Le Grande Illusion, directed by the great filmmaker Jean Renoir and undoubtably one of the greatest prison movies ever made, hones in French prisoners behind held in German camps during World War I. The plot concerns their attempts to escape, and their subsequent relocation to another more foreboding camp (where they also try to escape). The brilliant and compelling thing about Renoir's film is that everyone is painted as a victim; not a single person caught up in prison life - or indeed, the war - in Le Grande Illusion has it easy, and this realistic and wonderfully humanistic approach to the subject matter is what makes the film a true masterpiece. It puts so many other war film to shame. This is the sort of film that, having sat through you it, you instinctively feel is a great and important work of cinema. Le Grande Illusion also influenced a whole line of other prison movies, such as The Great Escape, but it has been bettered by very few - if any at all.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
