"The Great Escape" and its conventions

 Being that it was shot in 1963, the quality of this film is noticeably different than the other two movies we looked at. Those are all considerably newer movies than "The Great Escape". One thing that I kept in mind while looking at this one was that this isn't a prisoner breaking out of a proper prison, rather  prisoner of war breaking out of a Nazi camp. Starting with mis-En-Scene, the costuming in this movie. The costuming was very spot on to the content. The costuming is accurate to the time and place, being a Nazi POW camp. The main supervisor/guard (Von Luger) is dressed properly in a Luftwaffe officer uniform, and the prisoners are all dressed in what they came in wearing. Being that this was a prisoner of war camp, the prisoners weren't robbed of their clothing, hair, or shoes, which the Nazis did in concentration camps. Additionally the set is very realistic. It was modeled after the true place (Stalaag III Prisoner camp), and the specific set is near identical to the compound the escape really took place in. Additionally, something else I can't replicate, is the stunts done in this movie. Towards the finale of the movie, the main character (The Cooler) makes a 60 foot jump on his motorcycle. There are a few things about this movie I love, and that is definitely one of them. Realistically, I cannot replicate a lot of the conventions shown in this movie. It's too advanced, and at the same time primitive. We have a lot more technology now, which I both, can't afford, and am not experienced enough to understand. Back then, they had the real thing; they had to build real sets, use real motorcycles, and I just can't do all of that. One thing I can replicate is the sound. There was a lot of diegetic sound in the film. There were the droves of prisoners speaking, shuffling footsteps, gunshots, alarms, and other similar noise.




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