Wuchak RELEASED IN 1968 and directed by Edward Dmytryk & Duilio Coletti, "Anzio" (aka "The Battle of Anzio") chronicles the uneventful Allied amphibious landing at Anzio, Italy, in late January, 1944. While a reconnaissance detail offers evidence that there's no serious enemy opposition in the 30 miles between Anzio and Rome, the commander (Arthur Kennedy) inexplicably decides to dig-in, which provides Field Marshal Kesselring (Wolfgang Preiss) the opportunity to marshal his troops against the invasion. This prolongs their capturing Rome until early June.Winston Churchill was dissatisfied with this, commenting "I had hoped we were hurling a wildcat into the shore, but all we got was a stranded whale." The movie focuses on a war correspondent (Robert Mitchum) who accompanies a small group of Rangers who patrol the Italian countryside and are ambushed at the Battle of Cisterna and try to make it back. The soldiers are played by Earl Holliman, Peter Falk, Reni Santoni, et. al.The movie's based on real events, but you can tell that the writers pandered to the audience in light of some of the contrived dialogues, e.g. General Lesley quoting Churchill at the end (Lesley, of course, representing the real-life General Lucas). Another negative is the incongruent soundtrack and score, most notably the opening song by Jack Jones, "The World is Yours." Yet it could be argued that this lends the movie a unique charm.Some armchair critics complain that the movie should have focused more on The Battle of Anzio, as far as the invading Allies fighting Kesselring's counterattack, but that's here to a point (since all the events fall under the umbrella of that battle) and I think they came up with an innovative way to condense 4.5 months into a fairly compelling two hour flick.THE MOVIE RUNS 117 minutes and was shot entirely in Italy (Naples, Caserta & Rome). WRITERS: H.A.L. Craig (et. al) from Wynford Vaughan-Thomas's book. ADDITIONAL CAST: Robert Ryan has a small role.GRADE: B-

Leofwine_draca THE BATTLE FOR ANZIO is about as unexciting a war epic as you can get: an overblown (produced by Dino de Laurentiis), overlong US-Italian co-production, it fails to ignite the screen with any kind of energy, excitement or drive despite dealing with an interesting theatre of the Second World War. The first third is particularly gruelling, an almost plot less introduction to the leading characters before they head off to war, full of drunken partying and over-running scenes of people flirting and talking, all portrayed in the most boring way possible. Once we arrive in Italy, the next two thirds quickly change and the film degenerates into yet another men-on-a-mission type flick of which the Italians were so fond in the wake of THE DIRTY DOZEN.I was a little surprised to find out that such a supposedly epic film had turned into the usual low key story concerning guys trapped behind enemy lines. The budget isn't very evident anyway, with disappointing set-piece battles and only a few shoot-outs that manage to raise the pulse. The script is rather sub-par, throwing in the usual anti-war messages yet topping off with a cheesy happy ending in any case, and many of the characters are interchangeable aside from the leading duo. The young actors (Thomas Hunter, Giancarlo Giannini, Mark Damon, Anthony Steel) don't have a chance to shine and pointless cameos from the likes of Arthur Kennedy fail to register. Bob Mitchum and Peter Falk are typically good value for money but they're given particularly dull characters to work with here. THE BATTLE FOR ANZIO is definitely a war film that deserves to be forgotten.

Theo Robertson It's always a bad sign when a film's theme tune sounds nothing like the genre it's claiming to be . THE BAT for example features a funky jazz tune and boy was that film a pile of rodent droppings and alarm bells started ringing when the opening credits of ANZIO started where a war weary corespondent played a very possibly drunk Robert Mitchum marched through a military HQ to the sounds of a Frank Sinatra style swing song ! Yeah there's nothing quite like a war film to get you on your feet grooving away , bah bah bah bah bah bah bah ANZIO isn't an awful film but it's far from being a great one either with the script being the major problem . It opens one of those light hearted scenes of with over paid , over sexed and over confident US soldiers that we've seen far too many times before . I guess it's supposed to be amusing but it's not . Eventually the film lives up to its title and shows us what went wrong at the Anzio landings with the American generals Clark and Lucas not driving inland quick enough . This is a fairly good history lesson since it paints a fairly poor picture of American leadership in Italy . Remember in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN , BAND OF BROTHERS and A BRIDGE TOO FAR Monty is painted as possibly the most incompetent allied General of the war ? This was nothing compared to the ridiculous mistakes made by Clark and Lucas during the Italian campaign , though somewhat cowardly this film renames Clark as " Carson " and Lucas as " Lewis " which is a great pity because a history student could do worse than watch this film , though if they did they'd notice like a great number of war films made during this period ( BATTLE OF THE BULGE is a good example ) that both German and American tanks are from a different generation but the Anzio landings here are more accurate than the ones seen in PINK FLOYD THE WALL After this the narrative then sadly settles down into a straightforward war film where the action could basically have taken place anywhere like France or the Phillipines where a bunch of GIs are surrounded by the enemy and have to make it back to enemy lines . As many people have pointed out on these pages the script is rather unfocused and slightly disjointed and I had a gut feeling that some of it ended up on the cutting room floor , for example we see the platoon escape from a house at night and almost immediately after the platoon are trapped by some German snipers in the middle of the day , though to be honest this isn't a movie that is afraid to kill off characters so deserves some credit alongside the historical accuracy

JerryCantrell Dull at times, but it get's the job done. Over acting done on Peter Falk's part.I had the opportunity to watch this film on Digital Cable this morning. I took the chance as it was a war film I had not gotten to see yet. It has some decent action, but was rather dull at times. I may be mistaken, but it also appeared that during the ambush scene, the German's were using Bren light machine guns (wth). Perhaps I am wrong, but it I don't believe the MG-42 or 34 or had top loaded clips.Still worth a watch if you got time to kill though. Just don't expect a masterpiece.