Interesting Movie

Watching it now on Netflix. Switch it to German audio with English subtitles, sounds weird in English audio.
Weaponry looks good, airplanes look like trainers with camo paint.
 
In one scene you can tell they were not actually firing the M34 or 42, just shaking it to add muzzle flash in special effect. Belt was not feeding.
Still respectable.
 
Yeah, I made it about 20min into the movie before I shut it off. Saw it a couple years ago when it first came onto Netflix.

Terrible acting, clunky and cliché plot, sound and visual effects were laughable.

“Stalingrad” (1993) if you want to see a well done WW2 movie from the Krauts perspective.
 
I usually watch lectures and non-fiction on youtube. Youtube sometimes suggests war movies to me and there are some really good Russian filmmakers.

I liked The Brest Fortress and Panfilov's 28 Men, both told from the Soviet side. I like the camera work as part of the storytelling as photography is a hobby for me. The story arc of Panfilov's 28 Men is familiar but well done, a small group trying to survive a bad situation (a panzer assault can ruin your day). The Brest Fortress is the Russian version of that battle.
 
Has this been getting advertised lately?

My son told me there was a movie coming out from the German perspective and asked if he could watch it, he couldn't remember the name and I couldn't find anything other than Midway and 1917, neither match what he said.
 
I did not think it was that bad, in reality, it was the dialogue that had all the meaning more than anything else.

There is a message to the world about your average everyday German soldier from WW2!
 
Last edited:
Another movie, this one from the German perspective on the southern Eastern Front, is "Cross of Iron" from 1977. It's based on the 1955 book by Willi Heinrich, published in English in Britain as The Willing Flesh and in North America as Cross of Iron. I don't remember seeing the movie, but I can say the book is very good.
 
cigar_man said:
I did not think it was that bad, in reality, it was the dialogue that had all the meaning more than anything else.

There is a message to the world about your average everyday German soldier from WW2!
Click to expand...

Ummmmm Maybe??? This story was mostly about an SS soldier. Slightly different category from average Wermacht soldiers. Completely different reputation for tenaciousness.

When I was a kid, there were a couple of ex SS soldiers that worked with my father in the Copper Mountain mine, above Princeton, BC. One had a wife, with kids that weren't his. He loved to sing. Never saw him drink a drop of alcohol, nor lose his temper. I played with his kids as they were close by and they adored him. The man was about as ordinary looking as could be, until you looked into his eyes. He was maybe thirty, but looked 60. I remember him telling my father that he and a few hundred other SS fellows walked from Russia to the German border and wouldn't lay down their weapons until they could surrender to either the Brits or Americans. His whole family had been killed during the war, so he took up with the wife of a fellow soldier he knew, that had been killed. It seemed to work OK.

Copper Mountain was a company town, with a company store, bunk houses for the single transient types and family dwellings, without power or running water. He lived about a klik away from our place.

Just for a time frame, WWII had only been over for five years. Lots of propaganda was still being accepted as absolute truth. I saw people get beat up for speaking foreign languages. There was a lot of undiagnosed PTSD around back then, both among civilians and veterans. John Wayne's film persona was the accepted image to duplicate.

A few of the people just couldn't leave the war behind. They gave the German/Prussian/Dukhabor/Serbs a hard time. The very odd time it would become physical but not often. The police just stayed out of it.

The pot still came to a boil between some of those folks. Thankfully they were in a very tiny minority.

Back then, the mine was all underground, following the rich veins of rainbow colored ore. When the price of copper tanked, after the Korean War, the mine was no longer profitable and shut down. Everyone moved to other mining towns, where some of them met up again. I remember being relieved leaving that project. It always seemed to be dark or cloudy. Likely it was just the mood of the time.

We moved to a town called Salmo. The SS fellow with his family was there for a while as well, but only for a year. They went north. I've often wondered what became of them. Likely, like most immigrants, they just settled into becoming Canadians.
 
Just came home from a legion ( branch 98), for a friends wake. Her now widower husband served in Canadian unit 1950-60's. I met there another mutual friend who I just found out was born in Hamburg in 1940. Talked for some time about his experiences. His family immigrated here from Germany in 1958. His father was successful in being transferred to Paris late in the war. He barely survived the eastern front before that.
 
Last edited:
Ummmmm Maybe??? This story was mostly about an SS soldier. Slightly different category from average Wermacht soldiers. Completely different reputation for tenaciousness.
Click to expand...

Right, but it showed how his faith in the "Regime" faded as the days went by.

In the end, he lost total faith.

The bond between fellow soldiers (friendships) won at the end of the day, not the regime.

There was also whispered poignant words by a female voice near the end about, Victors!

I have watched this movie 3 times and each time the message gets clearer.

To me it was not about the acting or props, it was the message.

When you get it, it hits you like a freight train.

BTW, I get it, I'm half German (Grandparents, mothers side are immigrants 1901 ish) and half British (era 1851 in Canada)

There are some very interesting Third Reich family members on my mothers side.

I was born in the fifties and grew up with both flavours. My Mother was born in Melville, Saskatchewan and spent her teen years in Rivers, Manitoba where they had to change their last name to sound less German during WW2.
Her Father built half of the air training base at Rivers during WW2 as he was a carpenter.

We hung out mostly with the German relatives until my teens, so I ended up hearing stories from all corners. ( and God!!!!, do I miss the food)

I will not try to explain any further, it's yours to discover!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom