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Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2019 2:33:59 GMT -5
@mrp ... I did not know that there was a playset that was based on that movie you watched recently.
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Post by codystarbuck on Jul 2, 2019 0:07:16 GMT -5
I used to have the Guns of Navarone playset. We had a table in our basement that my dad built, originally for my brother's train set and slot car racing set. It became my battle ground, with the Navarone complex on one end, and my sister's abandoned McDonald's playset on the other. The McDonald's set was turned upside down, so army men could be positioned in the slots in the roof eaves. I had wood scraps for defensive walls, turned old spiral notebook coils into barb wire entanglements, had sandbag machine gun nests, trenches (created with gravel) and even an airfield (plastic 1 gal milk jug cut in half, to act as a hanger and my Flying Aces F4U Corsair planes, as fighters). I used old potato sack mesh as camo netting. My next door neighbor and I used to pool our army men and then throw beanbags and shoot rubber bands at them, to knock them over, until one of us won. We pretty much fought to the last man, which, in retrospect, gave it more of an Eastern front feel. Guns of Navarone is still one of the best special mission war movies, ever. The book is pretty good, too. My only quibble is that Miller, played by David Niven, is supposed to be an American, from Texas and Mallory is supposed to be a Kiwi. Where Eagles Dare managed to rack up a higher bodycount; but, that is probably because of Clint Eastwood. There is an Italian war film, Battle of the Commandos, with Jack Palance, which is a mix of Guns and the Dirty Dozen, where they have to locate and destroy a rail gun. Not bad, as these things go. No Inglorious Bastards, though (the original). Tobruk, with Rock Hudson and George Peppard is another good one, which was remade as Raid on Rommel, with Richard Burton, using much of the original footage. Force 10 was a better movie than book, and the movie is pretty up and down. I like it; but, Harrison Ford is pretty wooden in it and Carl Weathers chews scenery. Robert Shaw and Edward Fox make it work and Michael Byrne, as the German officer who first captures them is also good. Franco nero? Enh...........not bad. Richard Kiel is fun.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2019 9:51:23 GMT -5
Watched a pair of classic movies last night. First up, the last movie teaming Bogart and Bacall, Key Largo... Casablanca and Maltese Falcon made me a Bogart fan, but I am still experiencing some of his movies for the first time, and this was one of them. I know it's weird, but I can't watch Edward G. Robinson play a gangster without immediately thinking of every Loony Toons gangster caricature I have ever seen, but I still quite liked the movie. The second was the 1945 film version of Dick Tracy where he is on the hunt for Splitface... aside from the Chester Gould art in the opening credits, the character names, and the gimmick look of Splitface, there is not much to separate this from any other crime drama of the period, but it was still a fun watch. -M
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Post by codystarbuck on Jul 4, 2019 17:36:26 GMT -5
You know, it's sad but there aren't many good movies about the American Revolution or the period. There are a few that were done; but, most are so-so, at best. A couple are pretty bad. here's a sampling:
1776-based on the Broadway musical, set around the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. Falls into the so-so category, at best. A few good performances; but, not particularly compelling, nor does it have the greatest musical numbers.
I haven't seen The Devil's Disciple, based on the George bernard Shaw play, which is set in the period. Nor the Howards of Virginia, with Cary Grant, also covers the period.
Johnny Tremain is the Disney film, based on the YA book and captures things well, though it is simplistic stuff (original and film), from a historical perspective. It is one of the better ones.
Drums Along the Mohawk- set in the period and pretty good; though again, more an isolated story in the period.
Revolution, with Al Pacino-shot in England, british director, anachronistic accents and just bland story. Big financial bomb and critical drubbing.
The Patriot-horrible mess of a film that slanders the British Army and Banastre Tarleton; but also white washes slavery. Filled with bad history and nonsense and pulp storytelling.
John Paul Jones, with Robert Stack. Not exactly the actor to lead a dramatic picture.
LaFayette-about the French noble who came to the Rebel cause, with orson Welles as Ben franklin. Haven't see; but mixed reviews.
Tv did a better job. The Crossing is a decent account of the Battle of Trenton. The Bastard and the Rebels, from the Kent Family Chronicles, were adapted into decent movies/mini-series. The George Washington mini, with Barry Bostwick, isn't great; but, has moments. There was a tv movie, in the 70s, The World Turned Upside Down, about Yorktown. I saw it as a kid, but don't remember it.
Not a whole lot, considering both the legends and the history. Doesn't seem to inspire Hollywood, much. By contrast, the French and Indian War has Last of the Mohicans and Northwest Passage, which are both excellent.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 4, 2019 17:52:22 GMT -5
HBO’s adaptation of David McCullough’s John Adams is a great look at one of the great heroes of the Revolution.
Turn: Washington’s Spies was a very watchable show on AMC . The biggest problem was that the first season was fairl weak. It definitely improved as it went along.
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Post by Prince Hal on Jul 4, 2019 19:43:24 GMT -5
The Howards of Virginia is long and rather dull. Cary Grant is horribly miscast as a frontier farmer.
Disney’s Swamp Fox , essentially a mini-series that ran throughout the “Disneyland”series from 1959 through 1961, IIRC, was a more historically accurate account of Francis Marion than The Patriot, though that’s not saying much.
I love Northwest Pasage and also admire Michael Mann’s Last of the Mohicans. Ditto Johnny tremain, one of my favorite childhood books.
Check out The Scarlet Coat about Major Andre and Benedict Arnold. Always on TCM around the Fourth.
So many great stories could be told about the Revolution in movies, but they just have never caught on.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2019 22:23:16 GMT -5
I love Northwest Pasage and also admire Michael Mann’s Last of the Mohicans. Ditto Johnny tremain, one of my favorite childhood books. I love Northwest Passage too and Mann's Last of the Mohicans as well and I do have a copy of it.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 8, 2019 11:33:58 GMT -5
You know, it's sad but there aren't many good movies about the American Revolution or the period. There are a few that were done; but, most are so-so, at best. A couple are pretty bad. here's a sampling: 1776-based on the Broadway musical, set around the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. Falls into the so-so category, at best. A few good performances; but, not particularly compelling, nor does it have the greatest musical numbers. I haven't seen The Devil's Disciple, based on the George bernard Shaw play, which is set in the period. Nor the Howards of Virginia, with Cary Grant, also covers the period. Johnny Tremain is the Disney film, based on the YA book and captures things well, though it is simplistic stuff (original and film), from a historical perspective. It is one of the better ones. Drums Along the Mohawk- set in the period and pretty good; though again, more an isolated story in the period. R evolution, with Al Pacino-shot in England, british director, anachronistic accents and just bland story. Big financial bomb and critical drubbing. The Patriot-horrible mess of a film that slanders the British Army and Banastre Tarleton; but also white washes slavery. Filled with bad history and nonsense and pulp storytelling. John Paul Jones, with Robert Stack. Not exactly the actor to lead a dramatic picture. LaFayette-about the French noble who came to the Rebel cause, with orson Welles as Ben franklin. Haven't see; but mixed reviews. Tv did a better job. The Crossing is a decent account of the Battle of Trenton. The Bastard and the Rebels, from the Kent Family Chronicles, were adapted into decent movies/mini-series. The George Washington mini, with Barry Bostwick, isn't great; but, has moments. There was a tv movie, in the 70s, The World Turned Upside Down, about Yorktown. I saw it as a kid, but don't remember it. Not a whole lot, considering both the legends and the history. Doesn't seem to inspire Hollywood, much. By contrast, the French and Indian War has Last of the Mohicans and Northwest Passage, which are both excellent. I know what you mean about the films about the American Revolution. I've seen most of those you've mentioned and some of them aren't bad, but you wish there were more and you wish they were better. Except … I love "1776"! I've been watching it on the Fourth of July every year for the last few years. William Daniels as John Adams and Howard da Silva as Ben Franklin offer up a couple of great performances, and da Silva especially is hilarious. And there are a lot of much smaller parts where the actors get the most out of their lines, especially the actors playing Richard Henry Lee and Roger Sherman. (And Howard Caine (better known as Major Hochstetter on Hogan's Heroes) is very amusing as Lewis Morris of New York.) The songs are great! I wouldn't be watching it every year if it wasn't easy to sit through. It's around two and a half hours a long. I especially like the song where Adams is trying to get the rest of the Declaration Committee to write the Declaration of Independence. If I'm the one to do it They'll run their quill pens through it! I'm obnoxious and disliked You know it's true I usually rewind and watch that number once or twice before moving on.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 8, 2019 11:43:01 GMT -5
But I totally agree on The Patriot. Ugh! They got so much RIGHT but they failed miserably on too many important issues. If they wanted to make the British look bad, they could have written a scene about the British urging the slaves to come and join the British Army, which the British had no intention of allowing, they just wanted to disrupt the American as much as possible. So they herded the escaped slaves on to prison ships and incarcerated them indefinitely under horrible deprived unsanitary conditions. But if they had shown that, it would destroy the idyllic view they wanted to present of the nice Southern white people looking after their slaves.
The Devil's Disciple isn't bad, but it's kind of disappointing based on the cast. The Howards of Virginia is BORING. I totally understand why the classic movie channels don't go out of their way to show it very often.
I rather liked Revolution when I finally saw it for the first time last year. Not a great movie, but its bad reputation is completely undeserved.
And John Paul Jones is worth seeing for Bette Davis!
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Post by Deleted on Jul 8, 2019 11:55:35 GMT -5
Last night's classic movie viewing was the sci-fi classic Forbidden Planet While I have been familiar with the movie for a long time and seen many clips form it, and Robbie the Robot is a quintessential icon of classic sci-fi, this was the first time I had seen the movie all the way through. I quite enjoyed it, though some of the interactions between Altaira and the crewmen were cringworthy and got a lot of snarky comments from my wife, especially the prts when Leslie Neilsen was blaming how she dressed making the crewmen blameless in how they reacted to her. -M
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Post by codystarbuck on Jul 8, 2019 12:27:36 GMT -5
The Patriot is filled with issues. You can start with the scene where Gibson and his family are travelling up a street, to attend the debate about joining the Revolution. You see ships moore on their left. Those ships would be sitting on dry land, in the middle of the city. The Cooper Rive was on the right side of the screen, which is where the harbor is, a bit further up. That's minor, though.
The black people on Gibson's plantation are free men working for him willingly, because he is a nice guy. Uh Hunh.
When they go on the run, they hide out in the Gullah community. White people hiding in a group of African-Americans (and outright Africans); uh-hunh. It also ignores the fact that the Gullah community were slaves, in this time period. The area has a particularly distinct history, compared to the rest of the South, where much of the African culture was preserved and their own language developed. That passed on through generations. Many modern Gullah members sold handmade crafts in the Old Market, in downtown Charleston, plus as street vendors, near tourist sites. However, they gained freedom with the Civil War; slavery was well in force at this point.
The film does get correct that a slave owner could have a slave serve in his place, with the militia.
Cornwallis is treated rather badly here, perpetuating the idea that he was an inept military leader. he was actually one of Britain's best generals and scored major victories in India and elsewhere. Most of the fighting in the Carolinas, though, was between Tory militia and Patriot militias. Because these were neighbors, it was rather bitter fighting, with atrocities committed on both sides. However, there is little evidence that British regulars carried out such acts. Banastre Tarleton and gis Green Dragoons worked with Tory units and was unhappy with many of their actions. He was plastered with propaganda for acts committed by the Tories. The movie renames him (better to slander) and then turns him into a sadistic Bond villain. Patriots also murdered captured prisoners, crying Tarleton's Quarter, after an incident where Tories killed Patriot prisoners, as traitors.
The film does fairly well depict the Battle of the Cowpens, where Cornwallis was effectively blocked in trying to split the Colonies in two, to isolate them (in conjunction with the victory in the Battle of King's Mountain). However, the strategy of the battle came from the commander, Daniel Morgan. Morgan had a force of Patriot regulars (well trained and disciplined, by this point), frontier sharpshooters, and militia. He positioned his sharpshooters, as skirmishers, at the front line, the militia in the next, and the Patriots behind him, with natural topography protecting his flanks. The skirmishers targeted officers and NCOs, to disrupt the command of the British. They would gve way to the militia, who had a reputation for running from a fight when the odds were bad. They were ordered to fire 2 volleys and retreat to the read, reforming behind the Patriots, while masking the presence of dragoons, under William Washington. The idea was to use the sharpshooters to sow command chaos and pull the British forward, use the militias reputation to sucker them into a frontal assault, then have them run right smack into the hardcore Patriots, who would stand, allowing the reformed militia and dragoons the envelop the british. The forces under Tarleton bought it and did just that, and suffered a massive defeat. The film uses the basics of that, though has to have Mel rally the troops with the flag.
The worst offense is Tarleton burning down a church filled with civilians, something that never happened in the war, at any point. There were prisoners shot as traitors or Patriots hung, or Tories murdered; but, no one did anything on that level and it is an insult to history and a cheap gimmick to manipulate the audience.
Disney's Swamp Fox series was way more accurate than this thing, and it was playing up legend more than fact.
What was really sad was that Charleston and the Carolinas pretty much ignored the history of the region, in the Revolution, while playing up the Civil War. The exceptions being the battle sites at King's Mountain and the Cowpens. Then again, when you would tour the plantations in the area, they were pretty quick to gloss over the slave quarters and the subject entirely, playing up the architecture and decorative gardens. I went once, with my mother and had trouble controlling my smart alec reflex, in light of the poor history. I wasn't able to on one of the buggy tours of Charleston, where the guide was crowing about how the North never took the city. I piped out, "No, they just blockaded the river and starved out the population, while blockade runners made a fortune, without delivering significant goods." That got a dirty look.
There is a lot of interesting history to explore down there, if you are interested in that kind of thing; but, ignore the street tours and be wary of the plantation tours; they are more folklore and legend, with little regard for facts. The Historical Society and National Park Service attractions are far better (Ft Moultrie, the Calhoun House, the museum, etc).
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Post by Prince Hal on Jul 8, 2019 13:03:24 GMT -5
codystarbuck, as always your erudite commentary is a delight to read. As is inevitably par for the course, movies such as The Patriot opt for the simplistic when the truth is far more thought-provoking. Wondering if you have read much Kenneth Roberts of Northwest Passage fame, whose historical accuracy is, as far as I know, still applauded. He loved depicting the lives of unpopular, even infamous figures and presenting them in a fuller light. Notable among his works on the Revolution are Arundel, Rabble in Arms and Oliver Wiswell. The former are about Arnold's ill-fated (some would say ill-advised and foolish) attempt to take Quebec and his later heroics at Saratoga; the latter is about the plight of the Loyalists from Boston during the siege and evacuation in 1776 right through and after Yorktown. (It features appearances by Arnold and Robert Rogers.)
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Post by codystarbuck on Jul 8, 2019 13:14:14 GMT -5
codystarbuck , as always your erudite commentary is a delight to read. As is inevitably par for the course, movies such as The Patriot opt for the simplistic when the truth is far more thought-provoking. Wondering if you have read much Kenneth Roberts of Northwest Passage fame, whose historical accuracy is, as far as I know, still applauded. He loved depicting the lives of unpopular, even infamous figures and presenting them in a fuller light. Notable among his works on the Revolution are Arundel, Rabble in Arms and Oliver Wiswell. The former are about Arnold's ill-fated (some would say ill-advised and foolish) attempt to take Quebec and his later heroics at Saratoga; the latter is about the plight of the Loyalists from Boston during the siege and evacuation in 1776 right through and after Yorktown. (It features appearances by Arnold and Robert Rogers.) I've read Northwest Passage (used to own a nice vintage hardcover) and once saw one of the other books, in a vintage/used book store; but, the asking price was more than my wallet could bear. Northwest Passage was readily available to us, at B&N; but I don't recall us ever getting anything else from him. I never checked on what was in print. It's sad that I doubt anyone will ever do a really definitive movie or mini-series account of Benedict Arnold, who was one of the better military figures, for a time, until politics and ego led him to switch sides. Very complex person that would make for fascinating drama; but, he's a traitor. So, we are stuck with Peter Brady's portrayal, on the stage.
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Post by Prince Hal on Jul 8, 2019 13:29:45 GMT -5
codystarbuck , as always your erudite commentary is a delight to read. As is inevitably par for the course, movies such as The Patriot opt for the simplistic when the truth is far more thought-provoking. Wondering if you have read much Kenneth Roberts of Northwest Passage fame, whose historical accuracy is, as far as I know, still applauded. He loved depicting the lives of unpopular, even infamous figures and presenting them in a fuller light. Notable among his works on the Revolution are Arundel, Rabble in Arms and Oliver Wiswell. The former are about Arnold's ill-fated (some would say ill-advised and foolish) attempt to take Quebec and his later heroics at Saratoga; the latter is about the plight of the Loyalists from Boston during the siege and evacuation in 1776 right through and after Yorktown. (It features appearances by Arnold and Robert Rogers.) I've read Northwest Passage (used to own a nice vintage hardcover) and once saw one of the other books, in a vintage/used book store; but, the asking price was more than my wallet could bear. Northwest Passage was readily available to us, at B&N; but I don't recall us ever getting anything else from him. I never checked on what was in print. It's sad that I doubt anyone will ever do a really definitive movie or mini-series account of Benedict Arnold, who was one of the better military figures, for a time, until politics and ego led him to switch sides. Very complex person that would make for fascinating drama; but, he's a traitor. So, we are stuck with Peter Brady's portrayal, on the stage. You can find Roberts' books on Amazon. Vintage copies are too much for me, too, but there are trade paperback editions available. Libraries still have him occasionally, though probably more in my neck of the woods (New England) than elsewhere. I wonder if the Philbrick book about Arnold is good. Based on others of his, I'd say it was worth reading. You'r right, though, an Arnold movie would be great if it were well done. I forget if any of us mentioned The Scarlet Coat (1955) among Revolutionary War movies. Very nicely done (John Sturges directed) spy thriller that involves Arnold, Greene, Clinton, Howe, and Major Andre. More than a run-of-the-mill Americans-good, British-bad story.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 8, 2019 14:06:10 GMT -5
My thesis adviser had one simple rule about understanding historical movies-they will tell you much more about the time they were made than the time they were about.
Based on the choices how they portray historical events, what themes they emphasize or de-emphasize, how they portray historical personages, etc. will tell you much more about the zeitgeist of the times it was made that it will tell you about the reality of the events and people it portrays.
-M
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