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[narrator] This is Bavaria, Germany today.
The green meadows,
the magnificent castles and rolling planes
of Germany's largest region haven't changed much
in the last 50 plus years.
It was here in the summer of 1962,
that American film director, John Sturges
brought together a classic cast
for one of the most popular films of all time,
The Great Escape.
Based on Australian Author,
Paul Brickhill's 1950 bestseller,
about a mass Allied escape from a POW camp in Germany.
This mammoth United Artists production from the Mirisch brothers
cast such actors as Steve McQueen,
James Garner, Richard Attenborough,
Charles Bronson, James Coburn,
Donald Pleasence, David McCallum,
and many other fine thespians, British, American, and German.
What they accomplished in few months of filming time that summer of 1962
has become a benchmark
against which all other ensemble war action movies are measured.
If it's not the greatest guy movie of all time,
tell me what is?
I was there that summer.
John Sturges cast yours truly, Lawrence Montaigne,
as comedian flight officer Haynes
who happened to be a member in good standing
of Roger Bartlett's X Organization.
With Nimmo, I was in charge of Diversions.
And the first time you really see me,
I get into a fight with James Coburn.
‐Yeah. Knuckles will be fine. ‐Give him the coat.
What are you doing with my coat, mate?
What are you talking about? It's mine!
[narrator] Since this movie has become such an icon,
with memorable location shot all over Bavaria,
a group of film historians, film makers,
and pure unadulterated fans,
decided to retrace the filmmaking steps
of John Sturges.
And see those locations and how they look
50 years later.
The Great Escape's principle location was the prison camp itself.
Built on the backlot of Geiselgasteig Studios in Munich, Germany.
Well, unfortunately,
the location was bulldozed almost immediately after the film was finished.
And the forest that was ripped out to accommodate the production
has grown back considerably.
[Payne] This is four and five.
So, this is the sound studio
where they filmed the interior of The Great Escape.
We think that the camp is to the north of this football pitch,
which is now being dug up.
And if we look at the map,
we can see studio four and five, six and seven,
the football pitch,
some buildings are here,
but your marker is this mass.
And here you can see a rectangular square,
which apparently was where the camp was based.
[man speaking German]
[Robert E. Relyea] To build the prison camp
the most logical thing would be
build it right outside the studio.
Except, there's a black forest there.
So we brought the minister of the interior out.
Very elderly gentleman. We put him on the chapman crane
we brought him up in the air,
we let him look down, and said,
you know, uh,
"Mr. Minister, what we'd like to do is tear out 400 trees
in order to make the prison camp.
The reason for it,
besides the fact that we're right next to the studio...
The real reason for it is
we want the prison camp to look like
it's enclosed by another prison, the trees.
Now, explaining our reason
we'll now tell you what we would do in return.
We'll plant two for one.
Any place you tell us to plant trees.
I understand it's gonna take a long time for us to get even,
but then, you'll be double ahead."
And he sat on the chapman crane and looked through the lens,
and he said, "I understand."
And we started bulldozing trees.
[Payne] We are North of the Bavaria studios.
And we're looking for the camp.
There were many ideas where this camp was.
Some people say,
the camp is to the west of the Bavaria studios.
Some say, it's to the north‐east.
But, we have evidence to prove that
it was north of the studios.
In particular,
sound studio four and five.
At the moment, we're searching for
some sort of even landscape
to surmise that is where the camp actually was.
But we feel we are in the rough vicinity.
And you can see from the trees over...
Over the 50 years, the trees would be this height.
[man 1] There we go. You gotta see this.
[man 2] Is that a natural gap there? Is that a gap there?
[Payne] We know we're close, uh,
from what we've seen of the aerial photograph.
We know it is in this area.
It's very quiet.
Very spiritual.
So, use your imagination
and come to the Bavaria studios.
And search where the mast is,
and you will then find roughly,
where they filmed the camp in The Great Escape.
[narrator] While the camp is gone
most of the iconic locations of this film are intact.
Much of the picture was filmed
inside and outside the Bavarian town of Fussen,
which is about one hour south‐west of Munich.
In The Great Escape, actor James Coburn
played Australian Louis Sedgwick.
His nick name was "The Manufacturer."
Because he builds things,
including trap doors, air pumps,
trolley cars and tools.
Unlike many of the other prisoners,
he had the perfect escape.
His principle conveyance was a stolen bicycle.
[Payne] The first location is Markt Schwaben,
which is where James Coburn steals a bike.
[Coburn] When designing the character,
I mean, John was just saying,
"Well, now you get on the bicycle and you ride down the thing."
Well, rather than getting on the bicycle and uh...
I steal the bicycle in the first place, right?
So, instead of rushing, everything was...
I was very slow and very deliberate
and very cautious, you know, like, and very cool about it.
You know, rather being in a hurry, or playing the paranoia.
I just wanted to be the other way around,
just like, going through it like it was,
you know, I've been doing this all my life.
So, that was a choice I made.
[man] Now, this building to my left has been dynamited.
And this is a new building.
[man 2] So, what's this building called now then?
That's the Oberoi.
‐[man 2] Is that still called that? ‐Yep.
[man 2] And it's closed.
[Payne] It was here,
where James Coburn stole the bicycle,
and cycled away in that direction.
Why we know it's this location,
is because that Church with the dome,
the same restaurant is there
as it was 50 years ago.
[soft instrumental music playing]
But you can see from this picture,
if we super impose it, on what we see today
the Church is still here
and this building is still here.
And it's still a restaurant.
And Coburn is stealing the bike to escape
around about here.
[soft instrumental music continues]
[narrator] Not everyone was fortunate enough to steal a bicycle.
In the movie, trains were critical.
And many prisoners crawled out of that tunnel,
and wound up in the train station near the camp.
Instead of Zagan, it was called Neustadt in the film.
[Payne] We're going to where James Garner, and Donald Pleasence escaped.
And Richard Attenborough, Gordon Jackson.
And it's supposed to be the Neustadt station.
The Neustadt railway station, Neustadt.
And we're going to see a derelict part.
And we have to sort of try and guess
where the platform was.
It's an interesting location.
James Garner and Donald Pleasence came up from the side
and crossed over the railway crossing
in front of this derelict building.
It was a very tensed part of the movie
because they had just escaped.
And, so you're wondering...
And they were late. Everything was running late.
And so they get here,
and they're waiting for the train,
and they've already missed a bunch of trains.
So, Donald Pleasence, of course says to James Garner,
"So, what d we do?"
And James Garner says, "We wait for the train."
And 50 years later you look at the film, it's not old looking.
It's true. It's all truly very well crafted film.
[narrator] Any forensic look at The Great Escape
would have to focus in
on Steve McQueen and his motorcycle.
Although it was invented for the movie,
the concept of taking out a German dispatch rider and stealing his motorcycle,
has historical validity.
And it was popular with the French Resistance.
In The Great Escape,
Steve's character, Captain Virgil Hilts
is identified early in the story
as an experienced motorcycle racer.
And it seems simply natural for him to steal a bike.
That sequence,
and the hair‐raising stunt work that followed,
much of which was done by McQueen himself,
has become one of the most popular action sequences
ever featured in a film.
And one of the factors that launched McQueen's career
as an international superstar.
[Payne] We are in Hopfensee,
looking for the tripwire.
[Gay] Well, we're at the apex of the curve where Steve McQueen
comes across the road,
and ties a wire off between the fence posts,
uh, between the sign posts.
You know, objective being
to trip up the next Wehrmacht soldier that comes up the road.
‐[Christian Hawkridge] And the road itself was here? ‐[man] Yeah.
‐So now it's, um‐‐ ‐[man] It's not the‐‐
[Hawkridge] First of all the road is wider
and then the bicycle track as well.
‐So, the whole thing is wider, so it has to be steeper. ‐Yeah.
They would set up the posts where they have to be.
‐So you can't really‐‐ ‐[man 2] Yeah.
[Hawkridge] You can't really say
‐where the post is exactly. ‐[man 2] That was the post.
[tires screeching]
And so Sturges had this idea of,
string the wire at about forty‐five degree across the road,
you come along with the bike, hit the wire,
and it will put you off into the ditch.
And I said,
"It's really physically impossible to do,
but let me fake it.
See what I can do.
So I'd come down and make a real quick turn and it read phony,
you know, and...
I just, "Well, maybe Tim can do it."
Let Tim try it.
And so, Tim, he's gonna really give it a good go.
So, Tim comes down now, really hard and fast,
and gonna fake this hitting the wire,
and he fell off.
He crashed, right there in the street.
And really, though it was second unit.
And really, he says, "That's great! That's great."
I think there's a good chance
that this shot is...
Those trees right there. Those things are trees.
So, if you mounted a camera here,
on a slightly longer lens, lower down,
you'd get the composition with that marker post which I think,
‐that one, is that one, I would say. ‐[man] Yeah.
Camera was here I would say.
[narrator] When the cast wasn't digging tunnels
or running all over Germany,
they were sequestered in a beautiful local hotel
not far from Munich.
We're going now to the house
where the whole crew, or most of the crew lived.
Attenborough,
Steve McQueen,
James Coburn, Charles Bronson,
and on the one night, James Garner.
My parents made breakfast for them.
And also in the evening,
special things, fish and so on.
And they were all sitting in our living room.
They had a very cozy atmosphere, I would say.
And they liked it.
Down here, we have also the hotel list of Pergola Am Hopfensee.
This was the place where John Sturges,
Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, James Coburn,
or Gordon Jackson,
were in their apartments.
Charles Bronson was there, John Leyton was there.
‐Hello, follow me, please. ‐[Riml] Thank you.
This here, is where Steve McQueen lived.
This is where the director John Sturges, with his wife lived,
for almost six weeks.
Here lived Sir Richard Attenborough,
On the right side, I think, in this roof's suite
was Charles Bronson.
And here,
James Coburn.
There's a separate bathroom,
separate toilet,
and a big room with a nice view also.
To the cast, it's of a Neuschwanstein.
All the actors have been here in this house.
The company took the whole house.
They had been here for almost six weeks,
and making this movie.
Everybody had his own room.
And at that time it was very modern
because in each room we had a toilet
and a bathroom and a shower.
And I think this was the reason
that the film company took the whole house.
And my parents took care of them.
We had also two servants in the house.
They got breakfast each morning.
Sometimes in the evening,
a special dinner, which was cooked by my father.
And, well, during the day time they were outside
on different spots.
And they were very friendly.
And it was a family atmosphere, I would say.
They met in the lounge, discussed the script for the next morning.
I come to visit my parents
and then I went back for my studies in Munich.
So, I was not always around them,
but, I saw the cars outside.
James Coburn had a Porsche.
And I think Steve McQueen had a Jaguar.
Yes, and for me, this was also very interesting [laughs]
to see these sports cars.
Each evening or each afternoon, there was a helicopter here
who took the film material to Munich,
to the Bavaria Studios,
to the copy company.
[Payne] And what was Steve McQueen like?
Well, he was what he'd always been.
He was, uh...
Well, he had an atmosphere around him,
and very strong and a little macho, yes.
And, uh, well, he was very kind and nice to everybody.
He was not the type, the husband of Elizabeth Taylor.
He was nearby here once, in a hotel,
and they had to fix up the room again, huh.
No, this was... They were very good educated people.
[Payne] This is where James Coburn leaves
the town of Schleiden to escape on a bicycle.
And he cycles off into the distance.
[narrator] Actor Nigel Stock who played Cavendish "The Surveyor,"
found that his escape route included a short‐lived truck ride.
[Payne] We are going to see
where Nigel Stock gets captured.
This scene starts,
um, the fountain is there,
the truck comes along here.
And around the corner, there's a group of soldiers.
And Nigel Stock is captured.
This is the right location.
And you can see,
he gets picked up in a truck,
and he turns that corner.
There's the fountain.
And he turns the corner,
and in front of them there's a line of soldiers.
[soft instrumental music playing]
‐Chris, you notice that the building was yellow. ‐Yes.
And the yellow paint is underneath all this lot.
[narrator] Seemingly cornered,
Hilts takes up position against the wall of a German cabin
that is still very much there.
[Payne] Steve McQueen arrives in this part of the movie.
[Ekins] That was Steve, I mean, he threw this off, didn't he?
I mean, he was excited himself, he loved it, you know,
and he loved what he was doing and he knew what he was doing.
When he was son a motorcycle, he was home.
I remember there was one scene
and he pulls up and he stops,
he takes the gas cap off and he looks down there and shakes the tank.
Because that's what you would do, you know.
He's worried.
How much gas has this thing got, am I gonna make it.
And, you know, to add to this,
back on and vroom, off he goes again.
[Payne] And as you can see, over to right,
the mountains of the Alps.
The road where we are walking down
is the road possibly used in this film.
And to the left,
is the modern day road that exists
and moves into Hopfen am See.
Great bunch of people, all with same interests.
Love the scenery.
And walking in the footsteps of Steve McQueen is just a dream come true.
[Payne] We are in Visbek, which is a busy junction.
But in the film, Steve McQueen is asked for his papers.
Come on here.
[Payne] Because he didn't have any papers on him,
he kicked the German in the stomach.
[soldier] Hey!
Hey! Where are you going?
And behind, you can see there, this building,
and he rides away down the road and away.
And just up the road a hairdresser lived.
The barber was 14 year‐old‐boy called Jackie who saw the film.
And remembered Steve McQueen coming into the barber shop,
to have a wet shave.
And Charles Bronson,
who was a very serious man, and didn't say hello to Jackie.
But Steve McQueen was a very friendly man and said hello to Jackie.
Hello, Chris.
[speaking German]
[Payne] He turned here, he crashed through, didn't he?
They cut it here, and then they filmed it over there.
They came back here again and shot up there.
[gunshots]
So, we're coming up to the gate.
The gate was here.
There's the bridge there.
So, Steven McQueen kicks the soldier in the stomach
and drives off into the distance.
And he winds round
and comes along to the small bridge.
And there's a single vehicle.
He goes up and over the bridge,
whilst the cycle with the sidecar
crashes into the gate.
[Ekins] The one sidecar that crashed, was me,
with Chuck Hayward in the sidecar,
who went to the hospital afterwards.
And the other one was a BMW with a sidecar that a German was riding.
And the solo bike was Tim Gibbs, the Australian.
And I believe he was on a Triumph...
He was on that Bonneville, that we were discussing,
the Bonneville Triumph.
[soft instrumental music playing]
[Gay] McQueen is being chased by the Wehrmacht, here.
And, of course, he's on his bike.
He's coming up against... He's gotta hide somewhere.
[intense music playing]
So, he's coming up against this and he's looking.
You know, and he's got his pistol.
[motorcycle engine revving]
And he's looking, and he's looking this way and everything like that.
And of course, he sees he's in big danger.
This is the only thing he had.
I mean, it's open field, so he's got to find something
to get behind and to get some shelter and get out of sight.
And of course, we know what happened after that.
But, yeah, this is the original place, it's a big, big thing.
[intense music playing]
[Payne] If you look closely, you can see the grain in the wood.
And if you match it to,
this part of the hut, you can see the grain.
And the features would be roughly there.
[intense music continues]
Well, it wasn't too funny for the people
‐who owned the barn. ‐[man] No, I bet not.
Um, I hear rumor that they even were sued
‐all because of that. ‐[gasps] Oh, my god!
And so the whole barn down there,
they tried to wash it off three or four times
‐and it wouldn't go away. ‐Oh, jeez. [laughing]
It came back again.
[Payne] This is the road,
that Steve McQueen is riding along,
escaping from the Germans behind.
Closely behind.
He's coming to...
towards Pfronten‐Berg,
which is in the distance.
with St. Nikolaus church.
And on the bend here,
is where the, the poster is situated.
And over here,
here's the cross which was put up,
in 1960.
And, um, with the film made in 1962,
we know that this is the location.
So here, with Pfronten‐Berg
St. Nikolaus Church in the background,
is the place where one of the most iconic,
uh, scenes was filmed.
And then, he escapes up, uh,
through the hills and beyond.
This is the crossing
and the Pfronten railway station is over there.
This building proves,
that this is the location
where James Coburn was on his bike.
He looks around and then cycles off.
The frame there goes in between,
[door squeaking]
and he gets on the train, there.
[soft instrumental music playing]
So, Steve McQueen is escaping from the Germans,
and he goes up over the hills,
the brow of the hills,
and past the hut which is no longer here.
But, we know it's the right location,
because of the St. Nikolaus Church,
which in the distance, in Pfronten‐Berg.
And then, they cut away,
and finished with McQueen,
in, uh...
Riding of in this direction.
[Payne] That direction.
And then, they cut back again,
and McQueen is in front of the big mountain
that we can see in the distance.
[motorcycle engine revving]
[narrator] Of course, your average movie goer
didn't realize that Steve McQueen
actually put on a German motorcyclist uniform
at one point,
and chased himself.
This was necessitated by the fact that
the German stunt riders were simply not fast enough.
to keep up with very fleet Steve McQueen.
He was like a kid who had all these toys,
who liked to drive fast in cars and motorcycles
And, you know, that was his trip.
And he destroyed a car when we were, uh, [laughs]
when we were in Redding,
shooting Hell is for Heroes.
He crashed more than one car.
Uh, he crashed a couple.
He had a gull‐wing Mercedes,
that he stuck out into the woods somewhere.
He had this, uh, desire to, like man against machine.
And if the machine was strong enough he had respect for it.
If it wasn't, he didn't.
Relyea, he started to say, "Talk to him,"
said, "He'll be good, he'll be good," you know.
Came to work one day, started off.
And he was living just out of Geiselgasteig
you know, a little town, just uh, you know,
I don't know, I guess just north of Geiselgasteig.
And, there was a farming community out there.
And he comes over the ridge.
He was going about 90 miles an hour.
You know, standing on it.
He was always late, of course.
And, here were the two tractors,
so off into the forest he went,
boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, bang, poof.
And, [laughs] one of the trees went crash right down, and destroyed this...
Man, it was, it was just, uh,
it was just, [laughing]
It was just mashed by this tree.
When he'd go to lunch he'd drive a German motorcycle
with the sidecar on it.
And it's got, well, Swastikas all over it
and flags and everything else.
And people are yelling at him in the street,
you know in German, "Get that thing off the street." [chuckles]
He had no respect for anyone, McQueen.
Strange guy. He was a strange guy.
But I liked him a lot. He was uh...
We had a lot of good times together.
He and Jim Garner and myself.
Steve's ability on a motorcycle was enormous.
You and I have talked about the fact
that we look real closely,
a lot of the Germans chasing Steve, are Steve.
[Ekins] Frohlich, who was production manager,
German production manager, uh,
was telling us that he's got two greatest
motorcycle riders in Bavaria,
who are gonna come and chase Steve.
Steve heard this too, and, "Hmm.
Boy are we gonna have fun." [laughing]
We would just do the old Western trick
of having Steve take over the hill,
jump the hill, run down the gully.
And then he'd run and change uniforms
and put on goggles and a helmet,
and he would be the German chasing him.
So, Steve takes off and zip, zip, zip,
and it was kind of "one, two, three,"
with his German rider. [laughing]
Pretty soon, here they come,
and, they couldn't use it, you know.
And, so, obviously, what Sturges is gonna say,
"Steve, slow down."
I mean, it's gonna ruin everything, isn't it?
Sometimes he's two of the Germans chasing him.
Because he could handle bikes that well.
[Ekins] Then he puts a German uniform on,
then he chases himself through the scene,
and so then, you had equal speeds, didn't you?
And in the same scene, it was first Steve,
uh, and then it was myself and Chuck Hayward
with a sidecar outfit following him,
through that same corner.
[narrator] Here we see the roundabout,
where the German truck convoy
turns during the final tragic sequence in The Great Escape.
[Payne] The roundabout was used in the scene right at the end,
where the trucks lead off different ways.
And in the film you could see a cross.
So you know that is the roundabout which was used
in the location where the prisoners were taken.
And sadly, 50 of them were shot.
Just round the corner from the roundabout.
But we know,
this is the right location, because of the cross.
[narrator] Two of the audience's favorites in The Great Escape,
were Danny and Willie, the "Tunnel Kings,"
portrayed by Charles Bronson and British actor, John Leyton.
They're the ones who find a row boat,
and start paddling down the river to Holland.
That sequence was also filmed right outside Fussen.
[Payne] In the distance, you can see old Fussen.
And behind it, you can see the bridge,
which is where they rowed towards.
A very iconic picture.
[Purdey] And the large building there,
that one with the little triangulated bit
on top of the roof,
that is, that there,
which we can see just out there
with that tower just at the left of it.
[narrator] Actor David McCallum,
portrayed Eric Ashley‐Pitt in the movie,
the officer in charge of dirt disposal.
His moment of truth occurs in the train station,
when he confronts a deadly Gestapo agent.
That was also shot in Fussen.
[Payne] David McCallum was running away from the Germans,
having just killed a Gestapo officer.
And he arrives round about,
here.
[gun fires]
And he gets shot in the back.
He stumbles over to the tracks,
and in between the two tracks
he collapses and dies.
[narrator] The Great Escape was orchestrated
by squadron leader Roger Bushell,
whose name was changed to Bartlett in the movie,
and played by Richard Attenborough.
After a nail‐biting sequence on the train,
it looks like Bartlett and his closest friend Sandy McDonald,
played by Scotsman, Gordon Jackson,
are close to escaping.
But something goes wrong.
And suddenly, they're running all over Fussen,
trying to find a hiding place.
The door is about here.
[Payne] Roger Bartlett runs away with McDonald,
up this road.
We now have three windows.
But in the film,
there's three brown doors.
He turns the corner,
and you could see that the big building in the distance...
So, you know this is the part of the location.
This is in old Fussen,
and Richard Attenborough
is escaping from the Germans.
And he's coming across the rooftops.
We know this is the location,
because of the shapes of the mountains,
in the background.
[narrator] At one point,
McDonald slams into a bicyclist,
who turns out to be of all things
the father of one of the German guys
leading our forensic team around Fussen.
That could be the cyclist.
Here was a big tower, uh, for the camera.
[Payne] The bike comes out,
but the bike could, would be there.
Hey, it's my father.
[tires screeching]
[Payne] Green garage!
[Payne] Richard Attenborough's running away from the Germans,
and he grabs a newspaper over there,
and he thinks he's safe.
He makes his way around the corner,
and he goes and leans against this corner,
which is now Mary's Boutique
and says, "I've escaped."
But all of a sudden, a German comes up to him,
and asked him his name.
"Herr Bartlett."
[German officer] Herr Bartlett, you're German is good.
And I here also your French.
Your arms.
Up!
[narrator] Louis Sedgwick rode his bicycle all the way to France,
where he ends up in a curbside cafe,
run by the French Resistance.
In reality, that cafe is nowhere near France.
It's right next to the river in Fussen.
[Payne] James Coburn is having coffee
at this location.
And there are two waiters.
He's reading a newspaper.
Over the bridge, comes the Resistance.
[gun firing]
[car revving]
[narrator] It is James Garner and Donald Pleasence
portraying Hendley and Blythe,
who steal a German training plane
to make they're escape to Switzerland.
What happens if the thing starts?
They said, "It hasn't started,
and, you know, we can't get it started."
I said, "Well, what happens if it does?"
So, the guy told me, "Because I'm not a pilot."
Told me about the brakes and the throttle
and this, that and the other.
And so we got Donald out there, and I told him to crank it.
And when I, you know, once he got it cranked,
you know, I had to get out and help him,
and get him in because he couldn't see.
And then I got into it.
And, uh,
darn, if he didn't crank it and it started,
'cause we're never gonna do all that in cuts.
We got a camera crew out there, not too far away,
not too much further than you are.
And, uh, it started.
So, I got throttled back,
and set the brake a little bit,
and eased off on the brake, I saw it wasn't going anywhere.
I got out and got him up there, got him in the seat,
and then I sat down
and I revved up the throttle a little bit
and eased off the brake, and it started moving forward.
You never saw a crew move so fast in all your life.
They were safe enough,
because I do know a little about mechanics and whatever, so.
But it did, uh...
I almost started taxing that thing off.
[narrator] They run out of fuel.
and crash‐land in the forest.
A sequence that was amazingly shot for real.
With John Sturges' assistant, Robert Relyea
piloting the doomed plane.
What I will always fondly remember about that aircraft was
we were shooting this scene
where you see the plane head towards that lovely tower,
that castle near Fussen.
And as I made a very majestic turn up there,
the engine died.
And I thought, "Oh, I'm gonna go right into this castle."
We actually circled the castle with no power.
And then we came back,
another gentleman in the co‐pilot seat,
and we were looking for any place to get into
and I couldn't find anything except a farmer's field.
And we rolled up in this farmer's field,
and here came this little house,
And I was trying to brake the plane
but I couldn't get it to slow down.
We rolled right up to his porch
and he was sitting there with his feet up.
No shoes, no nothing.
And he was dumbstruck, of course.
I don't have a German license,
I have an American license.
The plane is illegally painted with Swastikas.
Um, he was having a fit.
Unfortunately, he was the equivalent
of our FAA commissioner,
at his summer home.
So, he was having a conniption.
The gentleman who was with me spoke German,
and when I was trying to lay on the grass and relax
from not going to his house,
he kept yelling at me.
He's telling us that we're under arrest,
don't move until he gets into town
and he can get a policeman.
But, John Sturges, came and bailed me out.
[Payne] We're in the nice Miesbach area.
Frauenried, the Hamlet of Frauenried.
And we have found the St. Mary's Church,
which is the still the same as it was, 50 years ago.
It's now painted yellow.
But in the film it was white.
And you can see that they now have grown some trees
to obscure the church.
We know this is the area,
because if we look at the trees behind us,
there's a bow.
It's a funny shaped tree that matches up with the film.
Somewhere on that line would be the camera position
depending on the lens they were using,
and how much space they needed.
I think the camera would be set quite far back,
on a longer lens for safety.
And that's how I think would explain this location
because it would be difficult,
I would have thought to get permission
to film this sort of stunt sequence, anywhere,
because they genuinely flew the plane in,
towards those trees.
It was pulled on a cable or whatever
from what we saw there.
So they'd have to fly in low over these trees,
and have a stunt pilot,
touch the wheels down just on this ridge.
And then the plane would travel through,
through there.
We are sure that the camera was up there.
We are sure that this is where the plane crashed.
And we're sure from what we've seen
that the port wing struck this tree with a kink in it,
and the starboard wing struck that tree there.
And who knows if their intention
was actually to go through this gap
between these trees.
But, what happened is that,
the port wing definitely struck this tree.
[Payne] And you can see the kink in this tree,
is the same as the kink in the tree in front of us.
The Germans, uh...
Several cars drove up this pathway,
came out of their vehicles,
as Donald Pleasence goes toward the church.
And so the German, who will be standing in the film,
to the left of the church
takes aim and shoots Donald dead.
And he falls to the ground where I'm standing.
[narrator] One of the most memorable moments in The Great Escape,
is when Steve McQueen rides up to the fence
that separates him from Switzerland and freedom.
The resulting motorcycle jump
then became one of the most iconic moments
in action film history.
[Payne] This is the area of Rossmoos, Benken,
which is where they filmed "the fence scene,"
which Steve McQueen is jumping over.
And apparently,
the stool that we see in front of us,
is where McQueen sat
while they were waiting to set up the film.
And, the farmer showed Steve McQueen,
how to roll a German cigarette.
And he smokes a German cigarette
while the scene was being set.
And there were hundreds of people involved.
[engine revving]
[reporter speaking German]
[speaking English] Those wonderful stunts you were just doing,
do they have any part in the film you're just shooting?
‐Yes, they do. ‐Uh‐huh.
Yes, we've worked it into the escape,
that's probably the end of the movie.
John Sturges and myself and my stuntman Bud Ekins.
Come time to do it,
and my adrenaline started going,
and I'd hit it about
50 miles an hour the day before.
And the adrenaline got going and I hit about
60 miles an hour.
And it really went up in the air.
And I could remember being in the air,
and there was dead silence.
I mean, there were a few hundred people there,
and all the extras and everything.
And when I was in the air, it seemed like I was up there forever,
and there was dead silence.
Nothing.
Just going through the wind.
And boom it hit the ground and it shook,
and almost fell off and come back.
And, boy, I got a big applause and everybody was...
Actually, with the dead silence
just towards the last, you heard, "Huh!"
Like that. [laughing]
Maybe it was me, I don't know.
But, anyway, I was the hero for the day.
[speaking German]
‐[Purdey] Those trees there? ‐[man] Yeah.
[continues speaking German]
[Riml] Here is where the jump is?
And the ditch used to be all around here.
So he jumped here and landed in the fence just over there.
John shot the jump over the barbwire,
which was shot three times.
Once with Bud Ekins, once with Steve
and once with a New Zealander, Tim Gibbs.
So, it was done once by Steve McQueen,
once by Bud Ekins, and once by Tim Gibbs,
a New Zealander who used to do European Motocross
with Bud Ekins and Steve.
The one in the picture is Bud Ekins.
But all three of them jumped it.
[speaking German]
The most happening, I just remember,
was when we went in uniform through the downtown.
And I just remember going to the main street in Fussen.
I just, I mention it before.
And, um, I just see the two elder women just like yesterday,
say, "Oh, my goodness, Mr. Hitler's here again,
Hitler's here again." [chuckles]
Because it was not allowed to go in his uniform.
‐You understand my English? ‐[man] Yeah, sure.
So, we said, "No, no. We're just students."
[laughing] "Oh, Hitler again."
I never get to see, you know.
And it was a good, a nice, nice time.
'Cause it is so impressive,
the story itself
that people want to survive,
that people want to go back home.
Yeah.
‐In, in the war. ‐Yeah.
That was very touching for me.
Because wars are still today, all over the world.
Mm‐hm.
And, people are killing each other
for reasons that are silly.
Only political maybe, but...
That's the deeper sense for me in this film,
that freedom...
‐And peace. ‐and peace,
is something that we have to keep.
For me, it was an accomplishment.
It was a tremendous accomplishment.
And I never minimized it.
Uh, when I came back,
to the States from Europe,
and, uh, and I got in touch with Betty Atkinson,
who was John Sturges secretary.
And Betty said, "Get out here, John wants to see."
John gave me a one‐day bit
on Ice Station Zebra. [laughing]
You know, because I had walked on the set
and he says, "Are you working?" "No."
"Go. Well, working now."
You know, and that was John.
So, all these little things, these, uh...
There was no Star Trek without The Great Escape.
There was no career without The Great Escape.
If I walked into an office and said,
"I was in Captain Sindbad."
They'd say, "Oh, really? Oh, that's nice."
But when I walked into an office with my agent,
and my agent said, "Lawrence was a featured player
in The Great Escape,"
The door went, toom! [laughing]
I mean, there was no doubt about it.
I got a reading.
If I didn't get the part at least I got the reading.
But I always got a reading.
And, it wasn't one studio or two studios.
I'm talking about 10, 15 studios.
Paramount, Warner Brothers, Columbia, you name it, MGM.
Every door was open to me.
Not because of Star Trek.
The Great Escape.
[narrator] A lot of movies had been produced
since The Great Escape made its debut
in theaters in the summer of 1963.
And many of them have become classics.
But year after year,
the fans returned to the green meadows of Bavaria
to see a story that always ends the same way,
with Steve McQueen bouncing his baseball
against the brick wall of the cooler.
And the German guard pausing to listen
to that immortal sound.
Director John Sturges, once explained
that the story of The Great Escape
was all about the indomitable spirit of mankind,
and its desire to seek freedom at any cost.
As far as Sturges was concerned,
it was reason the Allies won World War II.
Perhaps, we all need to be inspired by such thoughts.
At the very end when Steve goes in
and bounces the baseball, once more,
you hear this sound,
and the guard stops for a second
and looks back over his shoulder
and then you go to end titles.
That guard is
the second assistant director in the picture.
German gentleman.
Unlike on all pictures like this,
where you run out of actors,
so, you throw everybody, a uniform on everybody
and you all get to act.
But, here's a guy who understood.
And John took it very slow and easy
‐and said you know, "When you hear that, ‐[lock clicks]
that means you didn't win."
[ball bouncing]
He's locked up, but you lost.
[ball bouncing]
And that's what, I think, makes that moment so good.
[narrator] And don't forget,
that return to The Great Escape each year,
does leave you humming
that brilliant Elmer Bernstein score,
and wondering, just when will Virgil Hilts
see Berlin from the ground or the air.
[soft instrumental music playing]