I find this to be the case with most spy movies, simply because, unless you read a book they are adapted from, you get lost if you as much as blink

Lets have the most extreme example:

Now, I love that movie so much that I'd be willing to use its DVD as a sex toy, but the spy-plot of Where Eagles Dare is straight up impossible to keep up with on the first viewing... or second... or fifth

• The whole introductory briefing for the mission turns out to be 100% a lie

• They keep saying that there must be a jerry infiltrator in the British secret service. Important: infiltrator - singular. But it actually turns out that the german spies were almost outnumbering the legitimate allied agents. Lmao

• Richard Burton is trying to keep Mary's presence on the mission a secret. Except he actually aint trying that hard, he just casually talks about her with Eastwood

• Burton evetually claims that the plan is to have a fake general pass fake info, then break him out, and that leads us to:

• The whole table scene. Masterclass in tension, editing, acting, cinematography, and last but not least, making the viewer feel like they had a whole fleet of maglev trains take a detour through their brain. So within five minutes, Burton and Eastwood hold everyone at a gunpoint, then Burton holds Eastwood at gunpoint, then introduces himself as a kraut who has been working for the nazis all along and delivers a reasonable proof, then gets held at gunpoint himself along with everyone else, then wants to prove himself by having three german agents, whom he claims are british, to write a name into a notebook, then nonverbally coordinates with Eastwood to get a gun back even though he just disarmed him, then shoots half the room and orders the three german agents whom he claimed to be brits, to go with him, but at a gun point

table scene took about five minutes and now that all of this has happened, the movie still has half its timerun to go and is about to transition from the spy-thriller act into the 80s action movie (made in 60s) part.

I believe you do understand, why it might not be easy to keep up with, even though everything I listed is explained by the film at some point