The Great Escaper

A film that begins in an English care home. Bernard is ninety. He is living in a care home with his wife and both have trouble walking now. The anniversary of the Normandy landings is approaching. Bernard wants to go but the application period has passed. One morning he leaves without telling anyone. He puts on his jacket, puts his medals in his pocket, and gets on a bus. He crosses by ferry. He reaches France and takes a room at a hotel. Meanwhile the care home reports him missing. The news spreads and the country starts talking about it. From there the film runs two lines side by side. The day in France, and his wife at the home. Irene is not worried. She knew where her husband was going and had quietly let him go. At the commemoration Bernard meets others. He talks with a German veteran, and that scene is the film's best written. What the narrative is interested in is not escape but debt: the man's reason for going is not the ceremony; there is something he has been unable to say for years to a friend killed in the war. There are flashbacks. Young Bernard's landing day is shown in pieces and the narrative does not present it as heroism. The tone is light. The film takes its humour from old age and does not weight the feeling. The source is a real event. In 2014 a veteran left his care home and attended the seventieth anniversary in Normandy, and the story was widely discussed at the time. Glenda Jackson died after this film and it was her last role. Michael Caine, Glenda Jackson, John Standing and Danielle Vitalis are in the cast. Oliver Parker directed. Who it is for: anyone who wants to watch two great performers and likes quiet British drama. Who it is not for: anyone looking for depth; the narrative goes the expected way and some scenes point too hard at the feeling.