War film with 'top-notch cast' but everyone has the same complaint

Richard Attenborough’s 1977 war epic A Bridge Too Far is loaded to the brim with one A-list actor after the other.

Based on historian Cornelius Ryan’s book of the same name, A Bridge Too Far was adapted for the big screen by William Goldman.

As a means to promote the film, Goldman especially wrote a book titled Story of A Bridge Too Far — as a favour to Joseph E. Levine — which was published in December 1977.

Dramatising Operation Market Garden, the ambitious but ill-fated failed military operation by the Allied forces during World War II, A Bridge Too Far is set in September 1944 and follows the story of the attempt by British, Polish, and American forces to seize a series of bridges in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands in a swift bid to end the war by bypassing the German Siegfried Line.

A joint production between the United States and the United Kingdom, A Bridge Too Far was filmed in the Netherlands in many of the real historical locations where the events actually took place.

With an positively star-studded cast, A Bridge Too Far features Sean Connery, Michael Caine, Robert Redford, Gene Hackman, Anthony Hopkins, Dirk Bogarde, James Caan, Edward Fox, Elliott Gould, Hardy Krüger, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O'Neal, Maximilian Schell and Liv Ullmann.

The war film was on the receiving end of several accolades, having been nominated for eight BAFTAs out of which it bagged four, including Best Score for John Addison who had actually served in the British XXX Corps during Operation Market Garden.

The film didn’t fare too well with critics, receiving a dismal 59 per cent score on Rotten Tomatoes. While one critic wrote: “Does have its flat spots, but does have a top-notch cast to keep boredom at bay.”

A second reviewer said: “Though overlong, muddled, ponderous and overbaked, it's not without some impressive moments.”

Another critic stated: “The movie's big and expensive and filled with stars, but it's not an epic. It's the longest B-grade war movie ever made.”

While one critic said it was “a movie too long” another called it “a very long slog”.

In sharp contrast, audience reviews of the film were extremely positive and laudatory, with one viewer writing: “One of the greatest war films ever put to screen. With an all star cast the complaints about it being too long are unwarranted as the build up and story is fully required. An all-time great!”

While another said: “One of the best WW2 movies. The all star cast is incorporated well into the story of Operation Market Garden. Epic, intense full scale battle sequences make this memorable. Only demerit is movie is a bit too long.”

And while one viewer couldn’t stop gushing about the film: “One of the best war films over the years I enjoyed in 1977 and now watching it for my 20th time. Richard Attenborough did a great job on directing, all the actors did a great job. The cinematography, the sound, and music was great plus it's just a great film. I put it up there with one of my top 10 films of all time next to the movie Patton.”

Another kept it fairly simple: “Nothing much to say, historical accuracy, practical effects and incredibly high quality for its age, a gold standard of historical war movies.”

A Bridge Too Far is available to stream for free on BBC iPlayer.