Provenance Of

The influences behind Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

39 works across 28 centuries, back to Odyssey.

  1. Cover of The Great Escape

    1950

    The Great Escape

    Paul Brickhill

    Postwar memoir. United Kingdom. Written in English.

    A former prisoner's nonfiction account of the tunnel breakout from Stalag Luft III in 1944.

    What it handed down

    To The Great Escape (1963)

    Direct source, well documented.

    Sturges's film adapts Brickhill's account of the Stalag Luft III breakout. It keeps the tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry and the escapers' fates, while inventing American characters such as McQueen's Hilts.

    Where it came from

    The line stops here: a memoir of real events rather than a reworking of literary models.

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Preview card: the tree of influence behind Once Upon a Time in Hollywood