A forgotten masterpiece of war cinema, the 1977 epic A Bridge Too Far, has been resurrected for modern audiences with its debut on Amazon Prime Video in the UK.
Directed by the legendary Richard Attenborough, this monumental film brings to life the story of Operation Market Garden during World War II and was previously released on the American version of the streaming service last October.
The star-studded cast includes Sir Michael Caine, Sir , Sir Anthony Hopkins, James Caan and , portraying soldiers involved in the daring but ultimately unsuccessful mission to hasten the end of the war in 1944 by capturing strategic bridges in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands.
The release of A Bridge Too Far on Prime Video UK is serendipitously timed, coinciding with the 80th anniversary of the Allied victory in World War II and just two months away.
Simon Lewis, author of Making A Bridge Too Far, praised the film as “top of the class of all the sprawling historical war epics. It conveys the facts and the history with painstaking economy and fastidious fidelity to authenticity, almost without parallel”.
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Left to right: Gene Hackman, Ryan O’Neal, Sir Michael Caine, Edward Fox and Dirk Bogarde all appeared in the fil (Image: Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images)
The film’s portrayal of the events is both heroic and tumultuous, with Lord Attenborough sparing no effort to maintain historical accuracy.
Bill Goldman, the screenwriter behind the film, expressed his surprise at the epic runtime of nearly three hours. He told the BFI: “Attenborough felt to tell the story correctly a three-hour movie was required. He wasn’t about to ‘-up’ the Battle of Arnhem. This was complicated for me as I had never written a story that long.”
The authenticity extended to the film’s use of real military hardware, with a Falmouth military vehicle museum supplying more than 100 vintage vehicles, and the crew acquiring Sherman tanks, fighter planes, and Dakota transport aircraft, reports .
However, the filming in Deventer stirred emotions among the locals, as Lewis recounted to The Telegraph: “I think the younger residents lapped it up – particularly the younger women. But the older generation struggled with seeing German uniforms on their streets.”
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The film depicted the actions of the Allies during Operation Market Garden (Image: Getty)
The production also faced its share of drama with its stars, including that Sir , a decade removed from his James Bond role, demanded a pay rise after discovering Robert Redford’s substantial salary, leading to a temporary strike. Dirk Bogarde was reportedly discontent with his co-stars’ higher earnings as well.
Despite off-set drama, filming for A Bridge Too Far proceeded smoothly and the film debuted in 1977 to a mixed reception.
Notably, critic Roger Ebert awarded it two out of five stars, describing it as “an exercise in wretched excess… a mindless series of routine scenes [and]… a boringly violent indulgence in all the blood and guts and moans they could find”.
Yet, the film also garnered considerable acclaim. It clinched four of the eight Baftas it was nominated for in 1978, with Edward Fox – father of – bagging Best Supporting Actor. He later told the BFI that “A Bridge Too Far is the one I enjoyed the most” among all his film projects.
Gary Arnold from The Washington Post hailed the film as an “unqualified pictorial achievement”, while The Guardian’s Alex von Tunzelmann in 2009 declared: “A Bridge Too Far is a fantastic historical and cinematic achievement.”
Comedian Al Murray, in his 2013 memoir Watching War Films With My Dad, fondly remembered watching A Bridge Too Far with his father, saying: “It was a really big deal. We didn’t go to the cinema much, and this was a major dad-and-lad event. [It] was a big cinematic event for my father, too; living, as we did, in a village in Buckinghamshire with one bus a week.”