Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

ChicDragon It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Comeuppance Reviews Set primarily in Yugoslavia during World War II, Bridge to Hell is the story of Lt. Bill Rogers (Forest), a U.S. Air Force pilot who was shot down and escaped from a POW camp, and his compatriots Sgt. Mario Espozi (Mucari), and Blinz (Valente), a former German soldier who deserted and decided to join the good guys. Along their perilous travels to reach the allies in Italy, they end up teaming up with a small band of Partisans, including Vanya (Ferre). What ensues are a bunch of battles between our heroes and the Nazis, and not much else. There's also a subplot about "St. Basil's treasure", and how to find it and what to do with it. Will our heroes finally reach the BRIDGE TO HELL, and if so, why would they want to cross it? Bridge to Hell is a rather staid World War II actioner. It's not a bad movie per se, but it's run-of-the-mill and certainly not Lenzi's finest hour. Lenzi was doing a lot of movies like this in the final third of his career, and nothing about Bridge to Hell stands out in any way. His prior movie, The Wild Team (1985),  is very similar, but instead of being set during WWII, it's an exploding-hutter in the jungle. The main problem is that it's all very samey – rural locations, various different missions that involve shooting, blowing up planes, blowing up trains, blowing up bridges, and stock footage of all of the above. Instead of just a bunch of random Nazis, there should have been one super-evil Nazi bad guy. As we've seen countless times before, when there's no strong, central villain, the movie suffers, and Bridge to Hell is no exception.Not that all the aforementioned shooting-and-blow-up missions are all bad – there's a very cool train explosion, and it was nice to see our heroes dropping bombs on the baddies by hand from out of a biplane – but some more meat on the bone as it relates to character development, suspense, or surprises would have been nice. Also in the win column are pre-political correctness bits of dialogue such as the above quote and the fact that Rogers consistently calls his Italian buddy "Spaghetti". That's his nickname for him, and not only does Espozi not care, it perhaps makes the bond between the two men even stronger. Okay, we might be reading into that just a tad bit too much, but we really hate political correctness. Also, they were in the midst of a war zone, so there were no "safe spaces" to run to. Literally.For the 1989 U.S. VHS release on Cannon, they had their current star, Michael Dudikoff, do an intro to the movie, as they did for other titles in the "Action Adventure Theater" series. This intro is not included on the Inglorious Bastards 2: Hell Heroes DVD collection where Bridge to Hell can currently be found. The VHS tracking lines did find their way into the collection, however. In the end, Bridge to Hell is good-natured but dull, and not exactly a must-see.

al_duke --As spoken by Lieutenant Rogers. That was the one line in "Bridge To Hell" that stuck out in this no-budget WWII action flick. I watched it one day when I was off on one of the movie channels, whose theme of the day was World War II action flicks. It was very cheesy, and the storyline was very loose, the characters all seemed like they came straight out of a comic book; and it had scenes that went nowhere. However, I found the Yugoslavian setting and the plot device of Yugoslav partisan activity during the war years very interesting, which is not something often seen by US audiences. Then again, knowing Umberto Lenzi's work, I sort of knew what to expect. So if you are looking for historical accuracy, technical accuracy, great casting and acting, and a great storyline, look elsewhere; but if you just want cartoonish combat action and lots of explosions, with the added bonus of seeing some lovely Bosnian scenery, you've come to the right place!

Michael_Elliott Bridge to Hell (1986) ** (out of 4) Italian WWII film has three Allied POWs trying to make it across Yugoslavia to safe lines in Italy but along their journey they learn about a treasure being hid from Nazis so they decide to steal it themselves. The story is rather weak and director Lenzi seems to forget what the actual story is at times because the movie is constantly going off in different directions and we get scenes that don't appear to have anything to do with the actual story. Just take a look at one sequence where a bunch of guard dogs show up for no apparent reason unless that said reason ended up on the cutting room floor. The film was obviously done on a very cheap budget as there's very little here that would make you think that you were actually watching a war movie. We do get a couple big battle scenes with a lot of explosions and gun fire but it all looks rather cheap. We also get the mandatory plane crash, quick edit of pilots jumping out and then quick edit of an explosion. The entire movie is pretty much built around stealing this treasure but this too never really gets resolved and by the time the end credits start you wonder if you're missing something or if the production simply ran out of money. Lenzi had pr oven himself to be a good director but he doesn't really do much here as we get no style, no clear story being told and worse of all is that there are many times when the movie just drags along. None of the lead actors are all that good and it doesn't help that the dubbing is rather bad.

paul_johnr In the late 1980s, exploitation giant Cannon Films released a series of direct-to-video action flicks called 'Action-Adventure Theater,' which sported the endorsement of 'B' movie icon Michael Dudikoff. These four movies were cheap, zero-budget knockoffs from smaller European producers that had no chance of being widely marketed in the United States.'Un Ponte per l'inferno' AKA 'Bridge to Hell' is the lone title in this series with an historical context, set in Yugoslavia during World War II. The film was written and directed by Umberto Lenzi, whose career was in freefall at this point and would soon include more low-budget stinkers and hack television credits. Italian cult cinema fans are usually aware of Lenzi, who became a master of the giallo through such charmers as 'Orgasmo' and 'Seven Blood-Stained Orchids' while milking the war genre in 'Battle of the Commandos' and 'The Greatest Battle.' After becoming a recognized talent during the 1960s and 70s, however, Lenzi seemed to lose his mind, taking part in the deplorable 'Eaten Alive' and 'Cannibal Ferox' besides other trashy horror films.Lenzi was clearly out of options in his directorial career by the time of this film, as its cheapness is apparent from the beginning. The action takes place in Yugoslavia during the time of German occupation and focuses on three escaped POWs who are trying to reach the allied forces in Italy: Lieutenant Bill Rogers (Andy J. Forest), a U.S. air force pilot; Sergeant Mario Espozi (Carlo Mucari), an Italian soldier; and Blinz (Paki Valente), an Austrian who has deserted the Wehrmacht. With help from an Orthodox priest, the trio is led to a band of partisans who need pilots to fly their two remaining airplanes and bombard German armaments in the hillsides. The POWs meanwhile learn from nun-turned-partisan Vanya (Francesca Ferre) of priceless gold chalices that are enshrined in her order's St. Basil convent. After running two aerial missions successfully, the POWs decide amongst themselves to steal the treasure. They exchange their flying services for weapons and get help from Vanya to find the chapel, unaware of their plan.The premise of 'Bridge to Hell' is terribly weak and there is nothing in the script or production values to keep things afloat. It is all just a pretext for several lame action sequences in which a tiny partisan group fights hundreds of Germans and mows them down without breaking a sweat. Most of these sequences are badly acted and interspersed with stock footage from better-financed productions. This is obvious from how the film's characters are shown in tight locations and never integral to what is 'happening' nearby. There are times aplenty when continuity and editing skills are forgotten, leading to hilariously bad moments. The photography by adult film cinematographer Luigi Ciccarese is also overexposed and has washed-out color; it seems to have been downgraded in order for the aging stock footage to look more cohesive with Lenzi's own work.There is nothing in the plot to generate dramatic tension and the film quickly becomes a ridiculous, poorly thought-out cycle of gunfights, aerial maneuvers, and running through forests (as in trees, not Andy J.). The aerial bombardments by these POWs involve two shod biplanes that seem like relics from World War I and bombs that are thrown from the planes by hand(!). No matter how old or new the planes are, the idea of two such aircraft taking on a swarm of advanced German fighters (which the stock footage clearly shows) is ridiculous. Partisans on the ground stave off dozens of Germans with a few machine guns when in real life they wouldn't have lasted for more than two seconds. There are also crazy plot gaps such as when German attack dogs emerge from thin air and are gone as quickly as they came. Additional treats are the horrible audio quality and synthesized music by Fabio Frizzi that is pretty much a single theme repeated over and over again (like the plot). The very small pluses in this film are occasional touches of humor (Forest and Mucari bet a Rita Hayworth photo and a broken pocket watch during bombardment) and the presence of Francesca Ferre, who draws attention rather easily.One can never expect much from direct-to-video films, but it's clear that Umberto Lenzi hardly tried to make this film entertaining. Assuming he knew how cheap this movie would be, the director could have written a script that focused on character and did away with grandiose visions like 'The Greatest Battle.' But for one reason or another, Lenzi fooled himself into thinking that 'Bridge to Hell' could achieve those heights with the right amount of cleverness. This is largely why 'Bride to Hell' will stay buried in a tall mountain of 80s shlock, with little to no artistic merit.-Turkey- (0 stars out of 4)