Operation: Daybreak (1975)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

A different way of telling a story

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

It would be hard to find two braver soldiers in WW2 than Jan Kubiš and Jozef Gabčík This film is a worthy tribute to them. Although not without flaws, Lewis Gilbert's film is an impressive work nonetheless.The film tells the true story of the assassination of Reinhardt Heydrich, the Nazi governor of Czechoslovakia, by Czech members of Britain's SOE. These included Sergeant Jan Kubiš (Timothy Bottoms), Sergeant Jozef Gabčík (Anthony Andrews) and Sergeant Karel Čurda (Martin Shaw). The story is full of heroism, but also treachery.The whole plan was so audacious it plays like Hollywood fiction, but it really happened pretty much as shown here. Although the mission was successful, the vengeance of the Nazis was terrible. The movie ends as the small band of agents are trapped in a church and go down fighting."Operation Daybreak" breathes authenticity. Scenes of the Nazi's pomp and ceremony at railway stations and in the ornate buildings of Prague are striking. It is obvious that the mainly British cast were at pains to capture the essence of their characters, but it is Anton Diffring who steals the movie in the showier role of Heydrich.Unfortunately the film is saddled with a weak score – even for a 1970's movie. The music has no feeling for the period and is jarring in places. It shows the power music has to change the mood of a film. A bizarre credit proudly proclaims that the score was composed by David Hentchel and performed on an A.R.P. Synthesiser. Hentchel's tinny chords are easily overshadowed by Deutschland über alles, the most powerful theme heard in the movie.The film also has long passages in German without subtitles. I remember seeing this film on TV years ago and it didn't have them then, and I wonder if it ever had them.I can recall at least three other movies that depict Heydrich's assassination, including two made during the war – "Hitler's Madman" and "Hangman Also Die!". Oddly, the depiction of the assassination in the otherwise well-researched mini-series "Hitler's SS: Portrait in Evil", shows it taking place in the open countryside. This despite being made ten years after "Operation Daybreak", which re-enacted the event on the street corner in Prague where it happened.Director Lewis Gilbert had made some of the best British war movies by the time he made this, and although films like "Reach for the Sky", "Sink the Bismarck" and "Carve Her name with Pride" incorporated fictional characters and elements, "Operation Daybreak" seems to stick much closer to the facts.The final battle in the church is spectacular, despite the intrusion of Hentchel's score. According to information on the Internet, it's hard to know exactly what happened, although the film goes with the most accepted version of events.With an amazing true story, fascinating locale and the integrity of the filmmakers, "Operation Daybreak" rises above its flaws. In the end, it is a film that hits home.

US directors and Script writers cant imagine to realize a movie in accordance with historical facts. Here is an example of falsification of historical facts which are very well and fully documented.To assess this nothing is so easy as to check this wikipedia report: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Anthropoid .The different attempts to murder Heydrich did not occur as shown on the film.Maria committed suicide in the toilet after asking the Germans to let her go there before leaving the flat.She took a cyanide capsule.Ata was arrested with his father and was not interrogated in the flat as shown in the movie.He was interrogated with torture throughout the day, refused to talk. The youth was stupefied with brandy, shown his mother's severed head in a fish tank and warned that if he did not reveal the information they were looking for, his father would be next.This finally caused Ata to crack and tell the Gestapo what they wanted to know. Čurda did not play any part in this circumstance.Waffen-SS troops laid siege to the church the following day but, despite the best efforts of over 700 SS soldiers under the command of Generalleutnant Karl Fischer von Treuenfeld, they were unable to take the paratroopers alive; three, including Kubiš, were killed in the prayer loft (although he was said to have survived the battle, he died shortly afterward from his injuries) after a two-hour gun battle. The other four, including Gabčík, committed suicide in the crypt after repeated SS attacks, attempts to smoke them out with tear gas, and Prague fire brigade trucks brought in to try to flood the crypt. The Germans (SS and police) suffered casualties as well, 14 SS allegedly killed and 21 wounded according to one report although the official SS report about the fight mentioned only five wounded SS soldiers. The men in the church had only small-caliber pistols, while the attackers had machine guns, sub-machine guns and hand grenades. After the battle, Čurda confirmed the identity of the dead Czech resistance fighters, including Kubiš and Gabčík.How can a script writer have the nerve to distort history like this. How actors can accept to play in such a cheat!No, although the movie is very well played it doesn't deserve to be seen. It is mandatory to dramatize such events exactly as they occurred; this is part of the world history, some of the people can still be alive and especially the victims of the horror of the Nazi regime and their accomplices in the countries they invaded. It is an obligation to pay the victims tribute for what they suffered for us to be still in free countries today, by at least exposing their history with accuracy.Whether the USA believe it or not, we European were not playing Hollywood movies at the time and we deserve the utmost respect from this country whatever part did it take in the ending of the war which cant be used as an excuse for such gross distortions of facts.

Operation Daybreak (known as "Seven Men at Daybreak" in Argentina)is, in my opinion, one of the best history based World War II films ever made. The Obergruppenfuhrer Reynhard Heydrich's assassination in Prague, 1942, planed by the British and executed by Checz patriots, is pretty close to actual facts in this movie. It has intensity, action a good timing and well performed characters in every level though actors are not known as first rate ones (Bottoms, Andrews). Anton Diffring is very good as Heydrich and you could say he plays his ultimate Nazi aftermany similar roles (Where Eagles Dare, Checkmate or Betrayed!). He was probably older than the 39 years Heydrich was when he was killed but he surely fills the part.The final showdown of the trapped killers in the church surrounded by German soldiers, is well handled and very touching as they realize there is no way out.A final word for the opening scene in which as titles go by the Reichsprotektor is being dressed and polished by several valets at the magnificent residence he has chosen to live with his family (wife and daughter). You notice from the very start this is no ordinary man and not a kind man either.Surely a top 10 film in its genre.

I have studied the Heydrich assassination at some length as an historian, and the film does take some liberties with the facts. However this is to be expected as this is drama – not a documentary. The battle at the end does contain some errors such as the end of the agents in the main church, one was fatally wounded and the other two took poison, instead of being killed in the gun battle, but this in no way detracts from the overall accuracy of the film.The battle in the crypt likewise ended with the four agents committing suicide by gunshot, rather than a mixture of enemy action and suicide.I have been in the crypt many times and have never failed to be impressed by the astounding courage of these men.'In their darkest hour they lit a beacon that illuminated the world'