A Bridge Too Far (film)

A Bridge Too Far
original film poster
Directed by	Richard Attenborough
Produced by	Joseph E. Levine Richard P. Levine
Screenplay by	William Goldman
Based on	A Bridge Too Far by Cornelius Ryan
Starring	Dirk Bogarde James Caan Michael Caine Sean Connery Edward Fox Elliott Gould Anthony Hopkins Gene Hackman Hardy Krüger Laurence Olivier Robert Redford Maximilian Schell
Music by	John Addison
Cinematography	Geoffrey Unsworth, BSC
Edited by	Antony Gibbs
Production company	Joseph E. Levine Productions
Distributed by	United Artists
Release date	June 15, 1977
Running time	176 minutes
Country	United Kingdom United States
Language	English German Dutch
Budget	$25 million
Box office	$50,750,000

A Bridge Too Far is a 1977 British-American epic war film based on the 1974 book of the same name by Cornelius Ryan, adapted by William Goldman. It was produced by Joseph E. Levine and Richard P. Levine and directed by Richard Attenborough.

The film tells the story of the failure of Operation Market Garden during World War II. The operation was intended to allow the Allies to break through German lines and seize several bridges in the occupied Netherlands, including one at Arnhem, with the main objective of outflanking German defences in order to end the war by Christmas of 1944.

The name for the film comes from an unconfirmed comment attributed to British Lieutenant-General Frederick Browning, deputy commander of the First Allied Airborne Army, who told Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, the operation's architect, before the operation: "I think we may be going a bridge too far."

The ensemble cast includes Dirk Bogarde, James Caan, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Edward Fox, Elliott Gould, Gene Hackman, Anthony Hopkins, Hardy Krüger, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O'Neal, Robert Redford, Maximilian Schell and Liv Ullmann. The music was scored by John Addison, who had served in the British XXX Corps during Market Garden.