The Dirty Dozen was such a popular movie for MGM that it decided to repeat the formula in another World War II action feature titled The Devil’s Brigade the following year (1968).  And while The Devil’s Brigade is not quite the classic that The Dirty Dozen became, it is certainly well worth watching on its own merit.

Similarities between the two war dramas are remarkable.  Both begin with orders to assemble special military units to be comprised of misfits, prisoners and other men the regular U.S. Army deems to be untrainable.  The Dirty Dozen features twelve such men; The Devil’s Brigade features a hundred or so, then pits those men against a similar number of highly trained and smartly dressed Canadian troops for contrast. The soldiers in both films are forced to bond together and undergo intensive training for missions that may or may not ever take place.  In both cases, the men are given an opportunity to show what they can do.  The “Dirty Dozen” outwit American troops in practice maneuvers, while the “Devil’s Brigade” actually captures an Italian town held by the Germans without firing a shot.  Both of these “practice” missions are comic in tone.  Finally the main objective is undertaken and many of the characters that have enlivened the past two-plus hours are killed in action.

The Devil’s Brigade benefits from Andrew V. McLaglen’s rugged direction, believable situations and dialogue, welcome doses of humor and, most of all, solid character work from the cast.  Movies like this depend on audiences accepting and bonding with the characters strongly enough to maintain interest right through the climactic attack. The Dirty Dozen did this superbly; Jim Brown’s death scene is a classic movie moment that was even eulogized in Sleepless in Seattle!  The misfits of The Devil’s Brigade are less memorable but still well worth knowing.

William Holden, Cliff Robertson and Vince Edwards are the officers who train the men.  Richard Jaeckel (who was excellent in The Dirty Dozen as a guard) is even better here as an acrobatic soldier.  Claude Akins is a loudmouth bully, Jack Watson is the Canadian sergeant, Andrew Prine is the only soldier who wants to be in the outfit, Richard Dawson and Jeremy Slate are Canadian soldiers, while Carroll O’Connor, Michael Rennie and Dana Andrews portray military brass.  And look for former football great Paul Hornung as a lumberjack in the film’s big fight sequence.   ✰ ✰ ✰.  (6:2).