All you want to know about "GUNS OF NAVARONE"

The Guns of Navarone (1961)


Primary cast:

Gregory Peck : Capt. Keith Mallory
David Niven  : Coporal John Anthony Miller
Anthony Quinn  : Colonel Andrea Stavros
Stanley Baker  : Private 'Butcher' Brown
Anthony Quayle  : Major Roy Franklin
James Darren  : Private Spyros Pappadimos
Irene Papas  : Maria Pappadimos
Gia Scala  : Anna
James Robertson Justice  : Commodore Jensen/Prologue Narrator
Richard Harris  : Squadron Leader Howard Barnsby RAAF
Bryan Forbes : Cohn
Allan Cuthbertson : Major Baker
Michael Trubshawe : Weaver
Percy Herbert : Sgt. Grogan
George Mikell : SS-Hauptsturmführer Sessler (Hauptmann)
Walter Gotell : Oberst Muesel (LT Colonel)
Tutte Lemkow : Nikolai, the laundry boy
Albert Lieven : The Commandant
Norman Wooland : Group Captain
Nicholas Papakonstantinou : Patrol Boat Captain




PROLOGUE:

Greece and the islands of the Aegean Sea have given birth to many myths and legends of war and adventure. And these once-proud stones, these ruined and shattered temples bear witness to the civilization that flourished and then died here and to the demigods and heroes who inspired those legends on this sea and these islands. But, though the stage is the same, ours is a legend of our own times, and its heroes are not demigods, but ordinary people.

In 1943, so the story goes, 2000 British soldiers lay marooned on the tiny island of Kheros, exhausted and helpless. They had exactly one week to live for in Berlin the Axis high command had determined on a show of strength in the Aegean Sea to bully neutral Turkey into coming into the war on their side. The scene of that demonstration was to be Kheros, itself of no military value, but only a few miles off the coast of Turkey. The cream of the German war machine, rested and ready, was to spearhead the attack, and the men on Kheros were doomed unless they could be evacuated before the blitz. But the only passage to and from Kheros was guarded and blocked by two great, newly designed, radar-controlled guns on the nearby island of Navarone. Guns too powerful and accurate for any allied ship then in the Aegean to challenge. Allied intelligence learned of the projected blitz only one week before the appointed date. What took place in the next six days became the legend of Navarone.

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Squadron Leader Howard Barnsby RAAF: - Look, sir. First, you've got that ruddy old fortress on top of that ruddy cliff. Then you've got the ruddy fortress inside the cliff. You can't even see the ruddy cave, let alone the ruddy guns. And even if we could, sir, we haven't got a ruddy bomb big enough to smash that ruddy rock. And that's the ruddy truth.
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The Guns Of Navarone

Words by Paul Webster

Music by Dimitri Tiomkin



Islands of Greece are green and beautiful,
Green and beautiful,
Where the olive trees grow
In the field below,
But high on the cliffs the guns are hidden there,
Guns are hidden there,
In a cavern of stone,
Guns of Navarone

There is another isle as beautiful
Where the laurel once bloomed,
Here on this island known as Kheros
Two thousand soldiers are doomed.

Now is the problem how to rescue them
From a crushing defeat
When high on the cliffs
The Guns Of Navarone blocks His Majesty's Fleet

So in the face of odds impossible
Secret saboteurs in a fisherman's skiff
Headed for the cliff.

Six men come to save two thousand men
Two thousand men, the brave and the bold
For whom the bells have tolled.
Six men come to the scale the hills above
Here where the gods were,
Think what the odds were - six men.

Come from the sea with nitro glycerine,
Nitro glycerine and a ladder of rope
And a thing called hope.
Six flies climb the Nazi spider web,
Carefully set the charge and the fuse,
So little time to loose.

Tick-tock, swiftly tick the hands of doom,
Ev'rything reckoned,
Time to the second -
Contact!

Spark and a boom and flames are going up,
Guns are blowing up
Thru the thundering roar
Steam the men of war.
Yas-su, God speed to the gallant men, misson accomplished,
Farewell my friends,
And so the legend ends.

Yas-su, toll the bells of Navarone,
Safe be your journey,
Fair wind attends you. Yas-su. Yas-su.

Now on the island green and beautiful
With the morn again,
Hope is born again.
Free!
We shall be free, live and be free!
Free!
Free!

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Yalo Yalo

(Das Meer erzählt so viel von dir)
(My Friend The Sea)
(Au bord de l'eau)


Is ton afro
Is ton afro tis thalassas
I ayapi mou
I ayapi mou kimate
Parakalo sas kimata
Min mou tin exipnate
Parakalo sas kimata
Min mou tin exipnate

Yialo Yialo Piyename
Ki'olo yia sena leyame
Yialo na pas
Yialo n'arthis
Ta loyia mou
Na thimithis
Yialo na pas
Yialo n'arthis
Ta loyia mou
Na thimithis

Na'tan i tha
Na'tan i thalassa krasi
Ke ta vouna
Ke ta vouna mezedes
K'i varkes krasopotira
Na pinoun i ylentzedes
K'i varkes krasopotira
Na pinoun i ylentzedes

Yialo Yialo Piyename
Ki'olo yia sena leyame
Yialo na pas
Yialo n'arthis
Ta loyia mou
Na thimithis

Yialo na pas
Yialo n'arthis
Ta loyia mou
Na thimithis
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