Operation Daybreak [1975] [DVD]

A grimly exciting war drama about the Czech resistance's assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, deputy chief of the Gestapo and better known as Hitler's “Hangman”. This is drily, if expertly, directed by Reach for the Sky veteran Lewis Gilbert, and features a motley cast including American Timothy Bottoms and a particularly excellent Anthony Andrews as Czech patriots.

That this film convinces is a tribute to the story, and today, when the village of Lidice, which was razed by the Nazis in reprisal for the assassination, is hardly remembered, its telling is still timely.