Sydney Pollack's adaptation of William Eastlake's anti-pro-war/pro-anti-war 1965 novel. Readers familiar with the source text will note the liberal use of Eastlake's sometimes absurd, always insightful exchanges, delivered with a casual brevity that distinguishes Pollack's film from, say, Mike Nichol's long-winded uptight-laidback 1970 adaptation of Joseph Heller's thoroughly anti-war novel Catch-22 (1961).
The grab up top (alas, from the "full-screen" version I found at the newly-reorganized S.P.C.A Thrift Store) is from the scene where U.S. Major Falconer orders his men to cut down the castle's trees in an effort to slow the advancing German army. U.S. Captain Beckman, an art historian in civilian life, tries to convince Falconer that defending the castle is pointless, and will only result in the destruction of it and its priceless art collection. But Falconer, a progressive modern, is having none of it.
CAPTAIN BECKMAN: Europe is dying.
MAJOR FALCONER: Europe is dead. That's why we're here.
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