Hart's War:
Hart's War takes place in Belgium, Germany during WWII in 1944. Lieutenant Thomas Hart was captured by German soldiers and was taken to a prison, where they took his boots and left him naked in his cell. While there, his feet became frostbitten and he suffered from extreme cold. Also, a German interrogator forced him to give them information and secret intelligence. After three days, he and a lot of other Americans were put into train cars and taken to a prisoner of war camp. While stopped at a station along the war, two American airplanes began attacking the Germans there. The train cars had been painted with the letters POW but they were covered with thick snow so the airplanes fired on the train. As a result, some of the POWs were killed by friendly fire. In an effort to save themselves, one brave soldier climbs out through a window of the train and opens the door, letting all the POWs out. In th process however, the soldier breaks his shoulder and is shot twice by the planes. Later on, after the firing ceases, he dies of his wounds.
When Lieutenant Hart arrives at the camp, he is debriefed by an American officer, Col. William McNamara. When the Col. asks Hart if he had given in to the Germans when he was captured but Hart says no. McNamara knows otherwise however, because Hart was only held captive for three days and spoke to a Level 1 interrogater. The Col. does not tell Hart what he knows but instead puts him in a barrack with regular soldiers rather than with the other officers including himself. After a short time, two African American airmen, Lieutenants Lincoln Scott and Archer, are brought in from Tuskegee. The two men are the only blacks in the camp and although they are officers, they are still treated with harsh racial prejudice. One soldier in particiular, Vic Bedford, is a strong racist and becomes the mean bad guy (other than the Germans running the camp) throughout the movie.
Later on, Hart witnesses Bedford putting something underneath a bunk matress. The next night while the Germans are inspecting the barracks, they search the matresses and find a tent spike underneath one. Turns out that the bunk belonged to one of the black men, Archer and the Germans drag him outside and shoot him, claiming that he had a concealed weapon and was going to try to escape. After he is shot, the German commander who runs the camp storms into one of the bunkers and destroys a radio that the soldiers had hidden in a wall and were using to receive coded messages. Not long after, Vic Bedford is found dead while Lincoln Scott, the other African American, is seen standing over his body. Scott is accused of killing Bedford and is supposed to be shot but Lt. Hart demands that he gets a proper trial first. The German commander agrees as long as the trial is finished before the end of the week. Lt. Hart, who was a former law student, is appointed as Scott's defense attorney.
The next day, the trial begins in a building where the soldiers put on comedic plays for fun. Col. McNamara acts as the judge while the German officers watch over the trial. Hart puts up a good fight on the first day, but the prosecuter, one of Hart's roomates in the barrack, keeps counter-attacking him. Before the trial continues the next day, the German commander gives Hart a manual on the US Army court-martial proceedings, giving him the upper hand. This furthers the conflict between Hart and McNamara as the Lt. uses the rule book to question the Colonel and how he conducts the trial. On the next night, the trial is drawing to a close for that day but Scott gets up on the witness stand and delivers an emotional and heart-felt account of the struggles that he and his fellow African Americans had to go through in order to make it into the war. He tells of how blacks like him enlist to serve their country but instead of honor are given disrespect in return.
Late that night, Lt. Hart is lying in his bunk and sees a fellow POW suspicially sneaking around the other barracks. Hart gets up and follows him to a room behind the theater where the trial had been taking place. It is there that he discovers that the POWs had been digging a tunnel to get out of the camp. Col. McNamara reveals to Hart that the trial is all a scam and was just a distraction so that the soldiers could dig the tunnel. What's more, the Colonel says that it was him who killed Vic Bedford himself. He also revealed that Bedford put the tent spike underneath Archer's bed and gave the German's the location of the secret radio in return for killing the African American. Lastly, the Colonel tells how he found out that Bedford was going tell the Germans about McNamara's plans so he had to kill him in order to prevent that from happening.
One the last day of the trial, the Colonel and about 30 other soldiers fake having food poisoning to get out of the court proceedings and finish digging their tunnel. As he is about to descend down the tunnel, McNamara overhears Hart's closing statement in which he announces to the court (in order to save Scott) that he killed Bedford himself. The German commander orders everyone out of the theater and says that Hart is to be shot right away. After the head count comes up 35 men short, the commander suspects an escape plot and finds the tunnel. Now that he is aware that the trial was all a scam, he orders everyone in attendance to be killed as well. Right before they are all going to be shot, McNamara returns to the camp and accepts the responsibility. Because Hart was willing to sacrifice himself in order to save a friend, Col. McNamara asks to be killed in his place. The German commander spares the rest of the prisoners and kills hte Colonel himself. In the last scene, Hart leads the salute of McNamara's body and three months later, the Germans surrender and the prison camp is liberated.
I thought this movie was kind of boring at first because the whole film took place at the POW camp and had no fight scenes like the other WWII movies I have watched. I liked how it was hard to predict what would happen. I thought that Lincoln Scott really did kill Bedford for having his friend executed but I was really surprised to learn how that along with the trial was all a scam planned by the Colonel. I also liked how this movie had a good storyline and was different from the others I watched for the past two blogs. Despite it being slightly boring and over two hours long, it was still a good film and I am glad I watched it.
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