Guest kking199 Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 It is on now.. first 15 minutes have been VERY good! Check it out! ABC! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Panther131 Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 Yep. I caught the last hour. I was'nt sure if it was a super pershing or pershing, in that one urban tank footage with the tiger geting knocked out and brewed up heavily. Great clear footage. Best clarity in war film I have seen to date. (though I dont think I have seen all that much, just the history channel's "blunders" amd "suicide missions" mostly) But the clarity of some the normandy footage was unbelievable. I thought it was DVD. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aacooper Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 Unfortunately, didn't see the whole thing, but what I saw was excellent. The footage from Tarawa was thrilling and terrifying. The aforementioned tank duel was cool -- you could see the 90mm round strike the Panther (though all German tanks were identified by Tom Hanks as Tigers). It was also grislier than I thought - especially the bit about the Free French tank unit which suffered some casualties. There were several burning, live, Japanese on film as well. Also, there was footage of orphans in Nagasaki. It wasn't all "neat-o here's some combat footage". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Splinty Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 I watched the whole thing,it was very good. I thought the shots of the Japanese woman killing her baby and then killing herself were tragic and horrifying, a true comment of the human cost of war. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 I caught it last night also. It was VERY good. It was interesting to find out that a lot of the combat footage in John Huston's "San Pietro" (a documentary of combat in Italy, Nov '43) was "put on" by Huston. While filming a green battalion in combat he would throw a grenade and yell "Grenade !" to get the men to duck (there was one filmed instance of this). Poor guys are being filmed sh*tting their pants. A lot of tragic footage was in there too. The removal of the Free French Sherman crewman was quite grisly. The cameraman said he wouldn't have filmed it if the crewman was American since he would be afraid that someone back home would recognize the person. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jshandorf Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 Damn! I missed the whole thing last night cause i was playing TCP/IP! Grrrr.... Hope it comes out on video or DVD. I would buy it. Jeff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest kking199 Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 It was better than I anticipated and as mentioned showed the ugliness of war. I also thought some of the Pacific footage was excellent and the overall quality was good. It was a Pershing that took out the Panther in the city, (the cameraman mentioned this during the episode). I did not see the need for Ambrose to be in the show... I don't know but personally I am little Ambrosed out. You'd think by the airtime he gets he was the only person who wrote decent history books about WWII. I am not knocking his books, I have enjoyed the three I have read. He is an Allied homer though. I prefer a more objective view. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vcents Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 I was very impressed by this special...what made it enjoyable was the first person accounts relayed. If it would have just been Tom Hanks droning on, I don't think it would have had the impact that it had...it also differed greatly from the sanitized films we see on the History Channel. PS - How 'bout Tom's nappy beard? Hey Tom...mix in a trim every now and then. ------------------ The only thing worse than fighting with allies is fighting without them. - Churchill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 Yeah, I forgot about Ambrose's appearance. You know D-Day was the greateast achievement of the Americans in WWII ? Despite having written an account of British Paras - Ambrose seems to consistently fail mentioning the contribution of any other Allies when he is speaking/writing to an American audience. Homer indeed ! Anyway... excuse my opinionated Ambrose bashing (I liked his books too - but they are two-dimensional from a historian/enthusiast's perspective). Hanks had the beard because he was shooting CastAway (which I hear will be pretty good - except for an unconvincing ending). It was great to hear from the cameramen who actually shot a lot of the famous shots everyone here would recognize. They even covered Merrill's Maruaders in the CBI theater. One cameraman was "taken out" by some cargo-flyboys making inaccurate drops to the Marauders. Ended his stint in WWII. Another interesting note is that a lot of footage shot in Normandy by American cameramen was lost when it was gathered on shore and then transferred to one of the ships offshore. All of it dropped into the ocean while climbing aboard. Most of the surviving footage was either shot by Coast Guard cameramen (a number of the Higgin's Boat/LCVPs were driven by the Coast Guard) or one cameraman who was wounded in the 1st day of action and didn't get his film picked up by the clumsy Col. [This message has been edited by Schrullenhaft (edited 12-08-2000).] [This message has been edited by Schrullenhaft (edited 12-08-2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
russellmz Posted December 8, 2000 Share Posted December 8, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Schrullenhaft: Another interesting note is that a lot of footage shot in Normandy by American cameramen was lost when it was gathered on shore and then transferred to one of the ships offshore. All of it dropped into the ocean while climbing aboard. Most of the surviving footage was either shot by Coast Guard cameramen (a number of the Higgin's Boat/LCVPs were driven by the Coast Guard) or one cameraman who was wounded in the 1st day of action and didn't get his film picked up by the clumsy Col. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> one gnaws their teeth at frustration at hearing of all the lost footage from d-day: not only that but one photographer who went in with the troops shot like 100 pics, only to have the developer at home be so excited that he rushed and ruined all but three...argghhhh... ------------------ "They had their chance- they have not lead!" - GW Bush "They had mechanical pencils- they have not...lead?" - Jon Stewart on The Daily Show Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
:USERNAME: Posted December 9, 2000 Share Posted December 9, 2000 The hole in the side of the panther's hull is clearly visable. It must have been a regular AP round from the size of it and not a HVAP. It even shot flames out of the hole when the panther flared up. This encounter is documented in Death Traps also. From the footage it appears that US tank guns and howitzers did not spew out great puffs of smoke when firing. The MGs and rifles do and a haze will develop eventually. There was some good footage from the bulge also. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pvt. Ryan Posted December 9, 2000 Share Posted December 9, 2000 I found it interesting that much of the film shot in the war was in color but was released in B&W (according to one of the narrarators). I guess some of the original color negatives are starting to turn up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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