Sergeant J.J. Sefton. I have always found him to be a rather fascinating character. Fascinating because my reaction to him has always been hopelessly ambivalent.
On the one hand, he is rotten son-of-a-bitch. A monomaniacally selfish bastard intent only on turning everything to his own advantage. He may be just one more prisoner of war in one more German stalag but damned if he isn’t going to be [by far] the most comfortably situated. And if that means using everyone else as pawns [or dupes] in his various “business” enterprises, so be it. He figures it’s going to be a long war so he may as well make the best of it. And boy does he ever. He becomes, well, the very embodiment of dog-eat-dog capitalism.
On the other hand…
Yes, there is another side. Sefton may be all of these things…but he’s the one to go to to get things done. The guy that makes things happen. He’s the one who brings all of these dazzling enterprises to life. And boy do they ever make life in the barracks one hell of a lot more…stimulating. The telescope, the horse race, the distillerry, the gambling. How unimaginably duller life would be there without him.
Think of him as, say, one of Nietzsche’s Ubermen. Only a less principled – philosophical? – rendition.
But then things get complicated. The Germans have planted a spy in the barracks. They seem to know everything the POWs are up to. Who could it be? Well, those in charge despise Sefton. So he becomes their number one target. But Sefton [once again] manages to put the pieces [starting with a big one on the chessboard] together first.
Lots and lots of laughs here too. Thanks in particular to Animal and Shapiro. But this is no Hogan’s Heroes. Or, at any rate, the Germans are considerably less cartoonish.
IMDb
[b]The movie was shot in sequence. Many of the actors were surprised by the final plot twist.
William Holden did not like the part of Sefton at all as written in the script, thinking him too selfish. He kept asking Billy Wilder to make Sefton nicer and Wilder refused. Holden actually refused the role but was forced to do it by the studio.[/b]
at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalag_17
trailer: youtu.be/PQh3qoGYVTg
STALAG 17 [1953]
Written in part and directed by Billy Wilder
[b]Cookie [narrating]: I don’t know about you, but it always makes me sore when I see those war pictures… all about flying leathernecks and submarine patrols and frogmen and guerillas in the Philippines. What gets me is that there never w-was a movie about POWs - about prisoners of war. Now, my name is Clarence Harvey Cook: they call me Cookie. I was shot down over Magdeburg, Germany, back in '43; that’s why I stammer a little once in a while, 'specially when I get excited. I spent two and a half years in Stalag 17. “Stalag” is the German word for prison camp, and number 17 was somewhere on the Danube. There were about 40,000 POWs there, if you bothered to count the Russians, and the Poles, and the Czechs. In our compound there were about 630 of us, all American airmen: radio operators, gunners, and engineers. All sergeants. Now you put 630 sergeants together and, oh mother, you’ve got yourself a situation. There was more fireworks shooting off around that joint… take for instance the story about the spy we had in our barracks…
…
Hoffy: They ought to be under the barbed wire soon.
Shapiro: Looks good outside.
Animal: I hope they hit the Danube before dawn.
Price: They’ve got a good chance. The longest night of the year.
Duke: I’ll bet they make it to Friedrichshaven.
Animal: I bet they make it all the way to Switzerland.
Sefton: And I bet they don’t get out of the forest.
Duke: Now what kind of crack is that?
Sefton: No crack. Two packs of cigarettes say they don’t get out of the forest.
Hoffy: That’s enough, Sefton. Crawl back in your sack.
Shapiro: He’d make book on his own mother getting hit by a truck.
Sefton: Anybody call?
…
[after hearing gunshots, Sefton, who bet against the escapees, glumly collects the cigarettes]
Duke: Hold it, Sefton. I said hold it! So we heard some shots. So who says they didn’t get away?
Sefton [sadly]: Anybody here want to double their bet?
…
Duke: What slipped up, Hoffy?
Hoffy: Don’t ask me. Price was elected Security.
Duke (To Price): Okay, Security – what happened?
Price: I wish I knew. We had everything figured out to the last detail.[/b]
Except one.
[b]Sefton [slapping Shapiro’s hand when he tries to use Sefton’s soap]: Private property, bub.
…
Duke: Come on, Trader Horn, let’s hear it. What’d you give the krauts for that egg?
Sefton: 45 cigarettes. Price has gone up.
Duke: They wouldn’t be the cigarettes you took us for last night?
Sefton: What was I gonna do with them? I only smoke cigars.
Duke: Nice guy. The krauts shoot Manfredi and Johnson last night, and today he’s out trading with them.
Sefton: Look. This may be my last hot breakfast on account of they’re going to take that stove out of here, so would you let me eat it in peace?
Animal: Now ain’t that too bad? Tomorrow you’ll have to suck a raw egg.
Shapiro: Oh, he don’t have to worry. He can always trade the krauts for a six-burner gas range. Maybe a deep freeze, too.
Sefton: What’s the beef, boys? So I’m trading. Everybody here is trading. So maybe I trade a little sharper. That make me a collaborator?
Duke: A lot sharper, Sefton. I’d like to have some of that loot you got in those footlockers.
Sefton: Oh you would, would you? Listen, stupe. The first week I was in this joint, somebody stole my Red Cross package, my blanket, and my left shoe. Well, since then I’ve wised up. This ain’t no Salvation Army - this is everybody for himself, dog eat dog.
…
Sefton [to Duke and Price and Hoffy]: What’re you guys trying to prove anyway? Cutting trap doors! Digging tunnels! You know what the chances are to get out of here? And let’s say you do get all the way to Switzerland! Or say to the States? So what? They ship you to the Pacific and slap you in another plane. And you get shot down again and you wind up in a Japanese prison camp. That’s if you’re lucky! Well, I’m no escape artist! You can be the heroes, the boys with the fruit salad on your chest. Me – I’m staying put. And I’m going to make myself as comfortable as I can. And if it takes a little trading with the enemy to get me some food or a better mattress – that’s okay by Sefton!
…
Price: Which one of us is the informer?
Schultz: You are trying to say that an American would inform on other Americans?
Duke: That’s the general idea.
[he looks over at Sefton]
Duke: Only it’s not so general as far as I’m concerned.
Schultz: You are talking crazy!
Sefton: It’s no use, Schulz, you might as well come clean. Why don’t you just tell them it’s me, because I’m really the illegitimate son of Hitler, and after the Germans win the war, you’re going to make me the Gauleiter of Zinzinnati!
…
Cookie [narrating]: I guess it’s about time I told you a few more things about that Sefton guy. If I was anything of a writer I’d send it in to the Reader’s Digest for one of those ‘Most Unforgettable Characters You’ve Ever Met’…He was a B.T.O., Sefton was. A Big Time Operator. Always hustling, always scrounging. Take for instance the horse races. Every Saturday and Sunday he would put on horse races. He was the sole owner and operator of the Stalag 17 Turf Club. He was the Presiding Steward, the Chief Handicapper, the Starter, the Judge, the Breeder and his own bookie. He was the whole works, except that I was the stable boy for ten smokes a day.
…
Hoffy: What’s the big idea, Sefton? Take that telescope out of here.
Sefton: Says who?
Hoffy: Says me.
Sefton: You take it out. Only you’re going to have a riot on your hands.
Hoffy: Every time the men get Red Cross packages you have to think up an angle to rob them.
Price: When the Krauts find that gadget they’ll throw us all in the boob.
Sefton: They know about that gadget. I’d worry more about the radio.
Duke: I suppose they also know about your distillery and the horseraces?
Sefton: That’s right.
Duke: Just what makes you and them Krauts so buddy-buddy?
Sefton: Ask Security. Go on, tell him, Price. You’ve got me shadowed every minute of the day. Or haven’t you found out yet?
Price: Not yet.
…
Sefton: What is this anyway, a kangaroo court? Why don’t you get a rope and do it right?
Duke: You make my mouth water.
Sefton: You’re all wire-happy, boys. You’ve been in this camp too long. You put two and two together and it comes out four - only it ain’t four.
Hoffy: What’s it add up to you, Sefton?
Sefton: It adds up that you got yourselves the wrong guy. Because, I’m telling you, the krauts wouldn’t plant two stoolies in one barracks. And whatever you do to me, you’re gonna have to do all over again when you find the right guy.
…
Duke: Go on Price tell the crumb where he stands.
Price: All right, Sefton. You got away lucky last night. One more move, no matter how small, and you’ll wake up with your throat slit!
Hoffy: You heard that, Sefton?
Sefton: Sure I heard it. I still got one good ear. But one thing. There are two people in this barracks who know I didn’t do it. Me and the guy that did do it. And it could be any one of you.
…
Geneva man [to Sefton]: What happened to you? Were you beaten?
[Sefton doesn’t answer]
Geneva man: Why don’t you answer?
[he turns to Hoffy]
Geneva man: What did you do to this man?
Sefton: They didn’t do nothing.
Geneva man: Who beat you?
Sefton: Nobody beat me. We were playing pinochle. It’s a rough game.
…
Sefton: What’s the matter, Cookie? You on their team now? You think I’m the guy?
Cookie: I don’t know anymore.
Sefton: I understand how you feel, Cookie. It’s sort of rough – one American squealing on other Americans. Then again, Cookie – maybe that stoolie’s not an American at all. Maybe he’s a German the krauts planted in this barracks. They do this type of thing. Just put an agent in with us – a trained specialist. Lots of loose information floating around a prison camp. Not just whether somebody wants to escape, but what outfits we were with and where we were stationed, and how our radar operates. Could be, couldn’t it?
Cookie: In this barracks?
Sefton: Why not? Just one of the boys. Sharing our bunks. Eating our chow. Right in amongst the ones that beat me up. Except that he beat hardest.
…
Cookie: Who is it?
Sefton: That’s not the point, Cookie. The point is what do you do with him? You tip your mitt and the Jerries pull him out of here and plant him someplace else, like Stalag Sixteen or Fifteen. Or you kill him off and the Krauts turn around and kill off the whole barracks. Every one of us. So what do you do?
Cookie: Who is it?
[Sefton doesn’t answer]
Cookie: If you don’t want to tell me, why don’t you tell Hoffy? Or Security?
Sefton: Yeah. Security…
…
Price: Are we going to stand around here and listen to him until the Germans find out where Dunbar is?
Sefton: The Germans know where Dunbar is.
Hoffy: How do they know?
Sefton: You told them, Hoffy.
Hoffy: Who did?
Sefton: You did.
Hoffy: Are you off your rocker?
Sefton: Uh-huh. Fell right on my head.
…
Sefton: Okay, Herr Preismaier, let’s have the mail box.
Price: The what?
Sefton: The one you took out of the corner of your bunk and put in this pocket.
[Sefton snatches the black queen out of Price’s coat pocket]
Sefton: Now let me show you how they did it.
…
Duke [to Sefton]: Brother, were we all wet about you!
…
Duke [referring to Sefton’s safe escape with Dunbar]: Whadda ya know? The crud did it.
Shapiro: I’d like to know what made him do it.
Animal: Maybe he just wanted to steal our wire cutters. You ever think of that? [/b]