Anyone for whom a screening of the film The Great Escape is an annual Christmas tradition will know how strong a hold the myth of that escapade holds over the collective British imagination. But a myth is all it is. The old 1960s movie, with its star-studded cast performing stiff upper lip heroics, manages to turn a horrific tragedy and crime into an ‘Allo Allo’ style farce akin to Carry On Tunneling.