Sergeant Steiner [Breakthrough] *** (1979, Richard Burton, Rod Steiger, Helmut Griem, Curd Jürgens, Robert Mitchum, Michael Parks, Klaus Löwitsch) – Classic Movie Review 8359

With Sam Peckinpah’s 1977 Cross of Iron judged a success, a sequel called Sergeant Steiner [aka Steiner – Das Eiserne Kreuz, 2. Teil, aka Breakthrough] was ordered in 1979, directed by Andrew V McLaglen. James Coburn intended to reprise his Cross of Iron role as Sergeant Steiner, but pulled out at the last minute and was replaced by Richard Burton.

Director Andrew V McLaglen’s 1979 sequel to Sam Peckinpah’s distinguished Cross of Iron starts promisingly by hiring a distinguished cast, though all admittedly past their prime. Burton plays the German Sergeant Steiner from the original film, who lives through the horrors of battle on World War Two’s Western front, rescues American colonel Rogers (Robert Mitchum) and gets involved in the plot to kill Hitler.

Their strong performances are matched by Curd Jürgens (as General Hofmann) and Helmut Griem (as Major von Stransky), the almost equally renowned German actors involved in this middling wartime action thriller, spoiled because the intriguing material gets scant treatment in Tony Williamson and Peter Berneis’s thinly developed screenplay.

Also in the cast are Rod Steiger, Michael Parks, Klaus Löwitsch, Werner Pochath, Véronique Vendell, Horst Janson, Joachim Hansen Walter Ullrich, Dieter Schidor, Bruno Dietrich, Günter Meisner, Sieghardt Rupp and Christoph Waltz.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8359

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