"Why don't you knock it off with them negative waves? Why don't you dig how beautiful it is out here? Why don't you say something righteous and hopeful for a change?" Kelly's Heroes is...weird. Essentially, a former U.S. Army officer named Kelly (Clint Eastwood) is demoted to private after a botched assault that wasn't his fault. He eventually learns of the location of a massive stash of Nazi gold, equivalent to $16 million dollars (in 1944; it would be much more today). Well, what would you do if you're fighting in a seemingly pointless war in an army that pays you very little? Why, steal the gold, of course!
Assembling a team including the loud, profane, but solid Sergeant "Big Joe" (Telly Savalas) conniving, insulting quartermaster "Crapgame" (Don Rickles), and hippie (!) tank commander Sergeant "Oddball" (whose name needs no explanation), who provides his three M4 Sherman tanks as support to Kelly's infantry (according to Oddball, these Shermans have been modified so as to make their guns look bigger than they really are, and to make them shoot paint so as to make "pretty pictures"). As Kelly and his men smash through German lines, incompetent Major General Colt (Carroll O'Connor) thinks that his army (whose location he somehow doesn't know) is mounting a major offensive. Eventually, the ragtag group finds the gold (guarded by three dreaded Tiger tanks), culminating in a standoff between the final Tiger and Kelly, Big Joe, and Oddball (who are ill-equipped to be taking on a tank, period) in a spoof of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (down to Ennio Morricone-inspired music).
Overall, Kelly's Heroes is a delightful antiwar picture, with an interesting cast that included many actors on the verge of big-time success on television (including Savalas, O'Connor, and Gavin MacLeod, who had a funny role in this film as Oddball's bow machine gun operator Moriarty).
Rating: 87/100
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