Examiner2 Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Does anyone know of good documentaries covering the Italian front? In particular I would like in-depth analysis of individual battles throughout the entire campaign if there are any documentaries covering them. Comprehensive documentaries about the Italian front are something else that I would be interested in. Feel free to throw in a few book suggestions as well, although I am primarily looking for documentaries. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 in-depth analysis of individual battles In a documentary? I know Sandhurst (or was it Camberly?) did an indepth analysis doco covering Op GOODWOOD, but in general such things don't exist, do they? There are plenty of documentarys about battles, but they're usually simple narratives which might happen to be back-dropped by film related to the battle. More often, though, they're backdropped by whatever stock footage happened to be at hand. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Childress Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Try Rick Atkinson: http://www.amazon.com/Day-Battle-1943-1944-Liberation-butTrilogy/dp/080508861X/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1371431768&sr=1-4&keywords=rick+atkinson Excellent overview but not much battle minutiae. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Examiner2 Posted June 17, 2013 Author Share Posted June 17, 2013 Try Rick Atkinson: http://www.amazon.com/Day-Battle-1943-1944-Liberation-butTrilogy/dp/080508861X/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1371431768&sr=1-4&keywords=rick+atkinson Excellent overview but not much battle minutiae. Thanks I'll check out the book. And Jon, even though goodwood was Normandy I would still like to check out that documentary if you could remember the name of it. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Not very imaginatively, "Operation Goodwood" I believe. It was made in 1979, and includes extensive interviews with and between Pip Roberts and Hans von Luck. Copies are quite hard to find, unfortunately. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjkerner Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Try "The Battle of San Pietro," filmed and narrated by John Huston. And before anyone jumps on it for having "staged" footage, as some people do, apparently some footage of the troops moving up to the front was either stock or staged. Battle scenes weren't, and certainly not the footage of dead American boys from the 36th Division being stuffed into shrouds. It caused a ruckus with Army Brass, but Marshall defended it. It should be on YouTube. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Clarke Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Try "The Battle of San Pietro," filmed and narrated by John Huston: Battlefield series, "Battle for Italy". 2 hour program. Pretty good, some talk of what divisions where involved, strategic plan of combatants, weapons systems employed, etc: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag8uSgZnIGM Battle of Salerno: Ignore the godawful intro: Another DOD b&w feature, propaghandish: **** There really isn't much good stuff on Italy out there an the inter-webs. That Battlefield program is really the best I've found, the rest is pretty meh. Might need to stick to printed material to get in debt battle descriptions. I'm sure there are at least half a dozen good books out there covering the Italian front. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Thanks I'll check out the book. Be advised that it focusses primarily on the US Army and while it does include some narrative about the other Allies, they tend to be peripheral. There are the various official histories from the other forces involved that will focus on their respective experiences. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjkerner Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 For books, The excellent trilogy by Mark Zuehlke: http://www.amazon.ca/s/176-0451655-1528415?_encoding=UTF8&field-author=Mark%20Zuehlke&search-alias=books-ca and the US Army's (US Army Historical Center, or something like that) publications on the Italian Campaigns...don't have the link atm. I have the hard copies...excellent maps! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Examiner2 Posted June 17, 2013 Author Share Posted June 17, 2013 Be advised that it focusses primarily on the US Army and while it does include some narrative about the other Allies, they tend to be peripheral. There are the various official histories from the other forces involved that will focus on their respective experiences. Michael Advisement has been taken under consideration, operation reading the book has commenced. (The guy who names these operations is on vacation) I'm also checking out those DoD videos, pretty cool stuff guys. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sgt Joch Posted June 18, 2013 Share Posted June 18, 2013 Mark Zuelkhe? He is more of a general author looking for a popular subject matter rather than a serious historian and has been known to have a lot of factual errors in his book, especially the early ones. Considering the speed at which he churns out his books, I am not sure how much in depth research he does. For a good book on the Canadian Army, I would recommend Terry Copp's "Fields of Fire" and "Cinderella Army". However, both only deal with NWE. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjkerner Posted June 18, 2013 Share Posted June 18, 2013 Reasonable people differ. I would agree he is in the same vein as Atkinson (why no remark about his lack of depth?), but it was a good trilogy regardless, especially for the Canadan perspective. Fields of Fire is good; I haven't read Cinderella Army. I'll have to give it a go. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sgt Joch Posted June 18, 2013 Share Posted June 18, 2013 Atkinson? no I believe we have had discussions before that he is on the "light" side, much like Stephen Ambrose. The problem of course, is finding historians who can write. Glantz's research may be top notch, but no one would ever accuse him of writing a page turner. plus, very little is written on the italian front. "D-Day Dodgers" by Dancocks on the Canadians in italy is supposed to be very good, but it is out of print and hard to find. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted June 18, 2013 Share Posted June 18, 2013 a hard way to make a war by Gooderson covers the entire Italian campaign, mainly but not exclusively from the Allied side, and is exemplary. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JasonC Posted June 19, 2013 Share Posted June 19, 2013 JonS - thanks for the recommendation. Just ordered off Amazon... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted June 19, 2013 Share Posted June 19, 2013 Nothing to heavy but this looks interesting.. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Italys-Sorrow-Year-War-1944-45/dp/0007176449/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1371668008&sr=1-1&keywords=Italy+WW2 Also expensive but worth it...focusing on Monte Cassino though. http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Battles-Monte-Cassino-Then/dp/1870067738/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=2VYVCXQRXDQX1&coliid=I2KIJGLS15TUM9 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge MC Posted June 19, 2013 Share Posted June 19, 2013 check this http://militarymaps.narod.ru/osprey_e.html#bto_021 there is tons of maps of the war and there is Italian maps too.. look Campaign 134: Cassino 1944 - Breaking the Gustav Line 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jameshr4 Posted June 20, 2013 Share Posted June 20, 2013 I found Italy's Sorrow by James Holland very good. It gave a good overview of the last year of the war in Italy. Monte Cassino by Matthew Parker is a good indepth read concerning the battle. One final book to recommend is Whickers War, it is about Alan Whicker (he was facous in the 60's and 70's in the UK for travel documentaries) and his service in Italy with the Army Film and Photo Unit. There was also a good 2 part channel 4 TV series as well. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted June 20, 2013 Share Posted June 20, 2013 Atkinson? no I believe we have had discussions before that he is on the "light" side, much like Stephen Ambrose. Uh sorry, but no, not like Ambrose. His extensive bibliographies and notes suggest that he did a mountain of research for each book. And while he clearly admires the US Army, he is not given to the kind of abject hero-worship that glosses over failings of personalities or policies. His books also are largely free of the kind of egregious errors of detail that are a constant plague of Ambrose's work. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sgt Joch Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 the official canadian military history of the Italian campaign is available online: http://www.cmp-cpm.forces.gc.ca/dhh-dhp/his/oh-ho/detail-eng.asp?BfBookLang=1&BfId=25#archived 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FGM-Bootie Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 Thanks for that Sgt Joch. Will have a look when I get some peace fromt he wife and kid... LOL 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sublime Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 Or outright falsehoods that Ambrose committed to paper.. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ropey Posted June 27, 2013 Share Posted June 27, 2013 Also expensive but worth it...focusing on Monte Cassino though. http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Battles-Monte-Cassino-Then/dp/1870067738/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=2VYVCXQRXDQX1&coliid=I2KIJGLS15TUM9 Thanks for the plug Wodin - that's my book! Perhaps expensive, but as you say worth it. (But then I would say that.) Look out for the occasional special on Amazon. ;^) I would have to plug John Ellis' Cassino: The Hollow Victory which was my bible while researching. Cheers Perry 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjkerner Posted June 27, 2013 Share Posted June 27, 2013 Thanks for the plug Wodin - that's my book! Perhaps expensive, but as you say worth it. (But then I would say that.) Look out for the occasional special on Amazon. ;^) I would have to plug John Ellis' Cassino: The Hollow Victory which was my bible while researching. Cheers Perry I have your book, too. Cool! It's always somehow cool when authors of military books are interested in wargames. Sure, it's logical that they would be, but it still sort of blows my mind. I think it's because when I was younger and getting into wargames--45+ years ago--the contemporary authors were largely of my parents generation, and would mostly scoff at wargames, not having grown up playing them, and most likely had been in the war itself. But I digress. I liked your book, Perry. Good job! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted June 29, 2013 Share Posted June 29, 2013 No problem...love it when authors of great work turn up playing games I love. Thanks for the plug Wodin - that's my book! Perhaps expensive, but as you say worth it. (But then I would say that.) Look out for the occasional special on Amazon. ;^) I would have to plug John Ellis' Cassino: The Hollow Victory which was my bible while researching. Cheers Perry 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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