O/T - Is SPR considered realistic?

[Mr. Clark]

The guy who wrote that comes off like a total Jag.

These Mr. Nobody movie reviewers get on my nerves...

[Trooper]

Must be a new version of the DVD. The one my dad got, fairly soon after it came out, didn't have one.

That said, the Irish Defense Forces came out with a good half-hour long programme entitled 'You and what army, Private Ryan?' which was screened on national TV. The entire half-hour was dedicated to the beach scenes and the training of the Irish soldiers who stormed Curraghcloe. (Being a little untrained in WWII Beach Assault tactics, they had to be educated..) Is that on the DVD?

If not, I wonder if the DFPR office might offer the tape for sale...

NTM

------------------

The difference between infantrymen and cavalrymen is that cavalrymen get to die faster, for we ride into battle!

[Guest Der Unbekannte Jäger]

I would be interested in seeing that, sounds very interesting.

------------------

"The world is wide, and I will not waste my life in friction when it could be turned into momentum."

[tss]

A lot of people have complained (not on this thread but on others) about that German MG team in the middle of nowhere. While no sensible commander puts a MG in such an isolated position, sometimes strange things happen in war.

In particular, few months ago I stumbled upon a quote of a Finnish veteran who served as a MG gunner. On the second or third day of Soviet summer offensive (that is 10 or 11 June '44) his MG was positioned to cover flanks of the new defence line. The Soviets broke through the middle and the defenders withdrew. However, no-one remember that one MG team (actually, it wasn't even a full team but only two men) and they spent the whole day there, firing at Soviets when they saw them. They didn't suspect anything before 5-6 hours had gone. One of them tried to find contact with the neighbouring troops, but found the positions empty. They then quickly withdrew through a forest.

- Tommi

[Panther131]

If you want to see a hellish warfilm, see 'Stalingrad'

[Michael Dorosh]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeff Heidman:

This is a total nit, but I remember when Ryan blew up the HT I thought that Miller and Co. would have gotten waxed by Ryan and Co.

After Ryan zaps the track, Miller and his guys go running in and kill off the surviving Germs. I am betting though that the moment they ran around that track they would have been lit up by Ryans scout team. They had no idea there were other Amis around, and they were almost certainly jacked up with rather itchy trigger fingers.

Jeff Heidman<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Here's a better one for you - your halftrack gets zapped with a bazooka - what do you do? Personally, I would crawl - CRAWL mind you - away in the tall grass until I could get my bearings and determine where the enemy was. Why do the Germans in SPR simply bail out and start running willy nilly towards the camera?

Answer - to provide a "jump" scene when Miller goes scampering off to the other side of the halftrack.

Why didn't Ryan's squad shoot the Germans taht jump out at MIller, come to think of it? Maybe they were reloading, or wisely crawling away from their position - which they gave away with the backblast of the bazooka. I don't think Ryan's squad not shooting is a nit - but the Germans running around like retards definitely was.

[tss]

Michael Dorosh wrote:

Why do the Germans in SPR simply bail out and start running willy nilly towards the camera?

Possibly because they are shocked senseless. People do very stupid things when they are in panic.

One Finnish stug (no. 531-5) was knocked out by a T-34-85 at Vuosalmi. The loader jumped out of his hatch, and started running towards the enemy, even though his mates tried to warn him. He (or his body) was never seen again.

- Tommi

[Jeff Heidman]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken:

Jeff Heidman wrote:

> I am betting though that the moment they ran around that track they would have been lit up by Ryans scout team. They had no idea there were other Amis around, and they were almost certainly jacked up with rather itchy trigger fingers.

Maybe something to do with Miller's lot having wasted the squad from the halftrack? Ryan and co. would be wondering who was shooting at whom, and would also probably recognise American firearms. Assuming they didn't see Miller approaching in the first place.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The way I remember the scene, the track was between Miller and Ryan. Both of them were hiding in the grass, unaware of the other.

Ryan pops the track. Miller and Co. immediately get up and Miller runs *around* the track (so now he is on the side with Ryan), and shoots the Germans coming around that side.

It is possible that Ryan saw Miller prior to his dropping into the grass at the sound of the track though.

Jeff Heidman

[ntg84]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mr. Clark:

We should make some WAV files for CM from the DVD! What would that require? I have no idea how to go about doing it...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

There is some in the Game, I think I've heard Upham, the wimp, at the end when he was speaking German to the Germans, telling them to surrender. It's a German sound effect in the game if it's the one i heard.

[Mr. Clark]

I would have to re-watch the movie to be sure, but I think Miller and/or his squadmates are calling orders while attacking the HT. Ryan and Co. would hear the English language if nothing else.

Also, Miller and Squad are walking through the tall grass before the HT arrives, so it's possible Ryan and Co. see them as they wait in ambush for the HT.

My god! I could never nitpick a movie like some people here! I swear that in the search for ultra-realism, people forget that reality does not always make clear and cut sense.

BTW, here's a SPR interesting fact -

If the film was made by any other director, it would have never made the R cut, being NC-17 instead. Spielberg pulled this off one other time, with Schindler's List. If only Ridley Scott had that kind of sway, we would have had a bloodier Gladiator.

(If you get the Gladiator DVD, check out the "montage" of cut scenes to see some snips that were taken out so the movie could make the R cut.)

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

I disagree with the common statement that the first 20 minutes were realistic. They were realistically bloody, yes (only about 1/3rd of the opening wave made it to the wall behind the bluff, just across the beach), and the overwhelming sense in that is right. Some people react to that as more realism, as though nothing else is involved.

But they have drastically simplified what was going on for the purpose of fitting it into a movie. The supporting arms are largely missing. For instance, more U.S. soldiers were killed or wounded by mortar fire on Omaha beach than by machineguns - many of them while sheltering behind the sea wall, some by hits on or near the landing craft or crossing the beach proper. They don't show it because it took longer, basically.

While on the other side, the U.S. sent several battalions of "swimming" tanks to support the men on the beach, in the first wave. Some of them sank in the surf, and others were blasted by German guns, but a number were operating along the beach, shooting back at the machinegun nests. And destroyers came in to 400 yards off the beach, when they saw how bad things were, to plaster the bunkers with 5 inch guns.

The preliminary bombardment was also missing, and with it the sense that an enourmous weight of material was being thrown at the defenders, before the first ramp dropped. All of the above help to account for the numerous places along the beach where the men who reached the seawall were able to push on up the bluffs and inland later on, and for the parts of the beach were people got across it alive - and also why that, not just reaching the seawall, was the real problem on Omaha.

By comparison, SPR gives the impression of the infantry going in first and unsupported on the impossible task of wading through the surf and crossing the wide beach while being machinegunned. Unsupported they were not. The machinegunners shooting them were not untouched and waiting for them, but rocked about by bombardment and digging themselves out of their bunkers to rush the guns into their firing positions.

All too complicated, in the minds of the movie-makers, for Joe Citizen to follow or comprehend. Which is entirely wrong in my opinion. People would make an imaginative effort to comprehend it, and oversimplifying it was in some ways falsifying it. Instead we get the WW I "over the top" cliche with water on the way, and nothing else. Just flat isn't true, that is not what happened.

As for the rest of the movie's combat scenes, the typical problems with movies are there. It stands out when they instead get something right. An example is the difficulty of seeing anything while at ground-creeping level, in the machinegun nest scenes (not the scene as a whole, but that aspect of it).

In the town fighting, the main problem seen over and over is the ranges are too short (most of the time) and the opposing sides too easy to see, doubtless because of the needs of the camera (to get everything happening into one field of view, but also close up to see things).

Others have already pointed out the numerous ways in which doctrine is wrong (tanks leading, etc) in the closing battle scenes, so I needn't dwell on them.

[David Aitken]

Jeff Heidman wrote:

> The way I remember the scene, the track was between Miller and Ryan. Both of them were hiding in the grass, unaware of the other.

> Ryan pops the track. Miller and Co. immediately get up and Miller runs *around* the track (so now he is on the side with Ryan), and shoots the Germans coming around that side.

251 approaches. Miller yells, "Halftrack, cover!". Up to this point, what were Ryan and co doing? Presumably watching for the enemy probe they were expecting, in which case they would have seen Miller and co before they saw the 251. They would certainly have heard Miller. Ryan takes out the 251, which veers round between the two parties. Germans jump out of 251 towards Miller and are shot. Mellish (I think) shouts, "watch out, make sure they're down!". Miller moves round to Ryan's side, Germans run out towards Ryan and are shot. The only problem which crosses my mind is that Miller might accidentally have shot Ryan while firing at the Germans. Ryan and co had plenty of time to see Miller coming, hear Miller's lot shouting, hear their American firearms, and see the Germans being killed. They sensibly would have kept their heads down until they were sure Miller and co were friendlies. And no, I did not watch the scene in question in order to make this post. =)

[Guest Offwhite]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Smaragdadler:

Here is a review about this film I've found... http://home.t-online.de/home/d.nix/film/e-ryan.htm

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Wow. That piece is incoherent on a level comparable to the very best of Rob/1 and GAZ

If I was going to use the excuse of critiquing, say, "Das Boot" to vent my spleen on the German people, at least I'd make sure I knew the language first.

------------------

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep

Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap

- Rudyard Kipling, "Tommy"

[Michael Dorosh]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jasoncawley@ameritech.net:

I disagree with the common statement that the first 20 minutes were realistic. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Absolutely right on all counts. I think they should have made Miller and co. come in on the 5th wave - the ramps open and what do they see? Hundreds of dead GIs, and more just sitting doing nothing! It was teh Rangers that got things started on Omaha (in part) - the motto "Rangers Lead The Way" comes from that day, as you may well know. It would have been a bit more real to have Miller and company save the day after the GIs were already floundering for a few hours.

Excellent point in another post about people doing unpredictable things in comment - backed up by a good example. I still think the SPR scene was obviously staged for cinematic effect - which we all know to be true. The Germans running down the middle of the street in Ramelle confirms this - there was an experienced SS recce commander at Arnhem who simply drove across the bridge and got his ass handed to him....so it did happen. But too many of that kind of thing in a movie just kills it and does a dis-service to the guys who were really there.

For showing true terror and the effect of war on the human body and mind, SPR is unparalelled. It could also have been a lot more.

[Pak40]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by PD:

To me, the movie "The Longest Day" was more realistic, acknowledging that there were more people around than just the americans, the the pictures of the beaches through the sights of the two strafing planes showed more misery than "Ryan" was capable of.

'course it's only in Black and White.

[This message has been edited by PD (edited 01-19-2001).]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You're comparing two different types of movies: one that's showing the big picture of D-Day and another that's only showing a small unit's actions during D-Day. SPR wasn't intended to be a film about D-Day, it's intended to show war at a more personal level.

I don't know which "Ryan" you were watching but the scene on the beach with the guy's guts spilling out crying "momma" and the guy walking around in a daze looking for his arm showed more misery than in the entire film "The Longest Day".

[Guest Mikey D]

I've seen long topic threads on the 'techie' warfare chatgroups, and someone is always complaining about the T-34 wheels on the Tiger I in SPR, or the fact that no Tiger 1s were in the area, or no distant sound or artillery or passing bombers etc. etc.

But I'd say the first half of SPR is a good as the first half of the 1970s classic "Cross of Iron" (Eastern front) at depicting war, and that's saying something. Gets a bit too sentimental towards the end for my tastes though (but maybe I'd be sentimental too if I was 19 years old and sleeping in French ditches).

[Pak40]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jasoncawley@ameritech.net:

But they have drastically simplified what was going on for the purpose of fitting it into a movie. The supporting arms are largely missing. For instance, more U.S. soldiers were killed or wounded by mortar fire on Omaha beach than by machineguns - many of them while sheltering behind the sea wall, some by hits on or near the landing craft or crossing the beach proper. They don't show it because it took longer, basically.

While on the other side, the U.S. sent several battalions of "swimming" tanks to support the men on the beach, in the first wave. Some of them sank in the surf, and others were blasted by German guns, but a number were operating along the beach, shooting back at the machinegun nests. And destroyers came in to 400 yards off the beach, when they saw how bad things were, to plaster the bunkers with 5 inch guns.

The preliminary bombardment was also missing,

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

For obvious movie making reasons SPR can't be perfectly historically accurate or realistic. One of those reasons being that 4-5 hour movies don't float too well with the public.

I can't help but correct your inaccuracies. Usually I don't care if people are wrong but in this case it's just too much.

Yes mortars were devastating on Omaha beach. SPR did an excellent job showing that. Did you not realize this when Miller was dragging half of a soldiers body or the countless other explosions on the beach?

And , personally, I think that MG fire was far more devastating in the first and second waves than the mortar fire. If you've ever read Amrose's D-Day you'd get the same idea in your head.

In regard to your comment about the DD tanks, only 3 made it ashore. Yes 3 out of 32, the rest drowned. Omaha beach was some 5+ miles long and only 3 DD tanks made it ashore, so excuse Speilberg for not showing one. Other tanks coming off of LCTs made it ashore but they were on the other side of Omaha beach.

Regarding your quote on the destroyers: Yes they were there and played a big part helping to open the draws. But, as I stated, Omaha was several miles long and the chance that one of the few destroyers were even near the 200 meter stretch of sand where Miller's company hit the beach is very slim.

The preliminary bombardment on Omaha was very ineffectual. Naval fire was too far inland and the bombers, who were supposed to bomb the beach so that infantry could benefit from the craters, were also off target (for the most part).

THE TWO MAIN INACCURACIES OF THE BEACH LANDING IN SPR AS I SEE IT:

1. The beach width was way too short. SPR gave the impression that the run to the sea wall was maybe 75 yards. In reality there was a low tide when they attacked and the men had to run 200+ yards in some places to get to the seawall. I'm not sure of the exact figures but I could dig them up.

2. The soldiers were on the beach a lot more than 20 minutes before the first openings were made in the defenses. But I'm not really upset at this because I understand that Speilberg couldn't make a landing scene an hour long.

[Michael Dorosh]

Incidentally, here is the URL for a board dedicated to SPR and similar topics - if anyone wants to continue this discussion there, it is the best place to go.

http://network54.com/Hide/Forum/60599

[Guest AbnAirCav]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Silver Stars:

And I also thought a saw a liebstandarte key on the Tiger, which i think is also a little off, but hey, nobody but a grog would care or notice.....<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Actually, I give them credit for the sSSPzAbt 101 unit insignia of two crossed skeleton keys, since that on the date CPT Miller was killed (13 June 1944) the only Tiger unit in combat in the area was sSSPzAbt 101 near Villers-Bocage (sSSPzAbt 102 & sPzAbt 503 arrive in the area in early July).

However, FWIW, the sSSPzAbt 101 Tigers (including SS-Untersturmführer Hahn's "131") were actually fighting Cromwells & Shermans (including Fireflies) of the British 4th County of London Yeomanry "Sharpshooters" tank battalion at Villers-Bocage on the 13th.

Also to the credit of the Tiger converters they appear to have done their homework and a good job with the markings. "232" is correctly shown with the 2nd company's scheme of red numerals outlined in white, and the sSSPzAbt 101 unit insignia of the two crossed skeleton keys is correctly placed for the 2nd company on the right hull front (1st & 3rd had theirs on the left hull front). The numerals of the 1st company were green-olive outlined in white, which is what "131" appeared to be in the movie ... but on the http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~ipmsuk/armoursig.htm web site the "131" markings on the rear of the turret appear to be an incorrect red? The sSSPzAbt 101 unit insignia for "131" is on the correct left hull front for the 1st company, as is the "S" in the rhombus on the right hull rear which was unique to the 1st company, another nice touch by the converters.

--Keith

[Iraqi Tank Commander]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Forever Babra:

The girl in pink had nice sweater-puppies, but I don't know if they were real

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Heh

That's the first thing I noticed when I saw SPR on its opening day. That outfit had to have been chosen just for that purpose

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/wwii/100-11/100-11.htm#-day

That is a link to the army center for military history, and the standard army account of the events of that day.

There is an enourmous amount of information in quite impressive detail about just what happened that day. Getting it materially wrong is either laziness, or a more likely a deliberate desire to simplify in order to make it easier for audiences to understand.

The statement that only 3 tanks reached Omaha beach is wrong. 96 Tanks were sent in the first wave, most off LCTs rather than swimming DD, and more than half, 50-55, were active on the beach. That is on a frontage of 6000 yards, or 1 every 120 yards average. There were sections of the beach where most of the tanks had failed, because they had swum in DD and swamped, to be sure. There were others with more than their share, obviously.

As for another fellow's comments about the Rangers, the ones that went ashore on Omaha were indeed some of the first across the beach and up the bluff, and they took comparatively light casualties. Others on the same section of beach (Dog White) also fared well. Part of the reason seems to have been a fire near the top of the bluff touched off by naval gunfire or rockets, which created a smoke-screen of sorts along that section of the beach.

Incidentally, in retrospect the single stupidest aspect of the landings was the army and navy not coordinating to put an obscuring smokescreen along the whole beach before the first wave went in. The supporting rocket barrages in the finally run-in would have been perfect for it. But that is another story altogether.

As for the point about MGs and mortars, yes the MGs were the cause of most of the initial losses in the first two waves, before the men got to the sea-wall (or sometimes, just out of the water). But the first wave went in at 6:30, and the first units up on the bluffs were around 8-8:30. And the first units on the bluffs were by no means most of the men on the beach.

Yes, the movie shows some effects of mortar fire on the beach itself, in the first wave, but that is not the point. The point is it leaves the impression that the sea wall and safety from the MGs was safety period, when this was most emphatically not the case. Very high losses were taken in the first two waves from MG fire, getting to and crossing the beach. Large additional losses were taken behind the sea wall, by men cowering for protection from the MGs, exhausted and in shock, and still being plastered by the regular mortar fire.

The losses taken by units that pushed beyond the sea wall were comparatively light. That is the surprising thing. It looked impossible, especially given what had already just happened. Now they are supposed to run across a wide stretch of open ground, barbed wire, minefields, up a steep bluff, and into trenches and bunkers and machinegun nests?

But in fact the German defenses were thin along the bluffs, between the draws leading out of the beach. The positions along the top of them were sighted to deliver flanking fire farther down the beach, to the sides, not directly forward. The infantry positions along the crest-line were thinly held, if held at all, as the German defenders concentrated around the draws, where the heavier guns were placed (on the possible vehicle exits from the beach, you see).

"Bluff" had more than one meaning. Many of those obstacles - wire and mines - were about the safest place to be, because the Germans counted on them looking intimidating enough they were not actually covered by fire. The German defenses there were "bluff". The strongpoints near the draws swept the whole length of the beach, but not the whole length of the higher ground beyond the beach.

Once on the actual face of the bluff, the uneven ground made it very hard for the defenders to see the attackers. Moving off the beach was distinctly safer than staying on it, and the men who stayed on it were getting pounded by mortar fire. Incidentally, so of the men landing found that in places, the German MGs were firing fixed lines and patterns without aim, as they could not see their targets, and they got across by timing their move (like dodging the water from an automatic sprinkler sweeping back and forth).

[Guest Offwhite]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jasoncawley@ameritech.net:

There is an enourmous amount of information in quite impressive detail about just what happened that day. Getting it materially wrong is either laziness, or a more likely a deliberate desire to simplify in order to make it easier for audiences to understand.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Or an unavoidable reality of filmmaking, that some excellent material nevertheless ends up on the cutting room floor.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

Incidentally, in retrospect the single stupidest aspect of the landings was the army and navy not coordinating to put an obscuring smokescreen along the whole beach before the first wave went in. The supporting rocket barrages in the finally run-in would have been perfect for it. But that is another story altogether.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Numerous units landed in the wrong place and struggled to locate their assigned objectives as it was; wouldn't a smokescreen like that have obscured landmarks and thrown the entire landing into chaos?

------------------

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep

Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap

- Rudyard Kipling, "Tommy"

[Michael Dorosh]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Offwhite:

Or an unavoidable reality of filmmaking, that some excellent material nevertheless ends up on the cutting room floor.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I helped train the military extras for Legends of the Fall - you are more correct than you know. I think the director made the right choices with that movie - it wasn't a war movie after all - but it was still disappointing to see all that really great footage never make it to the big screen - and see the other really avoidable errors make it (like putting the wrong date on the battle even though it had nothing to do with the story one way or another)...

In the end, movies are just movies. I'm grateful that SPR resulted in so much more awareness among the general population of what veterans actually went through - it increased awareness in Canada just as much as in the States. The vets deserve the attention.

[ex PFC Wintergreen]

It appears to me that there is a discrepancy in the opening D-Day scene in SPR. I'm referring to the scene where they're up from the beach and are chasing and shooting (from above) the Germans down in the trenches. I could swear that there are US troops with 101st shoulder patches in that scene (Don't tell me this was historically accurate??)

------------------

Read me back my last line!

[Franko]

Okay, to anyone who says that the last battle scene was "unrealistic" because the Germans advanced with armor into the town has not done their homework. First, it may have been "stupid", but that does not make it "unrealistic". In other words, in reality, Germans (and other armies) did stupid things. Remember that Panther company that entered the twin villages during the battle of the Bulge (12th SS no less), and got slaughtered? They had no infantry support, either. Morons? yes. Realistic? Yes.