain range left to cross. This is quite funny because the Neuschwanstein shot reveals that they're actually flying straight in the wrong direction. The camera faces south, the plane moves from right to left, meaning they're heading east, straight away from the Swiss border which is just 50 kilometers west of the famous castle.

Mistake Continuity: In the scene where Steve McQueen is pulling wire across the road, and attaching the end to the pole to trip up the motorcycle rider you can clearly see two shadows on the ground of Steve in opposite directions due to the camera lights.

More mistakes in The Great Escape

The Great Escape trivia

Mistake Most of the film is based on true events. The only fabricated events were the Fourth of July celebration, the motorcycle scenes (which were added at the request of Steve McQueen), and the theft of a German airplane by Hendley and Blythe.

Mistake While Steve McQueen performed most of his own stunts, the only stunt he didn't perform was the 60 foot jump over the Austrian-Swiss border fence. The jump was performed by stuntman Bud Ekins, who later doubled for McQueen in "Bullitt."

Mistake In the scene following Hilts' theft of a German motorcyle, he rolls into a German town, where he is stopped by a police officer; the officer says something to Hilts, who then kicks him away and rides off. He was asked for identification papers he didn't have.

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The Great Escape quotes

Sedgwick: Danny, do you speak Russian?

Danny: A little, but only one sentence.

Sedgwick: Well, let me have it, mate.

Danny: Ia vas liubliu.

Sedgwick: Ia vas...

Danny: Liubliu.

Sedgwick: Liubliu? Ia vas liubliu. Ia vas liubliu. What's it mean?

Danny: I love you.

Sedgwick: I love you? What bloody good is that?

Danny: I don't know. I wasn't going to use it myself.

Danny: Oh, Hendley. I need a pick. Big, heavy one.

Hendley: Only one?

Danny: Two would be better.

Col. Von Luger: Group Captain Ramsey, in the past four years the Reich has been forced to spend an enormous amount of time, energy, manpower and equipment hunting down prisoner of war officers.

Group Capt. Ramsey: At least it's rather nice to know you're wanted, isn't it?

More quotes from The Great Escape