Extreme wide-screen format that didn’t fit many theaters. Terrible backing by the studio. Some critics didn’t like Caine’s German accent, I thought it was fine.
I think the key negative was the Thirty Years War explanation. It fits into four lines of a high school history book, and when it came up in a college history class....it was a six-minute explanation. Because it’s five separate civil wars and built over extreme religious issues...it’s an impossible war to put into any discussion group.
On my all time favorites list.
You’re spot on about lack of studio support.
It opened in NYC at a small to medium sized theater on W72nd and Broadway as opposed to Times Square Broadway the normal venues for big openings. If it had newspaper ads they were so small as to be un-noticeable. They only reason I popped in was that it was a block from my apartment and I passed it every day. As I recall, it was there for only a half week. I’m pretty sure that theater didn’t have a super wide screen.
I had talked it up to co-workers who tried to see it the following week end but it had gone. Poof now you see it, now you don’t.
At the time I was mystified at the lack of attention this great film received. Over the years I encountered only two friends that had seen when outstanding movies were discussed. Same as Peter O’Tooles “The Ruling Class”