In 1992, The French made "Diên Biên Phu" a movie about the battle. It was their "Apocalypse Now". It's pretty impressive. The only other movie I have seen about the event is "Jump into Hell". However it is anything but impressive, and although there are some facts in there, the filmmakers didn't let them get in the way of the drama.
When I was a kid in the 1950s, I used to like this film. At the time it seemed a novel war movie set in an obscure place called Indo-China, and as it didn't involve our guys, it could be viewed with a certain amount of detachment. But of course a few years later it morphed into the Vietnam War and did involve our guys very much indeed.
Looking back, the views in the film seem awkward - Russian and Chinese communism is presented as the main reason the French are having such a hard time rather than any nationalistic spirit on the part of the Vietnamese.
The look of the film is patchy. Grainy documentary footage is mixed with scenes shot for the film and it isn't seamless. The acting is of the emphatic variety with exposition issuing from all and sundry.
The key points of the battle are touched upon: the outgunned and outnumbered garrison; the isolated forts all named after women that fell one by one, and the fact that reinforcements bravely parachuted in.
Long after I saw "Jump into Hell", I read Bernard Fall's history of the battle, "Hell in A Very Small Place". It left me with respect for the French soldiers, especially the paratroopers.
Jacques (Jack) Sernas plays one of the soldiers who parachutes in along with characters who were Hollywood's version of typical Frenchmen - wine and women being a big focus.
A recurring motif is the interaction between the commander, General De Castries (Arnold Moss), and defeatist Major Maurice Bonet (Lawrence Dobkin). Each time the major suggests surrender, instead of popping him against the wall and spraying him with bullets, the general sprays him with high-minded speeches about how they are sacrificing themselves for the freedom of the world. However after a gallant stand, the garrison of Diên Biên Phu did surrender.
"Jump into Hell" is a hard one to recommend to an audience these days, but it does reveal the mindset of the 1950s and in a way helps explain why the next phase of the war in Vietnam was probably inevitable.
