Had this film on VHS tape, and it's quality was so-so. Just bought the new MGM DVD of The One That Got Away and it's a great improvement. The opening scene of Von Werra crashing his Me-109 was re-created real well. The side marking are just like in the old war photos. One small blooper on the full size crash mock-up of the Me-109: Von Werra opens the canopy and gets out...on the right side. All Me-109 canopies were hinged on the right side, forcing the pilot to get out on the left side. On a historical note, the British wanted Von Werra back because he knew too much of the British methods of De-briefing German pilots, and that the British had broken the Luftwaffe fighter codes. On returning to Germany, with Von Werra's help, the Luftwaffe changed their codes, and set up and copied the same methods the British used for De-briefing shot down aircrews. A special camp was set up at Oberusel(just outside Frankfurt). All Allied aircrew were first sent there before they went to a air force POW camp.Von Werra died shortly after taking off, and flying over the North Sea. His wingman noted sudden smoke, and the plane went straight into the sea. There was a problem with the engines on the new Me-109G models, and a number of German pilots lost there lives as a result.

I occasionally found this movie in a DVD-sold-out for just 1,99 Euro - not a big risk to buy it, I thought. The movie is more or less unknown in Germany. Used to the British/American stereotype "The Ugly Nazi-Kraut"-productions of that area I was surprised to watch an movie which tells its story in a "neutral", adventurous and partly documentary-like style.

The film makes a difference between "Nazi" and "German soldier" (that is something many people from Britain or the US doesn't realise until today) - but of course one should not forget that many German soldiers were Nazis indeed. On the other hand, have all allied soldiers been "democratic heroes", fighters against racism or defenders of the Genevea Convention? Unfortunaltey not.

Other commentators have pointed out the pros and cons of the story so I'd like to write something more on the main actor Hardy Krüger and why he was the - so to say - ideal cast for the role of OLt. Fritz von Werra. Krüger himself belongs to a generation of "normal people" which more or less automatically became involved in the NS-system.

Hardy Krüger, born in Berlin 1928 (he is not Dutch!) grew up in Nazi-Germany. He seemed to be a typical boy of that area and surely he was intelligent and had outstandingly talents. 1941 he entered the Adolf-Hitler-School in Sonthofen, an elite school to be prepared for a leading position in the Nazi-regime.

1943/44, at the age of 15, he got his very first role in the UFA-production "Junge Adler" (Young Eagles), a NS-propaganda movie to inspire the youth for service in the Wehrmacht/Luftwaffe. During the making of this movie he met other UFA-actors who had helped Jews to escape and which opened him the eyes for the real intentions of the Nazi regime.

The end of the war 1945 Hardy Krüger survived as a soldier of the German mechanized infantry division "Brandenburg" and became POW of the Americans.

After the war Krüger started his career as an actor. In many films he represented the type of the charming, boyish and a little bit gruff young man. Later he was one of the very few German actors in the 60/70ies who worked in international productions, eg Un Taxi pour Tobrouk (Taxi to Tobruk with Lino Ventura), Hatari (with John Wayne), Flight of the Phoenix (w. James Steward), The Wild Geese, Barry Lyndon, A Bridge too Far and many more.

This is one of several classic British war films made during the 1950s, but which I never had the opportunity to watch before: in retrospect, it has survived better than some of the others because the central character is not English and, therefore, such stiff-upper-lip sentiments are kept largely at bay throughout; the fact that he's actually a German who's portrayed as a resourceful - even charming - scoundrel rather than the stereotypical Nazi villain, makes the film all the more interesting when viewed today!

It details the exciting true-life escape story of ace pilot Franz von Werra (an ideally cast Hardy Kruger in his first international role) from several British prison camps in 1940; ironically, he was lost at sea not long after having reached Germany and resumed his war duty! The plot is basically split into three sections: the first establishes von Werra's defiance of authority and his resolve to break free from confinement - culminating with his initial escape attempt; transferred to a new camp, we immediately see him at work on building a tunnel - this time, he's part of a mass breakout and, by impersonating a Dutch flyer, almost manages to take off with a plane belonging to the R.A.F.!; finally, he leaps off a train transporting him to a Canadian prison and, bravely enduring the freezing weather, makes it across the border by boat into the still neutral U.S.A.

Absorbing and suspenseful, this is an excellent example of its type and period, with all the care that professional handling could bestow; above all, the quality of Eric Cross's black-and-white cinematography is most evident during the scenes of hardship in von Werra's various getaways. While this is Hardy Kruger's show all the way, the supporting cast highlights numerous minor staples of British cinema from this era, namely Michael Goodliffe, Alec McCowen, Terence Alexander and John Van Eyssen.

Ultimately, the best compliment I can pay to the film is perhaps that it makes for a worthy companion piece to Robert Bresson's inspirational A MAN ESCAPED (1956; one of the greatest of all films) and Andrew L. Stone's very funny THE PASSWORD IS COURAGE (1962) - both also dealing with the story of true-life P.O.W. escapees - although THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY is, in hindsight, neither as introspectively solemn as the former nor as gently humorous as the latter. In any case, I've watched and thoroughly enjoyed a good many contemporaneous British war films (THE CRUEL SEA [1953], THE COLDITZ STORY [1954], THE DAM BUSTERS [1954] and ICE COLD IN ALEX [1958], to name but a few); there are, however, quite a few more I need to catch up with - THE WOODEN HORSE (1950), ALBERT R.N. (1953), DUNKIRK (1958), I WAS MONTY'S DOUBLE (1958), DANGER WITHIN (1959), etc.