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Celebrities invariably enjoy an unexpected career renaissance just before their untimely passing. So it was with James Coburn, one of “The Magnificent Seven.” The tough guy actor would win an an Academy Award in 1998 for his portrayal of a dissolute father in “Affliction,” a return to cinematic prominence after a ten year battle with chronic arthritis that had paralysed his left hand. Still working prodigiously, he would die suddenly in 2002 from a fatal heart attack at the age of 74.

My own particular favourite amongst his movies is “Cross of Iron,” which deftly sidesteps the stereotypical characterisations so prevalent in war films. The principal protagonists are German soldiers, unconcerned with the politics of Nazism, and overtly preoccupied with both impending defeat and life thereafter. The glue that holds the film together is the central relationship between platoon leader Sergeant Steiner (James Coburn), and his commanding officer Captain Stransky (Maximilian Schell), an oily Prussian aristocrat who has transferred to the Eastern front with the explicit intention of winning the Iron Cross. Steiner couldn’t give a hoot for Iron Crosses, and he actively dislikes oily Prussian aristocrats.

Now digitally restored on Blueray, it’s a movie worth reappraising by those capable of tearing themselves away from mindless CGI epics.

http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/style/articles/2015-08/28/james-coburn-the-ultimate-sixties-tough-guy”