TRIVIA---KELLY'S HEROES was a World War II gold heist movie starring Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Donald Sutherland, Don Rickles and Carroll O'Connor.
KELLY'S HEROES was the second gold heist movie written by Troy Kennedy Martin with the first being the classic THE ITALIAN JOB which starred Michael Caine.
Clint Eastwood signed to star in the movie when his DIRTY HARRY director, Don Siegel, was the director, but Siegel had schedule problems and was replaced by Brian G. Hutton, who had directed Eastwood in WHERE EAGLES DARE.
Ingrid Pitt, who appeared with Eastwood in WHERE EAGLES DARE, was supposed to be in KELLY'S HEROES, but she said she was, "virtually climbing on board the plane bound for Yugoslavia when word came through that my part had been cut."
John Landis was a production assistant on KELLY'S HEROES and had a cameo as a nun. During filming, he came up with the idea for AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON.
KELLY'S HEROES was filmed in Yugoslavia because it had a lot of surplus US military equipment, including World War II-vintage M4 Sherman tanks.
Donald Sutherland's character, Oddball, a Sherman tank commander, tells Kelly that German Tiger tanks annihilated US tanks in Normandy's bocage country. In reality, the Tiger tanks were only in the British sector of Normandy after D-Day, an error that was repeated in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. The Tiger tanks in both movies were really ex-Soviet tanks modified to look like Tigers.
KELLY'S HEROES was the second gold heist movie written by Troy Kennedy Martin with the first being the classic THE ITALIAN JOB which starred Michael Caine.
Clint Eastwood signed to star in the movie when his DIRTY HARRY director, Don Siegel, was the director, but Siegel had schedule problems and was replaced by Brian G. Hutton, who had directed Eastwood in WHERE EAGLES DARE.
Ingrid Pitt, who appeared with Eastwood in WHERE EAGLES DARE, was supposed to be in KELLY'S HEROES, but she said she was, "virtually climbing on board the plane bound for Yugoslavia when word came through that my part had been cut."
John Landis was a production assistant on KELLY'S HEROES and had a cameo as a nun. During filming, he came up with the idea for AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON.
KELLY'S HEROES was filmed in Yugoslavia because it had a lot of surplus US military equipment, including World War II-vintage M4 Sherman tanks.
Donald Sutherland's character, Oddball, a Sherman tank commander, tells Kelly that German Tiger tanks annihilated US tanks in Normandy's bocage country. In reality, the Tiger tanks were only in the British sector of Normandy after D-Day, an error that was repeated in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. The Tiger tanks in both movies were really ex-Soviet tanks modified to look like Tigers.
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