"Breakout" is a film apparently based in part on an actual case. In the early 1970s, a man was supposedly falsely imprisoned in Mexico on behalf of the CIA (how true that part is, I have no idea). After years of trying to secure his release, the family decided to take a more active approach...and arranged for a helicopter to land IN the prison and rescue the man....and it worked! This real incident inspired the studio to make "Breakout".
In this story, Jay (Robert Duvall) is imprisoned in a hellish prison because some CIA operative paid the authorities to do this...even though he broke no laws. His wife (Jill Ireland) is beside herself and approaches a pilot (Charles Bronson) to try to fly into the country to rescue him. But the plan and the next one both fail. In the first attempt, she never told the pilot where he was flying in the first place...and when he landed he was attacked by the police and gave up the mission. The second, well...see about that one...and see if there's yet another attempt to free the man.
So is the film any good? It's not bad...reasonably exciting and worth seeing. One of my only reservations is that I found the rape jokes in one of the scenes a bit distasteful....though the 70s were clearly a different time! The other is that the Mexican soldiers giving chase were dumber than the Three Stooges...which doesn't seem very realistic!
In this story, Jay (Robert Duvall) is imprisoned in a hellish prison because some CIA operative paid the authorities to do this...even though he broke no laws. His wife (Jill Ireland) is beside herself and approaches a pilot (Charles Bronson) to try to fly into the country to rescue him. But the plan and the next one both fail. In the first attempt, she never told the pilot where he was flying in the first place...and when he landed he was attacked by the police and gave up the mission. The second, well...see about that one...and see if there's yet another attempt to free the man.
So is the film any good? It's not bad...reasonably exciting and worth seeing. One of my only reservations is that I found the rape jokes in one of the scenes a bit distasteful....though the 70s were clearly a different time! The other is that the Mexican soldiers giving chase were dumber than the Three Stooges...which doesn't seem very realistic!