1963 - THE GREAT ESCAPE, entertaining semi fictional account of a real event

Probably a high point for director John Sturges.  The Great Escape was a passion project for him for many years.

Sturges probably assembled one of the best casts ever.  Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Donald Pleasence, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, James Donald and David McCallum to name a few.

The film does take liberties with the actual events. But overall it is surprisingly faithful to the true story.

The credited writers were James Clavell and W. R. Burnett but the film apparently had a lot of uncredited writers.  In any case, this is an excellent war film.  Running time 172 minutes.