The Big Red One

Year:

1980

Duration:

113 min | 162 min (reconstructed version)

Genres:

Action | Drama | War

IMDB rate:

7.2

Director:

Samuel Fuller

Awards:

2 wins & 1 nomination

Details

Country: USA

Release Date: 1980-05-28

Filming Locations: Israel

Cast

Actor

Character

Lee Marvin

The Sergeant

Mark Hamill

Pvt. Griff, 1st Squad

Robert Carradine

Pvt. Zab, 1st Squad

Bobby Di Cicco

Pvt. Vinci, 1st Squad

Kelly Ward

Pvt. Johnson, 1st Squad

Stéphane Audran

Underground Walloon fighter at asylum (as Stephane Audran)

Siegfried Rauch

Schroeder (German sergeant)

Serge Marquand

Rensonnet

Charles Macaulay

General /

Alain Doutey

Broban (Vichy sergeant)

Maurice Marsac

Vichy colonel

Colin Gilbert

Dog Face POW

Joseph Clark

Pvt. Shep (soldier on troop transport)

Ken Campbell

Pvt. Lemchek (#2 on Bangalore torpedo)

Doug Werner

Switolski

Perry Lang

Pvt. Kaiser, 1st Squad

Howard Delman

Pvt. Smitty (soldier who trips mine)

Marthe Villalonga

Madame Marbaise

Giovanna Galletti

Woman in Sicilian village (as Giovanna Galetti)

Gregori Buimistre

The Hun (German soldier killed by The Sergeant in WWI sequence)

Shimon Barr

German male nurse in Tunisian hospital

Matteo Zoffoli

Sicilian boy - Matteo

Abraham Ronai

German Field Marshall

Galit Rotman

Pregnant Frenchwoman

Samuel Fuller

War Correspondent (as Sam Fuller)

Pascal Breuer

Hitler Youth (uncredited)

Luther Fear

German standing in tank in snow (uncredited)

Walter Flesch

Colonel (uncredited)

Anat Harel

Graziella (uncredited)

Ulli Kinalzik

Gerd (uncredited)

Christa Lang

German Countess (extended edition) (uncredited)

Guy Marchand

Captain Chapier (uncredited)

Steve Moriarty

Staff Sgt at Kasserine Pass (uncredited)

Yossi Pollak

Herr Green Shirt (uncredited)

Did you know?

Trivia

Sam Fuller: as a military cameraman documenting the troops. He's the older man with the cigar asking the troops to wave at the camera.

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Many critics felt that Lee Marvin was too old at 54 to play the sergeant.

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Reportedly Samuel Fuller wanted Martin Scorsese for the role of Pvt. Vinci, 1st Squad, but Scorsese moved on to do Raging Bull (1980).

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Goofs

1st Infantry Division on 11th November 1918 held the line along Meuse river, near the town Mouzon (that were the final stages of Meuse-Argonne offensive, and whole war altogether); in the movie, when sergeant and his team approach an ambush by the old cross, we see that this is the spot from the first scene, the last day of the WWI. And on the memorial ("But the names are the same...") it reads "Killed in action - Soissons". Big Red One actually did fight near Soissons, but that was during the so-called Second Battle of the Marne, July to first week of August 1918.

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Camera shadow is visible on the backs of the American soldiers as they rush to greet the French in North Africa.

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Griff's dog tags suddenly change positions when he is drawing on the back of the poster.

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Quotes

Zab: [narrating] Saving that Kraut was the final joke of the whole goddamned war. I mean we had more in common with him than all our replacements who got killed whose names we never even knew. We'd all made it through we were alive. I'm gonna dedicate my book to those who shot but didn't get shot, because it's about survivors. And surviving is the only glory in war, if you know what I mean

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Zab: [narrating] You know how you smoke out a sniper? You send a guy out in the open and you see if he gets shot. They thought that one up at West Point.

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Griff: I can't murder anybody.

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Faq

Q

What are the differences between the Theatrical Version and The Reconstruction Version?

A

In 1980, Samuel Fuller shot his almost autobiographic (Pvt. Zab is the alter ego of Sam Fuller) war movie. Unfortunately, only a heavily cut version made it into the cinemas. Until his death in 1997 he had the intention of making his experiences from the war into a movie that was true to historical facts as well as his personal philosophy. In order to save what could be saved he never distanced himself from the shorter unauthorized version. Thanks to film critic and -historian Richard Schickel "The Big Red One" has been reconstructed as good as it was possible after over twenty-five years and features now nearly 50 minutes longer than the old Theatrical Version. A detailed comparison between both versions with pictures can be found here.

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