the eagle has landed

Director: john sturges

Actor: michael caine,donald sutherland,robert duvall,jenny agutter

Data Published: Sat Dec 25 1976

Genres: Adventure,Drama,Thriller,War

Key Words: army ranger,german paratrooper,fallschirmjager,england,winston churchill

IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074452/

WIKI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eagle_Has_Landed_(film)

Description: The Eagle Has Landed is a movie starring Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland, and Robert Duvall. A German plot to kidnap Sir Winston Churchill unfolds at the height of World War II.

Plot: The film begins with captured World War II film footage of the rescue from Italy of Mussolini by German paratroopers. Inspired by the rescue of Hitler's ally Mussolini, a similar idea is considered by Hitler, with the support of Himmler. Admiral Canaris, head of the Abwehr (German military intelligence), is ordered to make a feasibility study of the seemingly impossible task of capturing the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and bringing him to Germany. Canaris considers the idea a joke, but realises that although Hitler will soon forget the matter, Himmler will not. Fearing Himmler may try to discredit him, Canaris orders one of his officers, Oberst (colonel) Radl to undertake the study, despite feeling that it is a waste of time. An Unteroffizier (sergeant) on Radl's staff, Karl, finds that one of their spies, code named Starling, has provided tantalising intelligence: Winston Churchill is to visit an airfield near the (fictitious) village of Studley Constable in Norfolk, where Joanna Grey, a German sleeper agent lives. Radl comes up with a scheme that could work, called 'Eagle', where the kidnapping will proceed with German troops leading the action. He also is convinced that synchronicity is behind it all, where actions and conditions merge at the proper moment, at the proper time. Himmler summons Radl and unofficially tells him to proceed, without notifying Canaris but with Hitler's knowledge, providing Radl with an 'authorising' letter signed by Hitler himself. Radl recruits Liam Devlin, a member of the IRA lecturing at a Berlin university, to the mission. Radl looks for a suitable officer to lead the mission and chances upon the highly decorated and experienced Fallschirmjäger officer Oberst Kurt Steiner. While returning from the Eastern Front, Steiner intervened when SS soldiers rounded up Jews at a railway station in Poland, and attempted to save the life of a teenage girl who was shot while trying to escape. For this, he was court-martialled, along with a platoon of his men. Rather than face the firing squad, the men were allowed to transfer to a penal unit on the Channel Island of Alderney, where they make high risk attacks with their captured motor torpedo boat using Manned Torpedoes against English Channel convoys. Radl travels to Alderney and, with the help of Devlin, recruits Steiner and his surviving men. The team will parachute into England from a captured Allied airplane. The commandos outfit themselves as Polish paratroopers, as few of them speak English. The plan is to infiltrate Studley Constable, complete their mission, rendezvous with an E-boat on the nearby coast and escape. The paratroopers land and the operation proceeds. Radl visits Himmler to announce that "The eagle has landed", but then Himmler destroys the authorising document he'd given Radl, suggesting that Himmler invented Hitler's approval. As the Germans take up positions in the town, the plan is foiled when a paratrooper rescues a local girl from certain death by a water wheel. He instead is killed in the process and his German uniform (worn under the Polish uniforms at the prior insistence of Steiner) is revealed to the onlooking villagers. The locals are rounded up into the village church, but Pamela Vereker, the sister of the village priest Father Vereker, escapes to alert a unit of the United States Army Rangers stationed nearby. Inexperienced, glory-seeking Colonel Pitts tries to foil the German plan almost single-handed but is killed by Nazi sympathizer Joanna Grey in her house, while his poorly-planned assault on the church fails with heavy casualties. Captain Clark, Pitt's young deputy, then organises a second, successful attack. Steiner's men sacrifice themselves to delay the Americans while Devlin, Steiner and his wounded second-in-command Neustadt escape, with the aid of local girl Molly Prior who was romantically involved with Devlin. Instead of boarding his motor torpedo boat, Steiner vows to make one last attempt at Churchill. Receiving news by radio of the apparent failure of the operation, Radl orders his assistant Karl to leave Alderney immediately and return home to Germany, in order to avoid the fate Radl knows is forthcoming. Radl is then arrested and summarily executed by firing squad, under the pretext that he "exceeded his orders to the point of treason". In this way Himmler distances himself from the failed mission. Steiner does manage to infiltrate the country house and apparently succeeds in killing Churchill before being shot and killed himself. Captain Clark, on scene, is stunned by Churchill's death, but is then informed by security personnel that "Churchill" was actually George Fowler, an actor and impersonator – the real Prime Minister is at the Tehran Conference. Clark and a superior officer are also advised that, "No one will ever know about this. This never happened. It did not occur." Devlin, evading capture, leaves a love letter for Molly, and disappears to live in obscurity. Whilst wandering around the coast at low tide, he comes upon the remains of a motor torpedo boat, presumably Steiner's.