Too Late the Hero (released in 1970) - A war movie, starring Michael Caine, and Henry Fonda

Too Late the Hero is a 1970 Anglo-American war film directed by Robert Aldrich, and starring Michael Caine, Henry Fonda, Cliff Robertson, Ken Takakura, Denholm Elliott, Ian Bannen, Lance Percival, Ronald Fraser, Harry Andrews and Percy Herbert.
Sam Lawson is an American Lieutenant who works as a Japanese language expert during the world war two. He has always avoided direct combat duty. But as luck could have it he is assigned to the British Infantry unit in the New Hebrides for combat duty
The unit is commanded by Colonel Thompson, with a duty of observing the movements of the Japanese for the Allied forces. The British unit is situated in the middle of a large field near a jungle and the other side of the jungle the Japanese keep watch. The observation and communications post of the Japanese give information about the movements of the ships in the Pacific. The Japanese radio operator gives an “All is well” signal every evening and the Allies need the help of Lawson to fake this signal. An American Naval convoy is attempting for a passage and it needs to buy 24 hours time to sail undetected to reach the war zone with supplies. The British commando unit of Lawson is assigned to destroy this observation post and emit a fake signal to confuse the Japanese.



Captain Hornsby an uppity British officer leads a patrol to destroy the Japanese observation post. They ambush a Japanese patrol and three of them, Currie, Connelly and Riddle are killed. Tosh, a cynical medic and others blames Hornsby's poor leadership for the killings. Campbell cuts a Japanese officers finger and steals his ring. One of the sergeant majors, Johnstone, is fatally wounded, is left behind by Hornsby and is then killed by the Japanese.
Scott the radio operator ruins the radio and this forces Hornsby to personally enter the Japanese post and capture the radio to sent in the signal. But Lawson feels that it is a suicidal attempt and try to stop them from doing it. In the resulting melee the Japanese men attack and kill Hornsby and Scott. Lawson being the senior ranking officer, leads the men to the jungle to safety. Japanese Major Yamaguchi tries to stop them from getting back to the camp and reporting about the airfield and arsenal present. They put up loud speakers and try to terrorize them to surrender. But Lawson and Tosh see through heir plan and ask the men to march forward to camp. But Campbell who is scared is in favor of surrender,manipulates the others to run away. But they are caught and Campbell is executed as the stolen ring is found on him. The Japanese use other soldiers as bargaining chips and ask for Lawson and Tosh to surrender. But both of them do not trust Yamaguchi's surrender plans and plan to make run for the camp. As they run zig zag through the fire of bullets both of them are hit. Tosh is wounded but drags him-selves to the camp and gives information about the Japanese arsenal. He also informs the others about the brave deeds of Lawson and walks back to claim back his body.
This movie is a little slow paced, but is heavily loaded with emotions which brings the viewer to realize the worth of soldiers who die for others.