Probably the worst of the great Henri Verneuil. I expected so much from this adaptation from a superb novel written by Pierre Siniac. This guy was a terrific crime novels author who has never been adapted besides this crap. His novel was outstanding, a men's tale, during WW2, lost in the desert, in the middle of a small town where a bank full of gold asked to be robbed. It was an action flick, violent, dark, and not for sissies of silly audiences for whom Audiard-Verneuil did this big scale crap. And worst, they took great actors, such as Belmondo, Constantin, Villeret...And they wasted it with comedy elements, and above all, the presence of a woman: Marie Laforêt, who had nothing to do in such a tale. The same for some women's tales where men have nothing to do either. Robert Aldrich would have done something awesome with such a story.
Besides the woman in the film, which destroys everything, all the rest, the first part is quite faithful to the book's atmosphere. This scheme, soldiers seeking a shipment of gold during WW2 can remind you another crap: KELLY'S HEROES.
What a waste. A gruesome deception for me, back in 1984.
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