Heavy

The Heroes of Telemark (1965)

Kirk Douglas and Richard Harris star in this war film based on real events and directed by Anthony Mann. When the Nazis invaded Norway they gained control of a heavy water production factory that would be important to any nuclear weapons program and thus the Allies were keen to sabotage.

While this film chronicles real events it does the usual Hollywood of taking a number of liberties with character and events in an attempt to make a better film. The biggest and most unbelievable invention of the plot is sticking in a professor who becomes a member of the sabotage team with no training, presumably an attempt to stick in a big name American actor in Kirk Douglas to increase interest in the US. Despite a number of historical inaccuracies the film does at least give a general idea of the lengths Norwegian resistance went to to stop Germany getting it's hands on heavy water.

As a piece of entertainment the film is largely adequately made but is not especially tense or exciting. The snow scape backdrops do make for some nice visuals even if they are not particularly capitalised on which is a shame as you would think that Anthony Mann who is better known for his Westerns would be better at using landscape.

3/5