todd-yingst This movie is a real stinker, with one redeeming scene.About 1 hour and 21 minutes into the movie, there is an order to charge. Some badly modified artillery footage, then some morters, and a machine gun scene. Then -- the best scene in the whole movie.Sgt. Pike gives the order to charge - and they take off running. One poor guy does a fantastic face plant right in front of the camera. The, as the camera pans right, you can see the guy getting up and trying to put on his helmet.I've watched this move dozens of times - but never noticed the face plant until this weekend. I laughed so hard, I cried.

artforartsake18 OK. Everyone is different. We all like stuff that others may cringe at, like, agree on etc. So this is what I liked, didn't thought of etc. For me this film was not the best. The film was gritty in appearance, black & white, which really, I thought, was a great creative decision to make to shoot it that way. It added a lot to the feel/atmosphere to the film.The characters were good, and I felt worked well developing the story but a kinda formula that's repeated a lot in early films of this genre. A usual mixture of characters, ranging from funny, then a fall guy, the only me guy, the serious guy the troubled guy (McQueen)The environment, budget film? $2,500,000 (estimated) shot in the states so the terrain the film was played out in just wasn't war torn European enough for me, although the tank traps on the German side look convincing! McQueen. Held the whole thing together. Great performance with the underlying possibility that he could explode any second. Love him in this film.Action sequences were pretty good actually. Well done. Worth watching? Yes. Maybe a 2nd look. BUT See the film make up your own mind. ;^)

mark.waltz The title says it all. While it might offend some people with its "Hell" reference, there is a purpose to it as in "War is Hell" or "Only the strong will survive hell on earth". Don't expect a happy ending a la "Destination Tokyo" or "Air Force" as far as World War II movies are concerned. This is almost 20 years after the war ended, and Hollywood was desperately fighting to get past the restrictions of the production code. This is battlefield combat at its most grizzly and realistic.Steve McQueen is a former sergeant demoted to private, a soldier who is just inches away from inner explosion. He shows up to join a battalion in France who believe they are about to be sent home. McQueen fears going home more than combat, so he is most grateful that doesn't happen. The company, lead by McQueen's old acquaintance Harry Guardino, ends up in the trenches, battling unseen Germans. Bob Newhart comes in as a clerk/typist who quickly learns to shoot. He is strictly there for comic relief of course. A small group of soldiers try to break through a mine field with disastrous results. One of the wounded screams over and over that he can see his guts before expiring. It's chilling and truly horrific, considering that several years later, Vietnam would be underway, with an advanced media showing the gore on a daily basis.There really isn't much to the story, just a vision of the horrors of war not presented realistically during that time. People don't just die after being shot or blown up when a grenade explodes in front of them. They die slow, agonizing deaths, so this could be almost called an anti-war film in that perspective. It shows the panic, mental anguish, and torment that the soldiers must face. While he is of course top billed, Steve McQueen is merely part of an ensemble which includes James Coburn (who plays the most likable of the men), Bobby Darin, Fess Parker and Nick Adams. Michele Montau has a memorable small role as a French barmaid who has an unforgettable exchange with McQueen. While the movies made during World War II about the war served their purpose in reminding us of our goals in this war, films like this and "The Dirty Dozen" give us more grizzly and realistic portrayals of what the war was really like.

bkoganbing One of Steve McQueen's better roles is one that is modeled on one that James Cagney played in The Fighting 69th. If you'll remember Cagney was a wise guy who lost his nerve on the battlefield and was sentenced to be shot, but redeemed himself in a heroic climax.Now McQueen wasn't a coward and he didn't have a priest like Pat O'Brien to have faith in him. But he was a reckless sort and convinced of his own righteousness. It negated his acts of bravery and when the film opens we find him down to being a private and under the command of a sergeant played by Fess Parker who likes him, but understands him all too well.And Parker's platoon has a really rotten assignment. Hold their position on the Siegfried Line with a handful of men until help arrives and maybe convince the Germans there's a lot more out there than there really are. McQueen in his usual rebel way goes his own way. It costs the lives of a lot in his squad. Still he does redeem himself like Cagney in the end. This is maybe the only film in which McQueen's rebel persona worked against his character. Still it's an interesting and moving performance he gives.Look also for good performances from the rest of the cast that includes Harry Guardino, Bobby Darin, Nick Adams, Mike Kellin, and Bob Newhart as other soldiers on the dirty detail.The film credits say 'introducing Bob Newhart' and he provides what little comedy there is. After the Parker platoon gets the assignment to hold on their assigned piece of real estate, Newhart comes driving up in a jeep loaded with typewriters. He's a clerk/typist at division headquarters and it seems as though he made a wrong turn. Never mind because Guardino and Parker commandeer him and his jeep.Which sets up one of his routines from his early standup act. Newhart used to work with a telephone and he's asked to do so here for the benefit of a German microphone planted on the American line. It actually works very well into the fabric of the plot.Hell is for Heroes is one tough and gritty war drama, the kind of film that a generation later, Steven Spielberg would get all kinds of acclaim for Saving Private Ryan. For war picture fans, this is a must.