The Long and the Short and the Tall (film)

The Long and the Short and the Tall released as Jungle Fighters in the USA and Canada is a 1961 British war film directed by Leslie Norman, which stars Richard Todd, Richard Harris, Laurence Harvey, David McCallum and Ronald Fraser. The film, which is based on a 1959 play with the same name, by Willis Hall, takes place in a Burmese jungle in 1942 during the Malayan Campaign.

During the Japanese invasion of Burma in 1942, a sevenstrong British sonic warfare sonic deception patrol takes refuge in a dilapidated hut at an abandoned tin mine in the Burmese jungle. Tension rises as they lose radio contact with their command force but learn the Japanese are nearby. The plot thickens when a lone Japanese scout stumbles across the hut, and his fate becomes the squads second dilemma. Sergeant Mitchem, the man in command of the patrol, wants to take the prisoner back to headquarters for interrogation. But as the men argue the prisoners destiny, tempers flare. Sergeant Mitchem clashes with his contemptuous secondincommand Corporal Johnstone and struggles to maintain discipline among his mutinous charges. The chief culprit is the gruff Private Bamforth, a man who dislikes both authority and the army but gradually becomes the conscience of the detachment.The film was shot at Elstree Studios in 1960, where Richard Todd had starred in The Dam Busters a few years earlier. Todd loathed making this film, however, as he didnt get along with Laurence Harvey, In an interview many years later, he said, I didnt enjoy working with Laurence Harvey... I took it for granted that they would cast Peter OToole, who was marvellous on stage, but they said they wanted a name. ........

Source: Wikipedia