Hailed by Orson Welles as one of the great anti-war films, Cross of Iron follows a squadron of Nazi soldiers on the Eastern front during the twilight of the Second World War. Drawing from his own WWII experiences, Peckinpah drew a multi-layered portrait of the enemy, focusing on the tensions between a battle-hardened sergeant, wonderfully played by James Coburn, and the arrogant Prussian martinet who commands the squadron. Cross of Iron's sympathetic portrayal of Nazi soldiers makes clear Peckinpah’s pacifist convictions, revealing the Germans not as sadistic villains but ordinary troops fighting desperately for their lives and those of their cohorts. The film was cut by several minutes for its initial US release, however the HFA will screen a rare European print of the full-length version.