Film
What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases
Bookmark this pageToo Late the Hero (1969)
Director: Robert Aldrich
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Aldrich tries the Dirty Dozen formula again. This time the setting is the Pacific sector in World War II, and the premise has a band of reluctant heroes required to get from one end of a Jap-infested island to the other in order to transmit a decoy message (hopefully to distract attention from the US fleet). Along with some wry reflections on class and officer-like qualities, fairly predictable anti-war sentiments are aired by Caine and Robertson as the two main protagonists, rubbing national hostilities off each other and chiefly concerned with saving their own skins. The usual collection of cowards, bullies and wimps go along for the trip, but there are some excellent character sketches (Denholm Elliott and Ian Bannen, in particular), the action has its moments (with the patrol's paranoia fed by taunting messages from Japanese loudspeakers hidden in the jungle), and the bantering dialogue is often very funny.Author: TM
Cast & crew
Director: Robert Aldrich
Producer: Robert Aldrich
Cast: Michael Caine, Cliff Robertson, Ian Bannen, Harry Andrews, Denholm Elliott, Ronald Fraser, Lance Percival, Ken Takakura, Henry Fonda full cast
Genre(s): War
Duration: 144 mins
Most popular on this site
Top Stories
Time Out's 101 Films of the Decade
Ten years, thousands of movies and millions of dollars in international box office, and it all boils down to this
Martin Provost discusses 'Séraphine'
Trevor Johnston talks to the director of 'Séraphine' about bringing a little known French painter back to life
Our verdict on Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones
Peter Jackson ends a triumphant decade with a sentimental misfire with this lush Alice Sebold adaptation
On the set of Ken Loach's 'Route Irish'
Dave Calhoun meets Ken Loach on the set of his forthcoming Iraq war movie
Stephen Poliakoff discusses 'Glorious 39'
Stephen Poliakoff’s ‘Glorious 39’ is his first film for cinema since ‘Food of Love’ in 1997. Dave Calhoun met him
Is 'Paranormal Activity' the new 'Blair Witch'?
How does a film go from DIY experiment to box-office smash? 'Paranormal Activity' director Oren Peli explains
Steven Soderbergh on 'The Informant!' and 'The Girlfriend Experience'
We talk to Steven Soderbergh about his two forthcoming films: one featuring a porn star, the other a chubby Matt Damon
A gateway to all things 'New Moon'
In anticipation of 'The Twilight Saga: New Moon', Time Out is offering the chance to pick up a limited edition pack with three exclusive magazines and a free poster.
The films that deserve a TV spin-off
With Roland Emmerich suggesting he'd like to make a '2012' TV spin-off, we propose some more movie-to-TV serialisations
Time Out's 50 greatest animated films with commentary by Terry Gilliam
In celebration of the release of Pixar's 'Up' and Wes Anderson's 'Fantastic Mr Fox', read our rundown of fifty classic feature length animations
What do you think?
Post your review now