War movies

[StarHalo]

Wow! Louie sounds like a great guy, it is sad that there are so few of the WW2 vets still around, it's always interesting to hear them tell their stories.

That’s the granddaddy of WWII stories, I very strongly recommend the book even if you’re not much of a reader, you will be for this one..

[xxo]

Saw 1917 a while ago - the cinematography is amazing, but the plot is hoaky and far fetched. With a halfway decent story line this could have been a great film but as it is it is disappointing.

Journey's End was much better, being based on the novel by R.C. Sherriff who drew heavily on his own combat experience while serving as an officer in the East Surrey Regiment during the war.

[Lynx_Arc]

Saw 1917 a while ago - the cinematography is amazing, but the plot is hoaky and far fetched. With a halfway decent story line this could have been a great film but as it is it is disappointing.

Journey's End was much better, being based on the novel by R.C. Sherriff who drew heavily on his own combat experience while serving as an officer in the East Surrey Regiment during the war.

I watched 1917 but it seem to drag on and on and on almost like a reality show more than a war movie. It was more like the story of a guy trying to survive the war than about the war and a guy trying to survive it to me. Way, way too much wandering around with rather weird circumstances happening I personally think were put in just to try and make this into more of a thriller than a war movie.
I ended up selling the movie as I couldn't drink enough caffeinated drinks to ever bother sitting through it again. They could have shortened the movie by almost a half and it would have been just as good.

[desert.snake]

Here's a good movie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkkJZweYaLI

and these 5 pieces in a row

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZlzMhfx2hQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0t5CHhsuaM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Glz5ZJLEPgY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEfxAE6dTDU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqJEMXbRgdw


And a good 20 episode series - The Unknown War (1978)

he is in english

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ibizxvxgaY&list=PLhs30iGhgICncex8qB-_Fmej-0HSwy4fH

[Kestrel]

And a good 20 episode series - The Unknown War (1978)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ibizxvxgaY&list=PLhs30iGhgICncex8qB-_Fmej-0HSwy4fH

Thanks for that link; I've had the DVD for that documentary on my Amazon list for years but never got around to ordering it.

[LGT]

Platoon. While it wasn’t historically accurate showing any specific events, the two Vietnam Marine Corps veterans I worked with said it was close. One just didn’t see the need for a protagonist, antagonist between Barnes and Elias.

[ledbetter]

Paths of Glory and the Grand Illusion are two oldies whose messages never fade.

[SCEMan]

Platoon. While it wasn’t historically accurate showing any specific events, the two Vietnam Marine Corps veterans I worked with said it was close. One just didn’t see the need for a protagonist, antagonist between Barnes and Elias.

I just read Oliver Stone's autobiography and both characters were based on platoon sergeants he served under. Neither knew each other but they were both very effective.

[Poppy]

I liked "Tora Tora Tora" for a wwII Pacific War film.

Regarding Vietnam, I was in High school, and watched it unfold each night on the news.
i read a number of books, later as an adult, some of which were made into movies, or documentaries.

VietNam a Television History" a history book... the companion to the 13 part TV miniseries.

"The 10,000 Day War" the companion book to a 8 part TV miniseries. I like that one much more... it was not as politically correct as the 13 part series, and spoke of the secret negotiations to end the war, and the funds promised to the North (that were beyond Nixon's authority to promise).

"The 13th valley" The story of a platoon, who humped the hills and valleys, take an area, only to relinquish it and take it again. The frustration of being a grunt, seeing your brothers get killed or maimed, and never seeing the enemy. When I watched the movie "Platoon" (which I also liked), I wondered if it was based on the 13th Valley. Certainly not, but the experiences were similar. If you like the movie Platoon, you'd likely enjoy the book the 13th Valley.

"Chickenhawk" huey helicopter pilot. They were heroes. It was planned to make it a movie, but wasn't.

Marine Sniper: Carlos Hathcock. There have been a number of sniper movies. None of them bad.

"The Flight of the Intruder" ...read the book, saw the film. I enjoyed them both.

"The Tunnels of Chu Chi" The Tunnel Rats. The book helps to understand how determined the enemy was to fight a gorella war. How they would crawl underground, pop up, and ambush a patrol, and disappear, frustrating our patrols.

More recently... "Black Hawk Down" They had GPS capability, but didn't bring it. If only they were as small and lightweight as our cell phones are today!

[bykfixer]

Watched 1917 recently. Not bad in my view. My favorite part was while the main charcters walked through a German bunker "pooof" a flashlight lit the place. Now as Hollywood would have it, the light lit the place up very well when in reality lights of that era were not very bright.

I wasn't watching out for authenticity or not, but was just watching a story being told with moving pictures.
Not as gripping as some war flicks but I'll watch it again.

[SCEMan]

I missed Viet Nam by about 20 numbers in the lottery but several of my close friends were drafted, so I've always had a keen interest in it.

One movie that's seldom mentioned is; Hamburger Hill.
It's a very realistic depiction of the battle for Hill 937 in the A Shau Valley, one of the bloodiest engagements of the war. Kinda like Platoon but on a bigger scale without the BS.

[Poppy]

I missed Viet Nam by about 20 numbers in the lottery but several of my close friends were drafted, so I've always had a keen interest in it.

One movie that's seldom mentioned is; Hamburger Hill.
It's a very realistic depiction of the battle for Hill 937 in the A Shau Valley, one of the bloodiest engagements of the war. Kinda like Platoon but on a bigger scale without the BS.

I missed Nam by 60-80 numbers. I thank God I did, I don't think I would like the way it might have changed me.

I REALLY didn't like Dunkirk! I know that I am in the minority, most people who I know, who saw it, really liked it.

Personally, I got lost watching the film, time warping back and forth, left me a bit confused, and too many of the characters/actors, looked too much the same, that I didn't always know who's story line I was following. I got anxious, during each of the near drowning scenes, but that is not enough to dislike a film. IMO it was terribly historically inaccurate.

There over 300 thousand on the beach looking to get evacuated, but in the film it appeared that there were only a hundred or so extras. They could have used cgi to create thousands.
There were what? 2, 3 navy ships? IIRC there were 39 large navy ships at the rescue including some destroyers, and 850 or so "little ships" private sea craft greater than 30 feet in length with relatively shallow draft.

There was no mention of the rear guard fighting of the French, who bought time for the allies to get off of the beach. The rear guard fighting has historically been compared to the Spartans at Thermopylae, yet there was no mention.

I really doubt that the men would have stood single file on the beach, for hours, and not dive for cover, or shoulder their rifles and take aim at the strifing german planes that were strifing the men on the beach.

Just terrible.

[SCEMan]

I REALLY didn't like Dunkirk! I know that I am in the minority, most people who I know, who saw it, really liked it.

It was okay. Beautifully filmed but I was expecting it to be on a larger scale, showing the magnitude of the evacuation and the miraculous failure of the Germans to overwhelm the trapped British army. I found it interesting but a lost opportunity to tell a bigger story.

[Lynx_Arc]

I REALLY didn't like Dunkirk! I know that I am in the minority, most people who I know, who saw it, really liked it.

Personally, I got lost watching the film, time warping back and forth, left me a bit confused, and too many of the characters/actors, looked too much the same, that I didn't always know who's story line I was following. I got anxious, during each of the near drowning scenes, but that is not enough to dislike a film. IMO it was terribly historically inaccurate.

There over 300 thousand on the beach looking to get evacuated, but in the film it appeared that there were only a hundred or so extras. They could have used cgi to create thousands.
There were what? 2, 3 navy ships? IIRC there were 39 large navy ships at the rescue including some destroyers, and 850 or so "little ships" private sea craft greater than 30 feet in length with relatively shallow draft.

There was no mention of the rear guard fighting of the French, who bought time for the allies to get off of the beach. The rear guard fighting has historically been compared to the Spartans at Thermopylae, yet there was no mention.

I really doubt that the men would have stood single file on the beach, for hours, and not dive for cover, or shoulder their rifles and take aim at the strifing german planes that were strifing the men on the beach.

Just terrible.

I agree with you I tried to like Dunkirk but the constant bouncing back and forth was done rather lousily and the moment you got "into" a story you were popped into another one that just felt disjointed. The individual stories that you popped back and forth to were not done well enough on their own either to make a separate movie which made it feel like you were watching 4 or so mediocre movies on 4 channels at once. I was expecting a movie sort of like a large epic and got 4 small movies instead.

[ledbetter]

“Good Lord Bird,” a new show/series on ShowTime about John Brown and his cause and raids on Kansas and Harper’s Ferry, is an interesting show of how the Civil War basically began.