Must see war films?
Discussion
Halb said:
Zulu was. Cain has talked how the producer wanted to fire him because he 'was doing nothing.' At the time, Caine was a nobody, and Baker one of of the, if not thee biggest star in the UK.
Interestingly, both Michael Caine and Stanley Baker had served in the British Army during National Service, and Caine had seen combat in Korea. So both would have been familiar with British Army command structures, and had a familiarity with handling weapons. Which is why, I think, that the 1950s to the 1970s was a 'golden age' for making war movies. By necessity the directors had to focus on human elements and character development, because model work and effects were limited. Now, movie directors/producers seem to think that high body counts, and lots of CGI equipment and effects can cover a thin script with characters about who we care very little.yellowjack said:
Interestingly, both Michael Caine and Stanley Baker had served in the British Army during National Service, and Caine had seen combat in Korea. So both would have been familiar with British Army command structures, and had a familiarity with handling weapons. Which is why, I think, that the 1950s to the 1970s was a 'golden age' for making war movies. By necessity the directors had to focus on human elements and character development, because model work and effects were limited. Now, movie directors/producers seem to think that high body counts, and lots of CGI equipment and effects can cover a thin script with characters about who we care very little.
Yes, with many famous old soldiers acting as advisers on films. Or in the case or Richard Todd taking Pegasus Bridge in the 1962 film The Longest Day knowing exactly what to do because he was there in 1944 taking Pegasus Bridge.https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/546...
Wacky Racer said:
Stanley Baker in "The Cruel sea"
"Snorkers, good Oh"
"Take no notice of him, he was a secondhand car salesman a few months ago" lol!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBZcE69_5a8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCUMGLCYCLg
"Perhaps you have a bun in the oven?" Denholm Elliott in a superb early role. In my all time top 5 films.. "Snorkers, good Oh"
"Take no notice of him, he was a secondhand car salesman a few months ago" lol!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBZcE69_5a8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCUMGLCYCLg
FourWheelDrift said:
yellowjack said:
Interestingly, both Michael Caine and Stanley Baker had served in the British Army during National Service, and Caine had seen combat in Korea. So both would have been familiar with British Army command structures, and had a familiarity with handling weapons. Which is why, I think, that the 1950s to the 1970s was a 'golden age' for making war movies. By necessity the directors had to focus on human elements and character development, because model work and effects were limited. Now, movie directors/producers seem to think that high body counts, and lots of CGI equipment and effects can cover a thin script with characters about who we care very little.
Yes, with many famous old soldiers acting as advisers on films. Or in the case or Richard Todd taking Pegasus Bridge in the 1962 film The Longest Day knowing exactly what to do because he was there in 1944 taking Pegasus Bridge.https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/546...
t in war films is that the uniforms and webbing etc... Looks like it's just been put on. Even if it's manky, it still looks alien. Soldiers spend forever tinkering with their stuff to personalise it for fit and function, and it looks comfy on and they move naturally. Actors never quite get it right. And don't get me started on berets...
Mothersruin said:
One of the thing that grips my st in war films is that the uniforms and webbing etc... Looks like it's just been put on. Even if it's manky, it still looks alien. Soldiers spend forever tinkering with their stuff to personalise it for fit and function, and it looks comfy on and they move naturally. Actors never quite get it right.
And don't get me started on berets...
It's down to the fact that a soldier has to live in (and out of) his webbing and bergen, so he/she develops their webbing over a period of years, starting in basic training with a "standard" set, then buying, swapping, or "going diffy" various pouches to suit their role or habits. Later still, when you settle in to a career you may even have tweaks made, or pouches custom made because issued webbing was slow to catch up to changes in the equipment you needed to stow in it. A friend of mine retired as a Staff Sergeant, and now makes his living as a military tailor and webbing repairer/manufacturer. My webbing ('58 pattern) was unusual in a British unit because it had a special ammo pouch designed to fit magazines for the 9mm SMG. I'd swapped it with a Saudi policeman prior to the Gulf War kicking off. The whole set later got stolen, and I was never able to replace it as it had been. Some soldiers made their webbing camouflaged by painting it or colouring it in with a sharpie, others sewed 'scrim' to it so it looked like a Ghillie suit. Being a soldier in an armoured unit, I didn't, on the whole, feel it was necessary to resort to such customisation, because my webbing spent more time hanging off the back of my driver's seat or attached to a bracket outside the vehicle than it did on my back.t in war films is that the uniforms and webbing etc... Looks like it's just been put on. Even if it's manky, it still looks alien. Soldiers spend forever tinkering with their stuff to personalise it for fit and function, and it looks comfy on and they move naturally. Actors never quite get it right. And don't get me started on berets...
Same with berets. You get issued with a "helipad" or an "S-tank" and get taught how to shape it and shrink it to fit your head. Then you get to a unit and frequently the Sergeant Major will spot your issued beret on parade and you'll be told in no uncertain terms to "double away to the PRI shop and buy a proper beret". I had mine nailed to a railway flatcar in Roberts Barracks, Osnabrück, and a CVR(T) was driven over the nail to bend it like a staple, thereby forcing me to "double away to the PRI shop" to get a new one, after I'd displayed a reluctance to spend my hard earned Deutschmarks buying something the army issued me for free...
...actors are seldom able to replicate this because their equipment and uniform is delivered to them by the costume department before they shoot a scene, then taken away again. They don't get to spend time in it enough to make all those little tweaks and changes that would begin to make it all look "right".
Edited by yellowjack on Tuesday 22 October 11:33
yellowjack said:
Mothersruin said:
One of the thing that grips my st in war films is that the uniforms and webbing etc... Looks like it's just been put on. Even if it's manky, it still looks alien. Soldiers spend forever tinkering with their stuff to personalise it for fit and function, and it looks comfy on and they move naturally. Actors never quite get it right.
And don't get me started on berets...
It's down to the fact that a soldier has to live in (and out of) his webbing and bergen, so he/she develops their webbing over a period of years, starting in basic training with a "standard" set, then buying, swapping, or "going diffy" various pouches to suit their role or habits. Later still, when you settle in to a career you may even have tweaks made, or pouches custom made because issued webbing was slow to catch up to changes in the equipment you needed to stow in it. A friend of mine retired as a Staff Sergeant, and now makes his living as a military tailor and webbing repairer/manufacturer. My webbing ('58 pattern) was unusual in a British unit because it had a special ammo pouch designed to fit magazines for the 9mm SMG. I'd swapped it with a Saudi policeman prior to the Gulf War kicking off. The whole set later got stolen, and I was never able to replace it as it had been. Some soldiers made their webbing camouflaged by painting it or colouring it in with a sharpie, others sewed 'scrim' to it so it looked like a Ghillie suit. Being a soldier in an armoured unit, I didn't, on the whole, feel it was necessary to resort to such customisation, because my webbing spent more time hanging off the back of my driver's seat or attached to a bracket outside the vehicle than it did on my back.t in war films is that the uniforms and webbing etc... Looks like it's just been put on. Even if it's manky, it still looks alien. Soldiers spend forever tinkering with their stuff to personalise it for fit and function, and it looks comfy on and they move naturally. Actors never quite get it right. And don't get me started on berets...
Same with berets. You get issued with a "helipad" or an "S-tank" and get taught how to shape it and shrink it to fit your head. Then you get to a unit and frequently the Sergeant Major will spot your issued beret on parade and you'll be told in no uncertain terms to "double away to the PRI shop and buy a proper beret". I had mine nailed to a railway flatcar in Roberts Barracks, Osnabrück, and a CVR(T) was driven over the nail to bend it like a staple, thereby forcing me to "double away to the PRI shop" to get a new one, after I'd displayed a reluctance to spend my hard earned Deutschmarks buying something the army issued me for free...
...actors are seldom able to replicate this because their equipment and uniform is delivered to them by the costume department before they shoot a scene, then taken away again. They don't get to spend time in it enough to make all those little tweaks and changes that would begin to make it all look "right".
Edited by yellowjack on Tuesday 22 October 11:33
Mothersruin said:
IIRC, I arrived in Traz just after you're lot got blown up.
Which time? I was an 'out-of-towner' at Quebec Barracks with 23 Engr Regt. I arrived just in time for the first attack, on the Garrison Sergeant's Mess. Five jerry-can bombs brought in through a culvert under the rail line, through a hole in the fence. Fortunately the alarm was raised in time to evacuate the building so no-one hurt by the one charge that exploded. I was literally sleeping in a cell in the guardroom at the time because my Squadron were away in Canada when I arrived. As a sprog fresh from the factory with no knowledge of the barracks, I was ordered to stay in that cell unless ordered otherwise.Then later, after I'd left, the same barracks was hit by the van mortar which appeared to be aimed at the fuel point. An ex-
sapper was involved in that plot. A transit van parked outside the barracks at the back gate access road. The beret incident at Roberts Bks was while we were loading our tanks, etc, onto rail flats for a big exercise on Soltau. Who were you with in Osnabrück, if you don't mind me asking?
yellowjack said:
Mothersruin said:
IIRC, I arrived in Traz just after you're lot got blown up.
Which time? I was an 'out-of-towner' at Quebec Barracks with 23 Engr Regt. I arrived just in time for the first attack, on the Garrison Sergeant's Mess. Five jerry-can bombs brought in through a culvert under the rail line, through a hole in the fence. Fortunately the alarm was raised in time to evacuate the building so no-one hurt by the one charge that exploded. I was literally sleeping in a cell in the guardroom at the time because my Squadron were away in Canada when I arrived. As a sprog fresh from the factory with no knowledge of the barracks, I was ordered to stay in that cell unless ordered otherwise.Then later, after I'd left, the same barracks was hit by the van mortar which appeared to be aimed at the fuel point. An ex-
sapper was involved in that plot. A transit van parked outside the barracks at the back gate access road. The beret incident at Roberts Bks was while we were loading our tanks, etc, onto rail flats for a big exercise on Soltau. Who were you with in Osnabrück, if you don't mind me asking?
t. Mercer Barracks, 4 RTR were 'downstairs'.I was there until '94, 16 Air Defence in Dortmund afterwards.
Edited by Mothersruin on Tuesday 22 October 13:15
Mothersruin said:
Ummm, would have been around 89/90ish I think. 12 Armoured which was great, yet a simple name change to 1Bn REME rendered it instantly st. Mercer Barracks, 4 RTR were 'downstairs'.
That would be the first attack. Donna Maguire & Co in '89. I seem to recall that they chose Osnabrück as the target because the Irish Rangers were in town, so their Irish accents didn't seem out of place. As an aside, I remember sharing the garrison bus with a couple of women from your mob, returning from leave one night. They weren't the most feminine of young ladies (to put it politely), and I think they were both working as Recovery Mechanics. I loved Osnabrück, despite it's reputation as a penal colony garrison prior to my arrival. t. Mercer Barracks, 4 RTR were 'downstairs'.Anyway, that's enough lanterns swung, and sandbags pulled up. We're in danger of hijacking a really good thread here...
FourWheelDrift said:
yellowjack said:
Interestingly, both Michael Caine and Stanley Baker had served in the British Army during National Service, and Caine had seen combat in Korea. So both would have been familiar with British Army command structures, and had a familiarity with handling weapons. Which is why, I think, that the 1950s to the 1970s was a 'golden age' for making war movies. By necessity the directors had to focus on human elements and character development, because model work and effects were limited. Now, movie directors/producers seem to think that high body counts, and lots of CGI equipment and effects can cover a thin script with characters about who we care very little.
Yes, with many famous old soldiers acting as advisers on films. Or in the case or Richard Todd taking Pegasus Bridge in the 1962 film The Longest Day knowing exactly what to do because he was there in 1944 taking Pegasus Bridge.https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/546...
.
nicanary said:
San Demetrio, London.
Cracking yarn based more or less on fact.
One of my favourite war films:-Cracking yarn based more or less on fact.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x57xv4h
A few others:-
Green for Danger
The Halfway House
Angels one five
The Cruel sea
Carve her name with pride
The Dam busters
Run silent run deep
Sink the Bismarck
Went the day well?
Operation daybreak
The Pianist
Paths of Glory
Hangmen also die
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