The great comicbook war/action hero lives in the pages of this shelved script gathering dust in a Warner Brothers' store room. Our agent hopes exposing him to the light of day may breath life back into this forgotten film project. The "Human Tank" and Eagle Company deserve a shot at winning WWII and getting out of it alive. Beware of evil Nazis and spoilers ahead.
SYNOPSIS: The script begins on full load. Eagle Company, led by SGT. ROCK are under fire from German Stuka planes. German troops are all around, in greater numbers but Eagle company work like a machine. Rock is the transmission, always moving the pace up a notch, never relaxing, shooting Germans till there are no Germans left to shoot. Suddenly German Panzer Tanks surprise the company. Rock is stuck in the wide open with a tank approaching from behind, German troops in tow behind it.
The Panzer’s flame-thrower belches flame and smoke at Rock and when it clears, Rock is gone. The tank moves on and as it goes over a manhole cover, Rock reappears underneath. He pulls up and is dragged along by the tank. With a grenade he takes out the tank and with a quick move Rock mows down the soldiers behind. Kick ass.
This all blurs like a dream. It is, sort of. More like a heroic tale being told to Eagle Company by FARRACCI, a soldier with a gift for gab. Other soldiers sit around in a barnhouse in the Belgian Countryside, resting and listening to the story. Some think it’s a fish-tale, others who know Rock say nothing.
Outside the barn on watch is Rock. One of his watchers returns and excitedly tells of a bunch of Germans sneaking into a barn not far away. Eagle Company moves in, surprises the lot but discovers that they’re just other Americans, who’ve stumbled across a gasoline storehouse. Rock tests for spies using a password trick and the CAPTAIN passes. Rock lets his guard down, turns then shouts Heil Hitler and salutes. Knee jerk reaction reveals these Americans are really Nazis as a few of them salute back. Rock takes em out in a firefight that leaves us with a gasoline pouring out of 100 bullet holes all around. Everyone flees, Rock being the last just before the barn erupts.
The men make it back to a base where Rock warns GENERAL PRITCHARD that he suspects Germans of secretly infiltrating behind American lines. Pritchard doesn’t believe it and dismisses Rock inferring that if German’s were nearby then they’d hear shells. “Do you hear shells Rock?” Rock turns just as the first shell is heard, slamming into the basecamp. Mayhem ensues, our friend Farracci is killed along with a few others. Rock, under fire fights back but when STUKAS move in and drop everything they’ve got all we see is fire everywhere. Rock goes down.
Rock wakes up in a beat down cathedral in Belgium, having been knocked out for 8 days. All he remembers is a red-headed angel, actually a young medic who probably saved his life. As Rock gets stronger he immediately moves about to find the young man, to no avail. Rock, ever restless gets his call back to action when the peaceful mobile medic unit gets bombed by the Germans. Rock finds himself some ammo, clothes boots and a handful of cigars to chomp and heads out.
We find out from a messenger that Eagle Company is back out in action without Rock. A young, green C.O., TEABERRY is assigned to Eagle Company who is in action along with another unit, BAKER COMPANY. Teaberry sets out to assume his command.
On his way, Teaberry comes across Rock marching back to battle. He offers a Rock a ride but next thing we see Rock is driving. Rock takes charge without much fight from Teaberry who doesn’t really know what he’s doing.
Eagle is under fire from the Germans and Rock and Teaberry run straight into the fray. After fighting it all out separately Eagle Company, Baker Company and Rock and Teaberry all manage to come together. We meet SGT. STEELE, a brickhouse of a man, almost a bookend to our hero Rock. They all band together and move out. Teaberry conducts a mail call for Eagle but is finding that a lot of the names he calls go unanswered, the Company is losing men.
We’re introduced now to the German Colonel Heydrich who’s been commanded to bring a large brigade of Tiger Tanks up through the lines and to Bastogne to fortify the advantage the German Army currently holds over the American troops there. Heydrich reluctantly takes the charge and moves on, commanding with a strong hand, destroying all and killing prisoners with little mercy.
As Eagle/Baker move on they come across the brigade of tanks. Seeing the directions they’re headed they decide that they’re going to take out the brigade before it gets to Bastogne, where they’re also headed. Nine men of Eagle/Baker vs 18 Tiger Tanks plus German Infantry equals suicide. Rock doesn’t flinch.
Rock stages a well-lit, well planned ambush and has success, not total however. After a good fight, Eagle is captured, Rock and Steele have gone missing.
Held at bay the men expect to be shot at the brutal hands of Heydrich. Rock and Steele return however disguised as Germans and take over the task, subsequently being able to take out more Germans in the process. Heydrich doesn’t know what has happened, he chances upon Teaberry, also now in disguise. Heydrich tries to test Teaberry and make him slip. Teaberry barely makes it past but his German is barely convincing. Eagle makes off just as Heydrich realizes he’s been fooled out of this band of prisoners, who now know about his mission. Heydrich moves out with his brigade, a still strong 15 tanks and infantry.
Eagle, now shrunken in numbers, injured and tired are on the retreat. They need a miracle to stop that brigade. They get one. A wayward cook who happened to steal a General’s helmet is not only now mistaken for a General but he has also found an operational Sherman Tank. General ‘COOK’ is trying to set up a blockade to stop the Germans himself and now he has Eagle Company to help. Rock, Steele and the rest move into action again.
Now they wait. As the rumble approaches, Cook uses his General’s Rank to order the area around their blockade to be shelled. HQ thinks this is crazy, wondering how a general got behind the lines.
The rumble approaches but the shelling does not happen and now it’s Eagle, one tank against 15 Panzers with Heydrich at the helm. The shells don’t arrive so Rock and Steele take them all on themselves. They fight as well as they can given their disadvantage and just as it looks like they’re about to lose, the shelling arrives. Panzer tanks everywhere are blowing up, and Rock gains the advantage. When the shelling stops, Rock grabs a missile launcher and Teaberry and takes on the rest on their own. More success, but they’re still up against tanks. Rock manages to get atop of the last one, containing Heydrich. He lets it ride over him, grabs on, climbs up on top and goes in himself, personally strangling Heydrich to death using the dogtag chains of the men he and Eagle Company have lost. The brigade is destroyed.
COMMENTS: SGT. ROCK starts with a bang, keeps you going with a bang and ends with a bang though possibly not a big enough one. From cover to cover this script is laced with adrenaline, the action scenes, situations and surprises are all delivered with punch. It’s a lot of great action to keep the eyes busy and it will make for some great shots and scenes but on the other end of the scale there’s really not enough plot and storyline to connecting it all together here.
The main characters are exactly what one would expect. Rock and Steele are cartoonish, hulking brickhouses of soldiers, shirts stretched over muscles, stomping through mud with their boots and spitting lead from their guns as they chew on their cigars. The rest of Eagle company are less pronounced in attitude and presence but make up for it with the typical range of personalities. The mouthy Italian Farracci, the spoilsport grump of the group RETREAD and the daydreaming KLEZEWSKI with the typical pregnant wife back home. This script really suffers from a lack of an antagonist with a face on it. The Evil Nazis make for a great enemy but we never really get to focus on just one of them to put a face on that enemy. As an example, Raiders of the lost ark gave the Nazis a spokesperson, someone for the audience to focus on and hate and to jeer as he perished. Heydrich is the sole and underutilized exception here but to only a mild effect. He acts in this script under orders from above, seen as someone just doing their job. Either he or another Nazi figure needs to be inserted, hopefully one that is the over-the-top Nazi zealot we just love to hate.
As exciting as the scenes will look in this flick the plot is too straight forward. Point A to Point B and that’s about it. Eagle Company have their orders, they march until they find their objective and then they succeed. There didn’t seem to be enough plot to distract the reader from the action here. Everything happens as expected, there’s no real second act predicament to make us think that maybe the guys won’t pull through. I wanted to see one of the ‘fake’ impostor American soldiers join the group and successfully infiltrate Eagle Company or perhaps have the situation be more harrowing when Eagle company does get captured as prisoners. The whole ‘captive prisoner’ situation was dealt with in one or two pages, a bigger double-cross is needed with perhaps Rock being held captive while an underdog from Eagle Company pulls through and saves the day.
I have to say that the dialogue and general flow of SGT. ROCK was great. I could picture the different characters saying these things and having it sound as cool as the action going on all around. The flow of the action was great too, it seems that every shot or scene I wanted to see in this story was described as I would imagine it.
This is a great script that only needs work to make it even greater. I’m cheering for Rock and his Eagle Company all the way through. I don’t have a distinct enemy to boo at however and think that a prominent villain needs to be established to create a more plausible threat to Rock and Eagle. A more plausible threat to our heroes would also arise if the plot twisted a little bit more and the storyline wasn’t so straightforward. Additional threats such as American HQ deciding to pull out all support on Eagle, dissension amongst the company or some kind of double cross would make the climax more exciting than just the action we see on the battlefield.
RECOMMENDATION: Of course this script has already been recommended for development. I asked around and yes Arnold is considered. Long time ago McTiernan was attached to direct... kaching! And Lord of Producing Joel Silver in charge. This script apparently has been in development since the mid-80's... yikes. I wish it would get made sooner than later. The combination this movie provides between being a WAR movie and an ACTION movie is appealing. It has a distinct appeal in being a good WAR movie but also a wider appeal because it is also or moreso a great ACTIONER. Casting not only Rock but also the rest of the crew in this movie would only make it more appealing and exciting. Of course Jean Reno as Kazlewski, Steve Buscemi as Farracci and perhaps an off-kilter Bruce Willis as the messhall cook cum General Cook are my choices. Okay maybe not Buscemi - that’s too ‘in’. There’s only one choice for Sgt. Rock and that’s Arnold. I think this role was written for him anyways.
