Excellent, smart action film.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

The sixties saw a slew of war films being made focusing on WWII with many that are still considered classics. Both THE GREAT ESCAPE and THE DIRTY DOZEN were made during this time. But with the Vietnam War losing steam and support and more anti-war protests going on it was only a matter of time before the two collided. This was the case with PLAY DIRTY.The war in Africa carries on and the allied forces are doing all they can to bring it to an end. Col. Masters (Nigel Green) has been sending out forays into the area and learning from them while casualties increase among those groups. He believes he has found Rommel's gasoline dump and wants to send in an elite group to take them out. While chastised by his superior Brig. Blore (Harry Andres) he's given the go-ahead and allowed someone who knows about gasoline depots to go along in charge. Once he leaves Blore presents the same concept and takes credit for the plan.Capt. Douglas (Michael Caine) is the unfortunate gas expert to go along. Relatively new to command he's an ex-British Petroleum employee. He meets with Masters and learns what his mission will be. He is accompanied by Capt. Cyril Leech (Nigel Davenport), a ruthless scoundrel more inclined to save his own skin rather than follow through with a mission. Masters agrees to pay Leech 2,000 pounds in return for Douglas' safe return.What follows is a rather lengthy trek across the desert with all that is included there. Sandstorms, an oasis and enemies galore attempt to prevent the motley crew from their goal. Each member of this group has some sordid past to contend with. Among them are murderers, traitors, rapists and a gay Arabian couple which I would think was quite controversial at the time. As proof of how despicable they are when they find a Red Cross truck for the Germans their first thought is to rape the nurse inside. One of the two Arabs stops this with Leech following up.Leech and Douglas have no use for one another. Douglas may not be a battle weary soldier but he knows his duty and follows through. Leech on the other hand is willing to go along until something better comes up. Along the way the combative duo eventually come to terms with their situation.Setbacks happen and problems force the team to rethink what to do next. Communications become impossible when their radio is damaged. Now on their own they continue to complete the mission, completely unaware that circumstances have changed and the higher ups now want the fuel left intact. These same men in charge feel that the task set for Douglas and his team is impossible and have no problem letting them be killed as acceptable losses. As a matter of fact they're counting on it. It isn't until the last portion of the film that the fate of Douglas and all in his command is revealed.I enjoy war movies as well as anyone. I realize that a number of them made during WWII were done as entertainment but propaganda pieces as well. Why would you want to make a war film during wartime that helped the enemy? But movies made following the war still carried on a somewhat patriotic flair to them which is not always a bad thing.The metaphors for the Vietnam War and the anti-war movement of the time had to eventually filter into the movies being made. While some of what happens in here is probably part true the movie at moments feels too over the top in its depiction of top level commanders seeking fame and glory at the expense of those beneath them. There were moments when watching that I wondered just who the bad guys in the story really were.As far as the movie itself is it is slow going. The trek across the desert moves at a snail's pace. The grit of the sand filling every uncovered inch of person and equipment can be felt while watching but the endless stretch of tan and brown doesn't make for exhilarating entertainment. The choice to focus on the two main protagonists of Douglas and Leech leaves the rest of the team relatively unknown with little or no dialogue with their dialogue extremely limited.In the end it was interesting to view from a historic aspect, a movie made against war about war, but I found little else to make me recommend this film to anyone but die hard WWII movie fans and Michael Caine fans. It's not something I'd go back to revisit.Twilight Time has released the film with their standard of perfection when it comes to the picture quality. Extras are limited to an isolated music and effects track and the original theatrical trailer. As with all Twilight Time releases copies are limited to just 3,000 copies so if you're interested make sure you get one before they're gone.

This is a film that has escaped my attention for the best part of 50 years. Until i met this film on budget DVD. Based around the famed British elite desert force of World War 2 the LRDG Long Range Desert Group the early forerunner to the SAS. The original special force. And set during the Monty Vs Rommel battles of late 1943. Here history stops and the films Counter Culture, Vietnam era, Anti Establishment, Anti heroism, Anti War, remember the "Ban the Bomb" protests & the late seventies swing to all things on the political LEFT! Drop out, Doped up and swinging on to free love time? Well i do, and well.From this historic era PLAY DIRTY was made. Yet, the film disguises its populist sentiments more or less until 60 seconds from the end, when BANG! - Boy did i not see that coming. Very well made despite a troubled production history, the original director and top star both dropped out at the last moment and a novice director then took over. The superb production values are excellent with authentic arms, uniforms and vehicles, the film is top from almost every aspect apart from the awful depiction of all things British Army. Rather insulting in reality to view through today's eyes. None the less this is a secret classic war film and classic ERA film it could OH SO, only of been made in 1969.Well worth a look, for lovers of the films from the 60's and even WW2 gender fans.

I generally like Michael Cain so when I saw that he was in this movie I became interested enough to watch it yesterday on Cine+ Classic. Well, Michael Cain was making a good performance in it but that was pretty much the only good thing about the movie. It starts of pretty promising but as soon as the actual mission starts it all goes downhill.Both Michael Cain and Nigel Davenport make good performances in the roles they were given. The rest are mostly there to fill up the scenes. The movie blurb makes references to the Dirty Dozen and that is really an insult to that movie. Most of the team are simply incompetent. Leech, the so called export starts of by screwing them into losing one of their trucks as well as a lot of equipment by pure spite and incompetence.Colonel Masters is a snivelling wimp when confronted with his superiors who in turn are career-focused assholes.The two Arabs that are supposed to portray homosexuals are just embarrassing. When everyone else is concentrated on defusing the booby trap these two just wander about stealing things until they trip another booby trap and one of them gets blown up. That was just stupid.Also, why the bloody hell is everyone standing around sweating and why is Captain Douglas keeping his hand on the bloody jack when it is clear that it is a simple mechanical wire to an explosive device and you would have to actually pull at the jack and thus the wire to make it go off. That entire scene was so we-think-the-audience-are-too-stupid-to-notice-that-this-is-crap.The film pretty much continues with such nonsense and then it comes to the end. I cannot say much without introducing a huge spoiler but…what a load of utter crap! After having watched through the entire movie you get this ending as a final insult.The only reason this movie got any stars at all is because of Michael Cain.

Not the best of war movies, and the type of story line that's been done before...However, I was fascinated to note that the screenplay was written by Melvyn Bragg who, in the 1990s, went on to produce a great documentary about the English language. How the world turns...Anyway – this effort does have some great and witty lines delivered by Caine and Davenport as the two rival captains on a mission to blow up a German petrol dump in the Libyan desert during the second world war's African campaign. On that basis, it's somewhat pedestrian – many scenes of travelling through desert areas, naturally; getting bogged down in the sand, naturally; meeting and killing Arabs at an oasis, naturally; and generally verbally fighting with each other, as each tries to assert their individuality.Where the narrative is different, however, is first, the twists in the story that produce some worthwhile surprises; second, the grittiness of the situations that serve to highlight the totally amoral attitudes of all concerned; third, the irony of the true nature of the German dump; and finally, the tongue-in-cheek chutzpah of the ending which, for me, almost turned the whole movie into a very long shaggy-dog story. I could imagine Bragg having a real giggle about it as he wrote it – and that's not maligning him at all.All of the main characters provide suitably professional performances, Caine once again with that disdainful and bored attitude reminiscent of his role in Zulu (1964) as Lt. Gonville Bromhead; Nigel Davenport gives a terrific performance (he outshines Caine, in my opinion) as Caine's rival; while the likes of Harry Andrews and Nigel Green exemplify the vacuous and glory-seeking nature of all military top brass. The standout performance, however, goes to Vivian Pickles as the German nurse who shows all the British soldiers what it means to stand up for your rights – not to be missed.As war movies go – perhaps anti-war – it's well done, but not without its faults, particularly some of the gaps in the narrative, sloppy editing and inexplicable jump cuts. Maybe, on TV, I saw a badly edited version to allow for too many commercial breaks? I'll assume so.Recommended for those who like war action.