RELEASED IN 1962 and directed by several directors, "The Longest Day" chronicles the Normandy invasion by the Allies on June 6, 1944, known as D-Day when American, British and Canadian forces boldly landed on five beaches over a fifty-mile stretch.What's interesting about this classic war flick is that they used Americans to play Americans, Brits to play Brits, Germans to play Germans and French to play French. In addition, each of the segments was shot by five different directors, including the parachuting episodes.The all-star cast includes luminaries like John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, Richard Burton, Robert Ryan, Eddie Albert, Henry Fonda, Red Buttons, Sean Connery, Jeffrey Hunter, Steve Forrest and Roddy McDowall. Furthermore, the opening military percussion-oriented score is superlative. The movie saves the compelling invasion of the Normandy beaches for the last act (unlike the mawkish "Saving Private Ryan," which starts with it).Unfortunately, the movie loses points for the B&W photography, which is inexplicable for such an all-star early 60's blockbuster. There are also some hackneyed or awkward parts, like the scene where a ravishing French woman & her bicycle suddenly appear at the railroad tracks by two skeptical German soldiers. Why Sure! Another arguable problem is that the ambitious scope of the film prevents the story from focusing on any one group of notable characters, which make the proceedings seem like a thrilling docudrama rather than a gripping action/drama.Nonetheless, "The Longest Day" is a must to catch a glimpse of what it was like on D-Day on several fronts, not to mention you get to see the proverbial big picture.THE MOVIE RUNS 2 minutes shy of 3 hours; and was shot in France. WRITERS: Cornelius Ryan with additions by several others.GRADE: B-

"The Longest Day" may be the best historical film ever made about World War II in Europe. It has plenty of action. It gives a wonderful picture, from both sides, of the invasion of Normandy on D-Day. The Allies are anxious and restless as they wait in England for the word to go on June 6, 1944. The Germans are reticent and uncertain, knowing that an invasion was imminent. But when? Where? Finally, all the parts of Operation Overlord play out.The largest armada in the history of the world set sail – more than 5,000 vessels headed across the English Channel for the coast of France. Shortly after midnight, more than 13,000 American paratroops take off for a night jump in the largest airborne assault in history to that time.Few of the Allies met their objectives the first day. Strong winds blew the landing craft east of their target sites. Americans met Germans entrenched with artillery and machine guns on cliffs high above Omaha and Utah beaches. At Gold, Juno and Sword beaches, the British, Canadian and French troops fought house to house in towns along the coast. Most of the airborne drops behind enemy lines were way off target and paratroopers were scattered across a large area. Yet, the Allies gained a foothold, confused and disrupted the enemy, and soon were able to move inland for the drive to defeat Germany.There is nothing about the plot to give away – the story is well known. But the production of this movie– about such a major event in world history, begs a close look for its achievement.The film is based on a book by Irish-American author Cornelius Ryan, who also wrote the screenplay. Ryan had been a war correspondent who was driven to write a book about the world-changing event. After a 1949 visit to Normandy, he began his research and interviewed more than 1,000 D-Day veterans. He finished his novel in 1959, and "The Longest Day: 6 June 1944 D-Day" was a huge best-seller.Daryl Zanuck bought the movie rights for 20th Century Fox. More than a dozen of the senior veterans – American, British, French and German, were consultants on the film. More D-Day veterans were military advisers. The result was a movie that closely followed the real event. The film won two Oscars and had three more nominations for its technical excellence. It had a huge cast that included more than two dozen notable actors of the day – all who gave top performances."The Longest Day" had a $10 million budget – the record for black and white films until "Schindler's List" 30 years later. The film was one of the first to record characters of different nations in their own languages. English subtitles appear in the German and French scenes. The movie was filmed at locations in France, including parachute scenes in Ste. Marie-Eglise. The beach landing scenes were shot on the Ile de Re in the Bay of Biscay off the coast of La Rochelle, France.As with any war film, all of the aircraft and ships couldn't be the originals, or even of the same time period. But Zanuck found Messerschmitts and Spitfires in the air forces of Spain and Belgium, and he rented them for the beach strafing scenes. Only military purists will note the different equipment elsewhere that's not accurate.The scenes of the invasion fleet were filmed in June 1961 during maneuvers of the U.S. Sixth fleet. It was then stationed in the Mediterranean. The film crews shot around the fleet's aircraft carrier because there were no carriers in the Normandy invasion. But 22 ships of the Sixth Fleet were photographed for the movie.The movie opened in France on Sept. 25, in America on Oct. 4, and in Great Britain on Oct. 23. When it came out, I was serving in the 1/504 airborne of the 1st Brigade, 8th Infantry Division at Mainz, Germany. The 2/505 airborne was part of our brigade. I met some of its troopers who had been in the jump scenes for the movie. Ste. Marie-Eglise, France, has an Airborne Museum dedicated to the American paratroopers who helped liberate Normandy. The movie shows a company of the 505 that was slaughtered by the Germans when it was dropped right on the town.Quite a bit is made about John Wayne's age in playing the part of Col. Benjamin Vandervoort, and I agree. By way of comparison to airborne commanders, the ages of most senior military officers are 15 to 20 years older. Those in this film – Allied and German, were mostly in their 50s. And, the actors who played them were very close in age. But, both actors who played the American paratroop leaders were way over age – and looked it. Wayne was 54 when he played his role – twice the actual age of Vandervoort who was 27 at the time. And Robert Ryan, at 52, was 15 years older than the real Brig Gen. James Gavin who was 37 at the time. This is a point worth noting.In the 1945 movie, "Objective Burma," Errol Flynn's character tells an older reporter that the paratroopers, including their officers, have to be young men to stand up to the rigors of airborne missions. "Do you know how old the colonel is in there? Thirty-four. You know how old our commanding general is? Thirty-seven." I appreciate and enjoy John Wayne and Robert Ryan as actors, but this is one time when the roles they played would better have been cast with someone else. Charlton Heston was supposed to have wanted the role that Wayne got. At age 39, he would have been good for either role. But, Paul Newman at 37 would have been just right as Gen. Gavin, and Steve McQueen at 32 would have been ideal as Vandervoort.

" . . . because our glorious Fuehrer has taken a sleeping pill and is not to be awakened," laments a German field marshal around dawn on THE LONGEST DAY. With its peppy theme song desecrated by sappy, upbeat lyrics, this farce is no BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI. The soldiers there had the sense to merely whistle "Colonel Bogie's March," NOT prattle insipid lyrics glossing over unspeakable war-time agonies. Most of the spoken dialogue in THE LONGEST DAY sounds so contrived, pompous, and written 15 years after-the-fact that it seems probable that some of the dimmer bulbs in the cast--such as self-admitted potheads John Wayne and Robert Mitchum--were allowed to ad lib their own lines. With at least 60 speaking parts, most characters (including Henry Fonda's doomed American President's son) get lost in the shuffle, and virtually none merit a movie watcher's attention (no matter how Heroic their Real Life counterparts). If Hitler had had an opportunity to watch this three-hour snooze-fest, he would not have needed to take a sleeping pill in order to nod off! Producer Darryl F. Zanuck apparently was too dense to realize that having FIVE directors on your flick is nothing to crow about. If he wanted to be honest about something, he might have advertised that THE LONGEST DAY was mostly his effort to make his latest mistress--Irina Demich--a movie star, so that he could reap the perks that might come with her gratitude. THE LONGEST DAY is like giving SAVING PRIVATE RYAN a HOGAN'S HEROES makeover. This could well be one of the WORST World War Two pictures of all time!

A largely historically accurate account of D-Day, one of the most important single days of the 20th Century, this is a thrilling and engrossing epic war film of a kind which is sadly not made anymore. Based on the 1959 book of the same name by Cornelius Ryan, it is a stirring tribute to the resourcefulness and bravery of the Allied strategists and combatants who ensured that Operation Overlord was a success. While it only covers the events leading up to the invasion and those of June 6, 1944 itself as to opposed to the rest of the campaign, there is a sense of "a lot done, more to do" as the film draws to a close. The film may be over but the war certainly isn't.The film benefits from a very strong script and is extremely well directed by all concerned in both the quieter character scenes and the wonderfully shot battle scenes. In spite of its multiple directors, the tone of the film is very consistent and, had I not known already from my previous viewing, I would assumed that there had only been one director. The fact that all of the German and French characters speak their own languages rather than English also gives the film a great sense of authenticity. The film is extremely well paced and there was not a minute where I was bored. On the Allied side, D-Day was chiefly depicted from the British and American perspectives but I did like that there was an acknowledgement of some of the other forces involved such as the Canadians, the Free French and the Free Polish. Still, they could have done more with it.There is a terrific sense of tension in the early scenes in which the Allied Forces are waiting to receive the word from General Eisenhower to launch the invasion in spite of the worst weather in the English Channel in 20 years. Eventually, it is decided to give the order as the conditions were unlikely to improve any time soon. There was talk of Eisenhower playing himself in the film but it was decided that he looked too old. The same was true of David Niven. I can't say that I'd really have cared in either case! The prelude to the invasion is also examined from the German perspective with Field Marshals Erwin Rommel and Gerd von Rundstedt, played very well by Werner Hinz and Paul Hartmann respectively, being dismissive of the prospects of invasion due to the poor weather conditions and are consequently caught unawares when it does come. On the German side, the strongest response to the invasion comes from Generals Max Pemsel and Günther Blumentritt, both of whom served as consultants on the film as did Frau Rommel, among others. They were also lucky enough to be played by the two best German actors in the film: Wolfgang Preiss and Curd Jürgens. Preiss later played von Rundstedt himself in "A Bridge Too Far", incidentally.The film has a very big cast which reads like a "Who's Who" of 1960s male film stars and almost all of them get a chance to shine. Richard Burton has a great cameo as the RAF pilot David Campbell, distraught at the death of the only other remaining member of his squadron from the Battle of Britain. He later turns up towards the end of the film after being shot down the previous night. Richard Beymer plays a cocky young private named Dutch Schultz who wins $2,500 gambling as he is waiting to be deployed. However, he has the reality of the situation brought home when he receives rosary beads from his mother. Cast against type, Red Buttons is excellent as Private John Steele, who was trapped on the church tower of Sainte-Mère-Église after his parachute became caught. Robert Mitchum has one of the more substantial roles in terms of screen time as General Norman Cota and gives a great performance as a general who cares about all of the men under his command. Henry Fonda, my favourite actor in the film, has a smaller role as General Teddy Roosevelt, Jr., who lead his troops onto Utah Beach in spite of his severe arthritis and died of a heart attack the following month. Jeffrey Hunter is very good as Sgt. (later Lt.) John H. Fuller, who does not survive the day sadly.At 55, John Wayne, who probably had the biggest role overall, was twice as old as his character Colonel Benjamin Vandervoort was on D-Day but he is nevertheless more suited to the role than he was to that of Genghis Khan in "The Conqueror", the last film that I saw him in. He was certainly not a very good actor but he had a likable screen presence in most of his films and this one was no different. That said, the anguish on his face when he sees the bodies of parachutists who were shot down while attempting to land in Sainte-Mère-Église was the best acting that I have ever seen from him. In a case of art imitating life, D-Day veteran Richard Todd plays his erstwhile superior officer Major John Howard and took part in the assault on Pegasus Bridge as he did in reality. Other than those actors that I have already mentioned, I was impressed by Richard Münch as General Ernst Marcks (who turned 53 on D-Day but did not have a great birthday), Eddie Albert, Sal Mineo, Hans Christian Blech, Peter van Eyck, Roddy McDowall, Mel Ferrer, Rod Steiger, Edmond O'Brien, Kenneth More, Peter Lawford, Sean Connery, Robert Wagner, Georges Wilson, André Bourvil and Irina Demick, who has the best role of any woman in the film as the French Resistance member Janine Boitard.Overall, this is an excellent war film which was deservedly nominated for Best Picture. It may not be on quite the same level as its companion piece "A Bridge Too Far" but it's not far behind either.