been watching war movies lately since im in a dry spell with computer games 

thought i would get a feel for what you all liked.

these are my favorite WW2 themed movies. (no particular order)

1. "Where Eagles Dare" 1968
         Clint Eastwood and Richard Burton at their best IMHO.
         PLOT: An American General is being transported in an RAF transport aircraft, the aircraft is shot down and the general is the only survivor. The General is taken to the nearest SS Headquarters for interrogation, but what the Nazi's dont know is that this particular General has inside information on the upcoming Allied invasion of France. A crack British commando unit plus one American Army Ranger (eastwood) is sent in for the rescue, but as the mission progresses double and triple agents are uncovered, and the American Ranger senses that the rescue team has deeper and more mysterious orders to carry out.    I really enjoy the "against all odds" and the double-double cross mentality of this film.

2. "The Longest Day" 1962
           With names like John Wayne, Richard Burton (again) and Sean Connery, it has to be good!
           PLOT: June 6th, 1944, Operation Overlord. The allied invasion of Europe reconstructed with a great deal of attention paid to historical accuracy for a film of the era. Told from several points of view from the Germans to the French Resistance to the Brits and the Yanks. One of the very first war movies i ever saw. Black and white, interpersonal stories with the men of the units and the gritty / manly combat sequences you would expect from a war film of the 1960's. Great film.

3. "Das Boot" 1981
            Jurgen Prochnow (wonderful performance in particular) i think this film really opened up the USA for him as an actor.
           PLOT: The battle of the Atlantic rages on and the tide of the war is quickly turning against the German U-boats who, up to late 1942 early 1943 enjoyed great success against allied merchant shipping. The sub sets out on a course that will lead it to near destruction at sea. One of few ww2 films viewed in the west that portrays Germans with sympathy, Das Boot does a wonderful job of setting political ideology aside and focusing on the fact that all of these sailors were just young men caught up in circumstances beyond their control.

4. "The Dirty Dozen" 1967
           A cast of some of the greatest male action heroes of the era - Lee Marvin, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, Telly Savalas too many to list.
           PLOT: Top brass hands a dangerous mission meant as a prelude to D-Day to a US Army Major. He is to infiltrate a Chateaus that serves as a meeting place for top German officers, and eliminate these officers at all cost in order to disrupt the chain of command in the area of the invasion. Oh and another thing... the Major's team is to be made up of rapists, murderers, and psychopaths all of which are facing a death sentence in military prisons. The catch is that each man who completes training and survives the mission will be granted a full pardon BUT failure to cooperate with the major only results in a return of the men to the brig to face the hangman's noose... HQ expects plenty of casualties either way.  I LOVE this flick! 12 misfits who would rather fight each other than fight the NAZIs train hard and by the time they are ready to air drop into france the group is acting like a respectable fighting unit. I like the film partly because it is one of those stories where nobody thought the Major and his "Dirty Dozen" could succeed... but they do it anyway! 

5. "Kelly's Heroes" 1970
           Another Eastwood film. This time he stars along side Donald Sutherland, Telly Savalas, Don Rickles and Carrol O'Conner. (Some call this a comedy... i call it a war movie with A LOT of comic relief)
           PLOT: During the allied advance through the fields of France Eastwood's character "Kelly" captures a German officer carrying important documents and a solid lead brick. Kelly begins to interrogate the highly inebriated German Officer and almost by accident discovers that the lead brick is actually a GOLD brick painted to look like lead... not only that but there are $16,000,000 dollars worth of them hidden in a German occupied bank in a small town behind enemy lines. almost immediately Kelly and some of his unit hatch a far out scheme to enlist "partners" in their new found business venture to sneak behind enemy lines and steal the NAZI gold as their own... secretly splitting it equally between those who survive their own secret little mission. This is not one of those movies where it is all comedy and nobody gets killed... the bullets fly both ways, but there is A LOT of comic relief in this flick. You will be on the edge of your seat and laughing at the same time as Kelly's plan unfolds before you.

Quote:


The landing is the only good part about the movie, the rest is totally illogical crap.

SS troops equipped with Tigers are stopped by a platoon of americans and shot to pieces 'cause they're as unorganized as some spare time soldiers. 


Seen "Der Untergang"?

Quote:


Yeah, but...
[Spoiler]

[/Spoiler]

It was the only movie that made me cry -...Magda Goebbels killing her children.


No other war movie, especially not the ones that get their immersion from dozens of computer-generated effects and bombastic sound can top the intensity of "Der Untergang".


Btw: Two other good movies..."Stalingrad" and "Hell Is For Heroes".

"A bridge too far" and "The Great Escape" now there are some classics i have on DVD... also i forgot to mention "Enemy At The Gates" too. i think that ed harris is a wonderful character actor. He portrayed that German sniper very well in that film.

Bjorn are you sure about that spoiler???... i thought the father and mother were alive when the little boy returned home.

One of them is called The Star (a remake of an older film) and the other one I can't remember the name of at the minute. My friend said they're brilliant even if your Russian is as bad as mine (they do have English subtitles thank goodness)

No Tora Tora Tora?  No Letters from Iwo Jima?   

Those are excellent movies!

just picked up Tora recently but havnt watched it. 

have yet to see letters from Iwo. 

i liked flags of our fathers but i felt that it jumped around too much for very effective story telling

i think the movie would have been better if the story had started out with the son going into flash back about his father and his fathers unit telling their story through as one big time line and then finishing the movie with the fate of all the young men.

but IMHO the movie went from point to point along the time line, which made it at times difficult to follow


good film none the less

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Agreed!  I own that too!  

Great series, and another accurate depiction as to what went on.  When you do a little research into how it was put together in relation to what actually happened with the real persons, you learn who well Speilberg and Hanks did!

hmm i need to get around to watching some origional war films .. bridge to far etc. etc..

but from what i have seen my favs

Downfall, Saving private, Black Hawk Down, Enemy at the Gates

although when it comes to history i prefer books

What, no Iron Eagle, Hotshots, Rambo, Delta Force or Missing in action 

Matt

Björn wrote on Jun 14^th, 2007 at 6:03pm:



That's clearly a 1-off.  Besides, even though it's on a tank chassis, wouldn't that be considered more as a mobile antiaircraft battery?

dcunning30 wrote on Jun 15^th, 2007 at 12:07pm:


German description is "Fugabwehrpanzer", so...still a tank.

It was also useful against soft ground targets, but not as versatile as the 88.

"Thirty seconds over Tokyo"  old but good

"12 o clock High"  old but good

dcunning30 wrote on Jun 15^th, 2007 at 5:16pm:


That was also a real good movie

I was watching "One of Our Aircraft" the other night oddly enough Charlie!
Mind you if you start on Dads Army then we have to go into matters like Ain't Half Hot Mum and 'Allo 'Allo

waspiflab wrote on Jun 17^th, 2007 at 3:03pm:



Awesome!!!!  I totally forgot about that movie!  Hillarious!

I can see that agin!   

I have to many to list but, here are a few!!

1) Kelly's Heros
2) Midway
3) Tora, Tora, Tora

 And so on!!

 Also, I don't know if you count this one but some of it took place in WWII " The Final Countdown "  It's a great movie!!

Cory

Willit Run wrote on Jun 18^th, 2007 at 12:11pm:


Here's the deal about Midway, which torques me!  Midway was originally released as a fairly long movie.  It had included the Battle of Coral Sea as well.  Coral Sea totally affected how Midway developed.  Since the original release, a long long time ago, somehow someway, the studio decided they didn't need the Coral Sea portion of the movie.  They totally cut it out.  Several years ago, I bought Midway on VHS, and lo and behold, Coral Sea wasn't included.  I think the running time of Midway without Coral Sea was 202 minutes.  If I can find Midway with Coral Sea, I'd buy it again.  Otherwise, that won't be a DVD that I would add to my collection.

expat wrote on Jun 18^th, 2007 at 4:59pm:


It is indeed. The original book "Seven Men at Daybreak" (IIRC) is very good too of course, as it is a completely true story depicting the assasination of Reinhard Heydrich. Even has (a young) Martin Shaw to keep the ladies happy...

Enemy at the Gates

Das Boot

Memphis Belle

Battle of Britain

Tora Tora (As far as I can remember it (Long long time ago))

Der Untergang

U-571 wasn´t too bad either.


But about Der Untergang, it was the only movie I have yet seen where people sat in the cinema 2-5 minutes after the movie, just thinking. No one went out when the movie was actually over.

dcunning30 wrote on Jun 29^th, 2007 at 11:01am:


Couldn't he have rented "Das Boot"? I admit, amongst those with an appreciation of history on this side of the pond (and that is preposterously few), "U-571" wasn't warmly welcomed. Sadly it was akin to remaking the "Dam Busters" with a Sqn of B-17s, Tom Cruise as Lt Col G P Gibson MoH, Silver Star* and Bette Midler as the proprieter of "Petwood's", the crew's regular evening haunt...


*Admittedly, Wg Cdr Guy Penrose Gibson VC etc, was one of few (if not one) who was permitted to wear USAAF wings along with his RAF ones. They were presented to him on a US lecture tour in the year after the Dams raid, before his death...

"Memphis Belle" however, is the perfect example of how to tell a true story using semi-ficticious events and characters.

I know U-571 isn´t really a realistic movie, but it partially catches the atmosphere quite well....