jon_j_rambo Posted July 27, 2006 Share Posted July 27, 2006 Anybody see these flicks? I saw them on Showtime for the first time this week, nothing like having the DirecTV mega package. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
well-dressed gentleman Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Europe Europa was great. You might like 'The Pianist' with Adrian Brody or 'Edges of the Lord' with that kid from The Sixth Sense. I'm surprised more jews didn't hide their identity. Wasn't there a jewish brigade in real life? I never noticed it in the British force pool. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scook Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Wow, only warflick I have watched in years is Private Ryan. Guess I deluged myself as a kid too much with WWII. The most memorable to me is "Cross of Iron". Great book and great movie. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jon_j_rambo Posted July 28, 2006 Author Share Posted July 28, 2006 In the movie, EE, was in true the Germans weren't cut? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerseyJohn Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Downfall is a terrific movie, great study in human nature under the most extreme conditions. The interviews with Hitler's late secretary are a priceless addition. -- Wonder if that bald gestapo low-life who went around hanging all the old men as deserters survived the war. I have a feeling that ten minuets after the city fell he was running around on the Soviet side doing pretty much the same thing. The Pianist is another great one for the same reasons, and a great look at general nazi brutality from the inside. The music is also great and Rubenstein (not to be confused with the Polish/American pianist Artur Rubenstein) made a lot of Chopin recordings during the fifties and sixties that have since been transferred to CD, of course. -- Neither of those movies ever got to the theaters around me. Shows what the demographic creeps think of the locals. I wound up buying both on DVD and am glad I did. Europa-Europa had me wondering how that guy managed to get by living in a Hitler Youth building and nobody ever noticed that he was circumcized? Not even the doctor giving him a physical? I find that hard to believe. Of course, it was recognized that some German Christians had also been circumcized so, if it was obvious that they weren't Jewish that was noted and they were left alone. I have a feeling that was the case here. Don't know why they didn't just come out with it. This is the only movie I've seen that shows children having been hanged with placards around their necks. In Enemy at the Gates a young boy was also shown being hanged, but it was more dramatic, I think, in this one because in Enemy the boy was a known spy (based on a real life shoeshine boy who was executed with friends) but in Europa the boy and girl, maybe 11 and 12, had simply been hanged because they were from a communist family. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
n0kn0k Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Some i can really recommend: Der Untergang (2004) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363163/ Stalingrad (1993) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108211/ Boot, Das (1981) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082096/ The Longest Day (1962) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056197/ A Bridge Too Far (1977) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075784/ The Pianist (2002) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253474/ Schindler's List (1993) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108052/ Saving Private Ryan (1998) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120815/ Band of Brothers (2001) (mini series) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0185906/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerseyJohn Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 nOKnOK, Terrific list. There are a huge number of World War II movies I'd add to it, but essentially I think you've already got a lot of it covered. To me the greatest war movie ever made is A Walk in the Sun from 1945. The film is in B&W, nothing fancy, though for one thing all the equipment is completely authentic, including a rare use of a German Pz II. After it's knocked out one of the GIs says, "Notice how the further we go the more of their old stuff we're seeing?" None of the infantrymen want to be where they are. They all keep thinking about how they have a good chance of getting killed in a day or two. The platoon is led by sergeants because their commanding officer was killed on the landing craft. None of the sergeants really wants the job but at least the top dog is a hardened veteran who knows all the tricks. Except he's cracking and, after the fight against the German armored car and tank he loses it, takes his bayonet out and tries to "Dig his way down to China." -- "He's trying a dig a hole so deep that they can never find him." One of the first scenes depicting battle fatigue I've ever seen -- and a damn sympathetic view of it. The most veteran of them cracks, not the green kid. Excellent. Richard Conte, as the machinegunner, has one great line after another, mainly muttered to his ammunition feeder as something is about to happen. "I'll let you in on a little secret. Ever see those guns at Coney Island where you shoot at the little planes? Well, I never could hit those damn things." -- As the tank comes down the wooded road -- "These things (the bullets) ever pierce armor?" -- "Never have yet." -- "Thanks for telling me." Very, very highly recommended. I'd say it's a must see and the short novel (Harry Brown?), written in 1944, is a great read if you can find it. -- One odd thing about the casting of Downfall I find difficult to understand. The actor playing Joseph Goebles is the tallest man in the movie. Odd choice for the despised Poinsoned Dwarf! But the rest of the cast was perfect, especially the portrayal of Albert Speer, who appears to have been the last nazi official entering and leaving the bunker who the SS guards still treated like a man in power. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fubarno Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 I recently saw Downfall too.( I saw EE many years ago). The one deepest impression that haunted me from the movie was the guy, mentioned above, running around stringing people up as traitors. The actor playing him was the stereotypical ugly German that one might expect to see in some anti nazi propoganda; fat faced with rosy cheeks, big and stupid looking but with a cruel beedy eyed face, and of course wearing some lederhosen and a Tyrolean hat. A right sick bastard. The other thing was the fanatical Frau Goebbels making her children take some tranquilizers before bedtime so she could come in later and give them all cyanide. Disturbing! Lots of other disturbing stuff too. Like a big auto accident that one can't look away from. Of course any scene with Hitler; pure delusional, evil fanatacism. Good movie for the WW2 history buff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glenmorangie Posted July 31, 2006 Share Posted July 31, 2006 @Fubarno Yes Magda Goebbels poisoning her children I found disturbing in the movie - my wife was practically hysterical. I've read a lot of books on the subject of the final days of the 3rd Reich including Anthony Beevor's excellent opus and I think that Der Untergang (Downfall) does the subject justice. I felt sorry (almost) for Fegelien. I think my top WW2 movies wood be: Das Boot Downfall Saving Private Ryan A Bridge Too Far Cross Of Iron and I would love to see the movie that Jersey John was talking about. Regards all Derek Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kuniworth Posted July 31, 2006 Share Posted July 31, 2006 Best movie; "talvisota", it's about the winter war. Just realism. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jon_j_rambo Posted July 31, 2006 Author Share Posted July 31, 2006 @Kuni --- How do you know it's real if you weren't really there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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