The Great Escaper

The Great Escaper is a 2023 British comedy-drama directed by Oliver Parker, written by William Ivory, and starring Michael Caine (which retired from acting after this movie) and Glenda Jackson (who sadly passed away a few months after the release of this movie).

The film (which is based on real life events) tells the story of Bernard Jordan (Caine), a 90-year-old Royal Navy veteran who makes headlines when he quietly breaks out of his care home to travel from England to France for the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Determined to pay his respects to fallen comrades, Bernard undertakes the journey alone, encountering kindness from strangers and revisiting memories of wartime service along the way. As his disappearance causes concern back home—particularly for his devoted wife René (Jackson)—the film interweaves this present-day adventure with reflections on love, aging, duty, and the enduring emotional weight of war, celebrating both personal courage and long-term companionship.

Gerontological films based on true stories can provide valuable platforms for exploring key theoretical issues in aging while grounding them in lived experience. As discussed in my previous reviews of notable films such as 27 Nights, Will and Harper, and The Duke, cinema can offer nuanced insights into later life, identity, and social structures surrounding aging.

Unfortunately, while The Great Escaper tells a moving story and benefits from the excellent performances of both Caine and Jackson, it ultimately falls short of becoming a meaningful gerontological film. Although it adopts a familiar life-course perspective—shifting between the protagonist’s wartime past and his present-day confrontation with aging—it relies heavily on stereotypical representations of veteran soldiers, war-related trauma, and power relations within residential care settings. As a result, the film misses an opportunity to transform a compelling real-life episode into a richer and more critically engaged exploration of aging. What remains is a sense of a missed opportunity: a good story that never quite becomes the thoughtful gerontological film it could have been.

UK

2023

Director: Oliver Parker

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEvYEPNxHzo