Download The Guns Of Navarone
Ingrid Abriola
In 1943, the Axis powers plan an assault on the island of Kheros, where 2,000 British soldiers are marooned, to display their military strength and convince neutral Turkey to join them. Rescue by the Royal Navy is prevented by two massive radar-directed large-calibre guns on (fictional) nearby Navarone Island. When aerial bombing efforts fail, Allied Intelligence gathers a commando unit to infiltrate Navarone and destroy the guns. Led by Major Roy Franklin, the team is composed of Captain Keith Mallory, a renowned spy and an officer with the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG); Colonel Andrea Stavros from the Greek Army; Franklin's best friend Corporal Miller, an explosives expert and former chemistry teacher; Greco-American Spyros Pappadimos, a native of Navarone; and "The Butcher of Barcelona" Brown, an engineer and expert knife fighter.
The team splits up: Mallory and Miller go for the guns, Stavros and Spyros create distractions in town (assisted by local residents), and Maria and Brown steal a boat for their escape. Spyros dies in a shootout with a German officer, and Brown is stabbed during the boat theft due to his reluctance to kill a guard. Meanwhile, Mallory and Miller infiltrate the gun emplacement but set off an alarm when they seal the doors behind them. Miller plants explosives on the guns and prepares a large booby trap below an ammunition hoist, with a trigger device set into the track of the hoist. The Germans eventually force entry into the gun emplacement and defuse the explosives planted on the guns; meanwhile, Mallory and Miller make their escape down the cliff and are picked up from the sea by the stolen boat. A wounded Stavros is also able to reach the sea and is helped aboard by Mallory, thus resolving the blood feud between them.
As the Allied destroyers trying to rescue the trapped British troops appear, the Germans open fire at them. When the hoist eventually reaches Miller's trigger, the hidden explosives set off the surrounding shells in a massive explosion, totally destroying the guns and the entire fortress. Mallory's team safely reaches the British convoy. However, Stavros shakes Mallory's hand and decides to return to Navarone with Maria, with whom he has fallen in love. Mallory and Miller, returning home, observe the aftermath of their success from a destroyer.
The film was part of a cycle of big-budget World War II adventures that included The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), The Longest Day (1962) and The Great Escape (1963). MacLean's novel had been a bestseller and was read by Mike Frankovich, head of Columbia Pictures, who became excited as to its cinematic possibilities. He showed it to Carl Foreman, who had written Bridge on the River Kwai and had a producing deal with Columbia, who was not as enthusiastic at first, in part because he knew how difficult making a movie version would be. Foreman eventually changed his mind and agreed to make the movie.[4] The novel had been inspired by the Battle of Leros during the Dodecanese Campaign of World War II but the guns on Leros were 152 mm (6 in), not the huge guns described in the book and the film.[5] The screenplay, adapted by producer Carl Foreman, made significant changes from the novel; these included changing the gender of the local resistance fighters and inventing a conflict between Mallory and Andrea.
Near the beginning of "Force Ten from Navarone," we're treated to selected footage from the original 1961 production. The German soldiers flee once more in panic, the explosives detonate yet once again, the great guns topple, the rock cliffs split open. If you're a fan of the original "Navarone," study these moments intently; they're the only connection between this movie and its namesake.
Just to set things straight: "Force Ten from Navarone" has none of the same characters as "Guns of Navarone," has nothing to do with guns and does not involve an assault on an island. It does, however, end with a gigantic cataclysm caused by sabotage.
That's because the special effects involving the destruction of the dam are really pretty well done. And they're set up with those reliable old clichés from almost all movies involving war and sabotage. How well we know them: First, we get a long shot of the objective (whether it is giant guns or giant dams or giant impenetrable fortresses), and there's appropriately Wagnerian music on the sound track. Then, seen from far away, Nazi soldiers strut back and forth on the parapets. Our heroes, reclining behind rocks and trees, examine the scene with binoculars.
Gregory Peck, Anthony Quinn and David Niven are Allied saboteurs assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers. Blacklisted screenwriter Carl Foreman (High Noon,The Bridge on the River Kwai) was determined to re-establish both his name and credibility after spending most of the 50's working in anonymity. To accomplish this, he decided to bring Alistair MacLean's best-selling novel, THE GUNS OF NAVARONE, to the screen. Supported by an all-star cast and produced on a grand scale, the film was an enormous success, receiving seven 1961 Academy Award nominations (including Best Picture) and winning for Best Special Effects. Although Foreman achieved his goal, it was MacLean who would wind up the true beneficiary; his novels became the source for many high adventure screen epics, including Ice Station Zebra and Where Eagles Dare. However, it is THE GUNS OF NAVARONE that remains not only the best of the MacLean adaptations, but one of the greatest action/adventure spectacles ever produced.
Several of the commandos are seen firing what first appears to be a Sten Mk II submachine gun (modified with a shortened barrel). In reality it is actually a mockup Sten that only shoots flames. Andrea Stavros (Anthony Quinn) uses this "Sten" to kill several German soldiers in the final firefights. Spyros Pappadimos (James Darren) also uses this flame-shooting Sten and kills several Germans and then confronts their officer who also has a mockup Sten gun. (How the officer got one is unknown). The mockup Sten gun is fitted with a small flame device to represent the guns flash (in slow motion you can see that the actors aren't actually pressing the guns trigger in time with the shots). The gun is also poorly constructed: The stock is mounted in such a way the thumb does not go all the way around it due to the presence of two (gas)hoses connected to the rear of the gun itself.
On the fishing boat, Pappadimos keeps a Bren gun hidden under a sail he is mending when the German patrol boat arrives. When the Germans discover who they are, Pappadimos opens fire, tearing a hole in the sail and guns down several sailors. The Bren gun is never seen after that, presumed lost when the fishing boat is smashed on the rocks.
After leading his scrappy team of British Army commandos through Greece, Captain Keith Mallory finds himself at the crucial point of his mission, the infiltration of an enemy fortress on the fictional Navarone Island. Mallory and his team had been briefly detained in Mandrakos, where they turned the table on their Nazi captors and stole the German military uniforms to provide them ideal cover as they sneak into the fortress and disable the guns and, ideally, escape with their lives.
A team of allied saboteurs are assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.
A motley crew of British soldiers and their Greek allies arrive at the island of Navarone, at German-occupied Dodecanese. Their mission is to destroy two large-caliber guns that prevent the fleet from saving 2000 of their comrades that are marooned on a nearby island.
The guns are huge, long-range navel cannons protected by a solid rock mountain. They are being used to pick off Allied navel ships. Previous attempts to destroy the guns by ariel bombardment have failed.
Evil-doerFull NameAnnaAliasNoneOriginThe Guns of NavaroneOccupationSchoolteacher, Greek resistance member, Nazi spyPowers / SkillsSkilled spyHobbyNoneGoalsPrevent the destruction of the German guns on Navarone and undermine the Greek resistanceCrimesNo informationType of VillainTraitor
She and Maria met Captain Keith Mallory's group when they arrived on Navarone to sabotage the guns. She was initially mistaken for a German soldier in the dark and knocked unconscious, but recovered. As the group trekked to Mandrakos to try and find a doctor for the badly wounded Major Roy Franklin, Anna took steps to ensure that they'd be found by German patrols. When she relieved Corporal Miller of his lookout post in a tree, she signaled a passing German airplane, which tipped off the Germans to the commandos' location, prompting Maria to lead the group into a valley and into some caves that cut through to Mandrakos.
While left to guard their stolen German truck, she sabotaged Miller's bombmaking equipment. When Miller discovered this, he knew it had been Anna because she'd been the only one in the truck at the time. The group confronted her, and Andrea Stavros revealed the lack of scars on Anna's back, prompting her to speak for the first time in some years, admitting her betrayal. Mallory demanded to know why she hadn't thrown in with the group, and why she'd continued obeying the Nazis, the very people she claimed she was so afraid of. Anna replied it was because she considered Mallory's mission to destroy the guns doomed from the start. Miller demanded she be executed. Mallory hesitated. As he finally moved to do it, however, Maria stepped forward and gunned down her former friend and ally for her betrayal, shocking everyone.
The installation of huge artillery batteries to protect harbors and coastlines was a prevalent theme in military doctrine leading up to the outbreak of World War II. The behemoth guns were thought to be the greatest deterrent to any naval invasion or attack, but how effective were they during the war?
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