Brass Target

M-G-M. Director John Hough; Producer Arthur Lewis; Screenplay Alvin Boretz; Camera Tony Imi; Editor David Lane; Music Laurence Rosenthal; Art Director Rolf Zehetbauer

Sophia Loren
John Cassavetes
George Kennedy
Robert Vaughn
Patrick McGoohan
Max von Sydow

Brass Target, like The Eagle Has Landed , speculates on what might have happened to an historical figure in World War II had a given set of circumstances taken place.

This time, instead of Winston Churchill getting bumped off, it's General George Patton's turn. Writer Alvin Boretz has turned Frederick Nolan's speculative novel, The Algonquin Project, into a seemingly true-to-life revelation of how Patton actually died, not in a car accident, but at the hands of a clever paid assassin.

Robert Vaughn, Edward Herrman and Ed Bishop play three officers in occupied Germany who concoct a plan to steal the Third Reich's gold stores with the help of OSS head Patrick McGoohan.

Patton, as played by George Kennedy, gets into a snit when the Russian Allies taunt him about the theft, and personally supervises the investigation, joined by OSS vet John Cassavetes. Gradually, just about every cast member is eliminated by one side or the other, until only Cassavetes, assassin Max von Sydow, and mutual lover Sophia Loren remain for the predictable finale.

Hough manages to interject some excitement into the action scenes, but these come few and far between. A generally competent cast is hamstrung by the material at hand.

(Color) Widescreen. Available on VHS, DVD. Extract of a review from 1978. Running time: 111 MIN.

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