In a British Armyglasshouse in North Africa, prisoners convicted of service offences such as insubordination, being drunk while on duty, going AWOL or petty theft are subjected to repetitive drill routines as a punishment in the blazing desert heat.
The arrival of five new prisoners slowly leads to a clash with the camp authorities. One new NCO guard who has also just arrived employs excessive punishments, which include forcing the five newcomers to repeatedly climb a man-made hill in the centre of the camp. When one dies, a power struggle erupts between brutal ex-civilian prison guard Staff Sergeant Williams, humane Staff Sergeant Harris, and Regimental Sergeant Major Wilson as they struggle to run the camp in conflicting styles.
Roberts is a former squadron sergeant major from the Royal Tank Regiment, convicted of assaulting his commanding officer – which he explains to his fellow inmates was because he was ordered to lead his men in a senseless suicidal attack. Roberts openly scorns Williams' brutality and serves as a challenge to his authority. Like Roberts, the RSM is a career soldier and commands authority within the prison in which he is working. He sees his duty as breaking down failed soldiers, then building them back up again "into men".
The other members of Roberts' cell are McGrath, a hard northerner serving a sentence for drunkenness, fighting and assaulting officers of the Military Police; Army office clerk Stevens, a timid and naive man jailed for going AWOL; Bartlett, a spiv who shirks active service and has been jailed for selling Army vehicle tyres to the Arabs; and the light-hearted King, a West Indian soldier serving a sentence for stealing three bottles of whisky from the officers club and being drunk and disorderly.
Staff Sergeant Williams' ambition is matched only by his cruel treatment of the prisoners; he seeks to use their suffering as a means for promotion. The RSM also questions Staff Sergeant Williams's motives for getting out of London, as in another scene, he mentions the fact that the Germans were bombing the UK (including the civilian prison Williams worked at) just as Williams was volunteering for prison duty in Africa. Staff Sergeant Williams openly admits that he is trying to impress the RSM by showing that he has got what it takes to do the job, and attempts to undermine the RSM with a late-night drinking contest.
Staff Sergeant Harris is the conscience of the prison who sympathises with the men. This causes the RSM to hold the viewpoint that Harris is far too lenient. The officers, both the commandant and the medical officer, take their duties casually.
Williams is not only a bully but also a coward and chooses to single out Bartlett and Stevens who are the two weakest members of the group, particularly Stevens. Stevens finally dies after repeated and unwarranted punishments by Williams, and the whole prison rises in protest. Roberts openly accuses Staff Sergeant Williams of murdering Stevens. King corroborates the story. The RSM faces down the general prison population, ultimately raising a cheer by offering cheese with their dinner. Meanwhile, with the help of two prison guard corporals, Staff Williams beats up Roberts in an empty solitary cell. Roberts suffers a broken foot and Harris gets him carried to see the medical officer. The RSM intervenes and orders Roberts to march despite his injury. King again protests, and after being subjected to racial abuse by the RSM, refuses to wear the uniform or acknowledge any form of army discipline.
The medical officer and Staff Sergeant Harris insist on reporting the abuses at the camp whilst the RSM and Williams join forces in an attempt to intimidate them into backing down. The injured Roberts is left alone in the cell and Williams remains behind. He then prepares to administer another beating to Roberts, when King and McGrath enter the cell, proceed to attack Williams, and beat him off-camera. Roberts pleads with them to stop, knowing that if prisoners beat up a prison officer, any case they may have had against him is lost.
The screenplay was by Ray Rigby, who wrote for TV and had spent time in military prison. Movie rights were bought by Seven Arts Productions, which had a production deal with MGM. Producer Kenneth Hyman arranged for Rigby's script to be rewritten by other people, but when Sidney Lumet came on board as director, Lumet went back to Rigby's original draft. He and Rigby did cut out around 100 pages of material before filming.[1]
"There really isn't a lot of story", said Lumet. "It's all character – a group of men, prisoners and jailers alike, driven by the same motive force, fear."[1]
Sean Connery agreed to play the lead because it represented such a change of pace from James Bond. "It is only because of my reputation as Bond that the backers put up the money for The Hill", he said.[2]
Lumet says he told Connery before filming began that, "'I'm going to make brutal demands of you, physically and emotionally', and he knew I'm not a director who has too much respect for 'stars' as such. The result is beyond my hopes. He is real and tough and not at all smooth or nice. In a way, he's a 'heavy' but the real heavy is the Army."[1]
Filming took place in Almería, Spain, starting 8 September 1964. An old Spanish fort in Málaga was used for the prison.[3] Many people associated with the production regarded the filming as pleasant, despite difficult conditions. Temperatures went above 46 °C (114 °F) and nearly all the cast and crew became ill, even though thousands of gallons of fresh water were brought in.[4]
Rigby published a novelization of the story in 1965.[5]
Strikingly shot in clear, clean lines by Ossie Morris, this subject, at least until the frenzied final stages when the plot takes over entirely, seems to provide the ideal outlet for Sidney Lumet's discursive and fastidious talent. All the scene-setting, in fact, has the sort of brilliance that can result only from a capacity for taking infinite pains. The placing of the men in relation to each other and to their extremely photogenic environment is precise and meaningful in the sense that, without becoming heavily symbolic, it works on more than one level. The hill, and all the organised activity going on around it, has a visual fascination that is enhanced by the dramatic use of natural sounds and by firmly controlled performances from the leading actors: Harry Andrews, as the ruthlessly dictatorial Wilson, couldn't be bettered; Ian Hendry never overplays the difficult role of his sadistic instrument Williams; and Sean Connery portrays the tough Roberts with convincing style. It is only with Ian Bannen, as the man who tries to save Stevens, and Michael Redgrave, as the well-meaning but flaccid Medical Officer, that a feeling of weakness begins to creep in. This, like the final antics of Ossie Davis, is the fault not of the actors but of the film, which presents its case negatively, relying on a collection of liberal clichés to illustrate the positive aspects. The clichés are there from the start, prompting the carefully representative choice of prisoners, and biding their time; but shortly after Wilson silences the prisoners' combined protest about Stevens' death, they come into their own to such an extent that the film takes an hysterical turn from which it never recovers. Ian Bannen's performance, his cynical laugh as he indulges in mock pleasantries with the immovable Sergeant Major, belongs, however enjoyably, to the theatrical side of the film. In the end Lumet's tidy-mindedness, his care in tying-up all the loose ends of an increasingly involved plot, leaves no room for inferences other than the obvious ones. All this is fiction where the hill itself was hard and undeniable fact.[6]
Variety wrote: "Kenneth Hyman's production of The Hill is a tough, uncompromising look at the inside of a British military 'prison in the Middle East during the last war. It is a harsh, sadistic and brutal entertainment, superbly acted by an all-male cast, and made without any concessions to officialdom. ... Sidney Lumet's forceful and authoritative direction gives added power to the production, and Oswald Morris's stark black and white lensing adds to the tough realism. The clipped military dialog may be difficult for some foreign audiences, particularly in the earlier sequences, but that's just a minor flaw. ... Breaking away from his 007 image, Connery gives an intelligently restrained study, carefully avoiding forced histrionics, The juiciest role, however, is that of the prison regimental sergeant major, and Harry Andrews does a standout job. Always a solid and reliable actor, he has never bettered this performance. Another top grade characterisation comes from Ian Hendry as the brutal staff sergeant who attempts to blackmail the medical officer to save himself from the inevitable. A characteristic of the production is the all round acting quality. Each part is clearly drawn and has been exceptionally well cast. Michael Redgrave, in a comparatively minor role, at once suggests the weak M.O. whose conscience is eventually roused; Ian Bannen makes an effective staff sergeant with a sense of decency and fair play ... The Hill may not be to everyone's taste, and certainly may have only limited appeal to femme audiences, but it is stamped with sinceritiy and expertise."[7]
The Radio Times Guide to Films wrote: "When Sidney Lumet cast Sean Connery in The Hill, the former 007 cast his fake hair to the wind for the first time. It's a terse, tough, absolutely riveting picture about an army prison in North Africa where the inmates are forced to march up and down a phoney hill. It's the Greek myth of Sisyphus with a vengeance, an impudent symbol for British colonial impotence in the 1960s, though it's set during the Second World War."[8]
Leslie Halliwell said: "Lurid melodrama which descends fairly quickly into black farce with a number of sweaty actors outshouting each other. Enjoyable on this level when you can hear the dialogue through the poor sound recording."[9]
