{{Short description|1962 film directed by Jean Renoir}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2024}} {{Infobox film | name = The Elusive Corporal | image = Le-caporal-epingle-poster.jpg | caption = Film poster | director = [[Jean Renoir]] | producer = Adry De Carbuccia <br /> Roland Girard <br /> Georges Glass | writer = [[Guy Lefranc]]<br />[[Jacques Perret (writer)|Jacques Perret]]<br />Jean Renoir | starring = [[Jean-Pierre Cassel]] <br /> [[Claude Brasseur]] | music = [[Joseph Kosma]] | cinematography = Georges Leclerc | editing = Renée Lichtig | studio = Les Films du Cyclope | distributor = [[Pathé Consortium Cinéma]] | released = {{film date|1962|5|23|df=yes}} | runtime = 105 minutes | country = France | language = French | budget = | gross = $16.9 million<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.jpbox-office.com/fichfilm.php?id=9343|title=Le Caporal Epingle (1962) - JPBox-Office}}</ref> }}
'''''The Elusive Corporal''''' ({{langx|fr|'''Le Caporal épinglé'''}}) is a 1962 French film directed by [[Jean Renoir]] that stars [[Jean-Pierre Cassel]], [[Claude Brasseur]], and [[Claude Rich]].<ref name="NY Times">{{cite news |url=https://movies.nytimes.com/movie/15644/The-Vanishing-Corporal/overview |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110520065746/http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/15644/The-Vanishing-Corporal/overview |url-status=dead |archive-date=20 May 2011 |title=New York Times: The Elusive Corporal |accessdate=19 July 2008| first=Bosley |department=Movies & TV Dept. |work=[[The New York Times]] |author-link=Bosley Crowther |date=2011 | last=Crowther}}</ref> It was entered into the [[12th Berlin International Film Festival]].<ref name="imdb">{{cite web |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055827/awards |title=IMDB.com: Awards for The Elusive Corporal |accessdate=6 February 2010 |work=imdb.com}}</ref>
Renoir shot his film in Austria in 1961 from [[Jacques Perret (writer)|Jacques Perret]]'s book based on his own [[prisoner of war]] experiences.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1992/12/12/-jacques-perret/|title = - Jacques Perret}}</ref> Renoir's friend and assistant director [[Guy Lefranc]] had also been a World War II prisoner of war<ref>Bergan, Ronald ''Jean Renoir: Projections of Paradise'' Overlook Press, 1995</ref> and had developed the project for seven years.<ref>p.58 Durgnat, Raymond ''Jean Renoir'' University of California Press, 1974</ref> The story serves as a companion piece to the director's 1937 film, ''[[Grand Illusion (film)|Grand Illusion]]'', once more bringing together men from across the broad social spectrum of French society to depict one man's Sisyphean efforts to escape captivity in a German POW camp.
==Plot== Among over a million French prisoners of war taken to work in camps in Germany in 1940 is the Corporal, a young man of good background who, finding the oppressiveness of Nazi Germany and the misery of prison life unbearable, makes repeated efforts to escape. Escapes from a logging camp, a brick factory, and a dairy farm all result in recapture, followed by weeks in a punishment camp. Taken into town for dental treatment, he wins the affection of the dentist's teenage daughter, Erika.
His last foray, with two companions, uses the trick of measuring the roadway through the camp gates and then disappearing once in open country. Ringing at the dentist's door, Erika lets them in and, when asked for civilian clothes, she kits them out. Taking a train. they are identified as foreigners by a passenger and the [[Feldgendarmerie|military police]] are called. At that moment the train runs into an Allied bombing raid, upon which everybody jumps out. Escaping cross country, they encounter a farmer who proves to be another French escapee: he gives them food and describes a safe route to the frontier. The Corporal and his remaining companion part on a bridge in Paris, free men among friends in the country they love.
==Cast== {{castlist| * [[Jean-Pierre Cassel]] as Le caporal / The Corporal * [[Claude Brasseur]] as 'Papa' / 'Pop' * [[O. E. Hasse]] as Le voyageur ivre dans le train * [[Claude Rich]] as Ballochet * [[Jacques Jouanneau]] as Penche-à-gauche * [[Sacha Briquet]] as L'évadé grimé en vielle femme * Raymond Jourdan as Hippolyte Dupieu * [[Guy Bedos]] as Le prisonnier qui bégaye * [[Philippe Castelli]] as Le prisonnier électricien * [[Gérard Darrieu]] as L'homme qui louche / The cross-eyed man * [[Cornelia Froboess]] as Erika Schmidt (as Conny Froboess) }}
==Production== [[Guy Lefranc]] was assistant director on the film. The film's sets were designed by the [[art director]] [[Wolf Witzemann]]. [[Location shooting]] took place around [[Paris]] and [[Vienna]].
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== *{{IMDb title|id=0055827|title=The Elusive Corporal}}
{{Jean Renoir}} {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Elusive Corporal, The}} [[Category:1962 films]] [[Category:1960s war comedy films]] [[Category:French war comedy films]] [[Category:1962 French-language films]] [[Category:French black-and-white films]] [[Category:World War II prisoner of war films]] [[Category:Military comedy films]] [[Category:Films based on French novels]] [[Category:Films set in Germany]] [[Category:Films shot in Austria]] [[Category:Films shot in Paris]] [[Category:Films directed by Jean Renoir]] [[Category:Pathé films]] [[Category:1962 comedy films]] [[Category:Films scored by Joseph Kosma]] [[Category:1962 French films]]