本片是由Joseph J. Lawson执导的一部影片。1944年,战事如火如荼,一支美国的坦克队伍英勇作战,却难敌纳粹军队的攻击,屡屡败退,千钧一发之际,他们找到了突破口,终于冲出敌军的防线。然而此时坦克燃料用完,他们不得不步行前进,路上他们遇到了一个修女,并从修女口中得知不远处孤儿院还有许多孩子等待救援,原本负责保护他们的美军护送队已被德军处决,修女执意回去保护孩子,为了保护无辜的人们,士兵们跟随修女来到了孤儿院……
太平洋战争初期,美军将兵力投入欧洲战场,无力挽回菲律宾战事,导致一万名美军、六万名菲军在巴丹半岛被俘。日军一直残酷对待这些战俘,军部更于1944年一月决定屠杀俘虏,这部电影,讲述的就是发生在44年一月四天中的故事。
游骑兵上尉普林斯分属幕西中校的队伍,他们接受了在麦克阿瑟将军北上过程中营救某战俘营里500名美军的任务,由于日军对待战俘毫不留情,此次行动必须高度隐秘。同一时间,战俘营中的少校吉布森(约瑟夫•费因斯 Joseph Fiennes 饰)正艰难的为生存和获取外界信息而努力,虽然当地有护士玛格丽特等人想法设法为战俘提供帮助,但缺药的状况一直存在。为执行屠杀命令,宪兵军官长井接管了战俘营,而战俘营外,游骑兵战士们经过秘密行军终于抵达了目的地,营救成败,很快就要揭晓……
The winter of 1917, the North-East front, the final clashes of the Great War. An Italian stronghold situated at 1800 metres above sea level, on the Asiago plateau, described in the novels of Mario Rigoni Stern. It’s snowing everywhere; the Austrian trenches are so close that you can hear the enemy soldiers breathing. A hundred years since the outbreak of World War I, maestro Ermanno Olmi describes with Torneranno i prati his vision of a conflict that cost the lives of 16 million human beings, just as it was brought back to him by the memory of his father, called to arms at 19 years of age, to find himself within the bloodbath of Carso and Piave. A drama that scarred his youth and the rest of his life, just like millions of others.