SILVER

After its release in 1977, U.S. audiences ignored CROSS OF IRON, perhaps unsure how to relate to German soldier protagonists on the Eastern Front of World War II who fight not only Russians but also their abusive commanding officers. But CROSS OF IRON was a critical and commercial success across Europe. James Coburn plays the coolly competent Sergeant Rolf Steiner, respected by all in the battalion. Maximilian Schell is the grasping Captain Stransky, callously endangering his men in a misguided pursuit of military honors. Orson Welles telegrammed Peckinpah to praise CROSS OF IRON as the best antiwar film since ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT in 1930, fellow filmmaker Quentin Tarantino cited it as an influence on INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS and lead Coburn called it one of his personal favorites, along with another Peckinpah film PAT GARRETT & BILLY THE KID. DIR Sam Peckinpah; SCR Julius J. Epstein, James Hamilton, Walter Kelley, from the novel “The Willing Flesh” by Willi Heinrich; PROD Wolf C. Hartwig, Arlene Sellers, Alex Winitsky. UK/West Germany, 1977, color, 132 min. RATED R