That’s where “Stompie”, the Mandela Way T-34 came from…
I have a limited edition 28mm figure which was free with the entry ticket to a wargames show and depicts Ian McKellen as he appeared in that movie.
Cheers,
M
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Oh, it ruins films 100%; if they can’t be bothered then often I can’t be bothered to watch; a clear case of cutting one’s nose off to spite one’s face I know. As soon as I espy say, a German officer wearing black leather gloves, as opposed to grey suede ones, then I leave the room. I just can’t bear it.
The opening scenes of “We Were Soldiers” – the French in Indochina bit? Berets sloped the wrong way. However, I toughed it out and enjoyed quite a good film.
Don’t get me started on those dreadfully pedestrian Brit TV detective series or the like when the setting is a barracks, or another travesty of the British military. Uniforms inevitably wrong, forms of address wrong, and the awful background of soldiers marching up and down, as after all, that’s all we do all day isn’t it? Aaaagh!
Epaulettes over collars, Sam Browne cross-straps over the lapel; I even wrote to the BBC once offering my advisory services for free as long as they paid for my train fare. No response of course. Mind you, the above dress faults, I see every Remembrance Sunday in my local town when today’s soldiers parade. I give up.
I haven’t seen that version of Richard III (always been a bit of a fan of King Richard – battled his way to the top, was apparently quite a good soldier, and probably no more dastardly than any other European monarch of the time; just reviled by the Tudors of course, hence to Shakespeare’s version).
Incidentally, in the 1944 film “Henry V” in one scene Brit red double-decker bus can be seen in the distance chugging its way up a far away hill.
About ze Germans speeking vith zat strange akzent:
Directors at Daimler Benz and Chrysler have announced an agreement to adopt English as the preferred language for communications, rather than German, which was another possibility.
As part of the negotiations, directors at Chrysler conceded that English spelling has some room for improvement and have accepted a five-year phase-in plan.
In the first year, “s” will be used instead of the soft “c”. Also, the hard “c” will be replased with “k”. Not only will this klear up konfusion, but komputers have one less letter.
There will be growing kompany enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome “ph” will be replased by “f”. This will make words like “fotograf” 20 persent shorter.
In the third year, DaimlerKhrysler akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reash the stage where more komplikated shanges are possible.
DaimlerKhrysler will enkourage the removal of double letters, whish have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent “e”'s in the languag is disgrasful, and they would go.
By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps sush as replasing “th” with “z” and “w” by “v”.
During ze fifz year, ze unesesary “o” kan be droped from vords kontaining “o”, and similar shanges vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.
After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis, and employes vil find it ezi to kommunikat viz eash ozer.
Ov kors al supliers vil be expekted to us zis for all busines komunikation via DaimlerKhrysler.
Ze drem vil finali kum tru …
Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.
If zis mad yu smil, plez pas on to oza pepl.
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Brilliant!
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Yes! I know the books well! But I sadly recall, that once again, some details were wrong; it might have been the bloody gloves again (see my response to Robin) – I hasten to add I have no glove fetish (!) - but any perceived lack of attention to detail puts me off.
But I found the genre quite welcome, after all, one can only read so many military text books and military history; the odd novel is more than welcome. I might have to revisit, if I still have them.
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Bogarts Sahara,great movie of course,I even enjoyed Belushie’s version a bit.I was just wondering though,was it true,were there any American troops fighting in Libya with the British in 1942 during the retreat to El Aleman, if do I never read about it anywhere.
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There are several different versions of this out there on the 'net
so I take no credit whatsoever for it.
The web-page I found
claimed that Mark Twain did something similar to the German language:
link to pdf-file: https://resources.german.lsa.umich.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/TwainSchrecken.pdf
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As far as english spoken WW2 movies i like the fact that the actors in say Schindlers List, Conspiracy and Valkyrie just used their natural accents. Between the stories themselves, attention to details (I’m sure to the avid historian there are issues, but for the general viewer), the superb acting and set design its easy to fall into those stories and ignore the lack of accents. Look at it this way, i don’t know the differences or nuances of regional german accents so i have no yardstick so i variety of english accents sound fine to me. Now a movie like Das Boote written and performed in german suffers when dubbed so it depends on the origin of the movie.
As far as Red Dawn from the 80’s, those ‘Hinds’ were surplus USN Sh3 Seakings, I just couldn’t get past that since my dad flew them so that poor substitute just didnt fly w me, i couldnt suspend disbelief, now had it been some foreign helo, even if i tecogmized it, i could have gone along. But Seakings?!? Search and rescue birds, pulled our astronauts from the 60’s out of the water and recovered most of the space crafts so i just couldn’t do it. But im willing to look past inaccuracies when a director make an honest effort like Speilberg has to represent various vehicles using obvious chassis’s that arent right but convincingly portray vehicle X.
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They were actually visually modified SA-330 Pumas. They had the wings and forward canopy added, along w/the horizontally split doors. You cab also tell by the large wheel bulges at the rear on each side.
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My mistake, maybe i got these confused w a Rambo flick or something. I just recall groaning seeing Seakings as Hinds in some 80’s action movie. They all blur together and thankfully have faded. At least The Right Stuff had accurate Seakings since I’m so partial to them. Whichever movie they were subbed for Hinds will undoubtedly come back to me say, around 4am cause it’ll bug me now. I think the best Hinds ive seen in awhile was the blend of news footage and point of view in Charlie Wilsons War, not too badly done there for the most part. They are such a distinct looking helo that bad substitutions just really stand out to me.
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While low budget the 1980’s era, The Beast basically stars a Ti-67/T54/T55 is cult classic.
Also known as
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I remember reading a junior sci-fi book at school where each chapter was preceded by a short quote or two, some made up and others real. One from Shakespeare was credited to an “Early Golden Age Propagandist”…
Cheers,
M
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Not you, you drove a type writer… 
The short format of movies means that some details (and even characters) need to be omitted, but in events based on history the failure to give even a cameo to some persons of note can be surprising. In “Valkyrie” Claus von Stauffenberg’s eldest brother Berthold (the senior of twins, the other being Alexander) was also a prominent member of the “20th July” plot but fails to be mentioned, possibly to avoid confusing
the audience. Alexander was in Greece at the time and not part of the plot, but his wife Melitta (nee Schiller) often flew Claus to various appointments. Her omission is more understandable; in a movie about an attempt to kill Hitler how do you explain a Jewish woman who was awarded the Iron Cross by the Nazis?
Also in the movie Otto Remer is played in an unrealistic manner; to have given a true portrayal would have invited ridicule. Here he is interviewed in “The World at War”, skip to the 44 minute mark:
Cheers,
M
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Like Gino said, the Red Dawn “Hinds” were converted French-built SA-330 Pumas
https://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Red_Dawn_%281984%29
Not saying they were much more realistic… 
H.P.
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They were a pretty good stab at the “A” model.
Cheers,
M
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Completely agree, like i mentioned there’s a bad hind hiding out in some 80’s action flick that was a Seaking but ill be damned if i can remember. And lord know i watched plenty of those movies back then and ill never get those hours back, lol. Thx for the clip and clarification!
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Great points, id say Conspiracy did a pretty faithful job. The Wannsee Conference was about a similar duration and from the one surviving copy of the notes it seems the attendees and general structure was captured. Just the dialogue had to be rounded out but considering the documentation on those particular Germans being plentiful i don’t think it was too far fetched as far as the ‘banter’. Its a tricky thing as you you point out to keep your audience in step, certainly more so when the target audience is by far and large ignorant of the particular and individuals.
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I guess it was in Red Scorpion (1988)
In The Beast of War (1988) the Soviet chopper is a SA321K Super Frelon (straight from the IAF stock 
)
1988 was a bad year for movie accuracy…
H.P.
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It was probably also a mistake (with hindsight) to depict (the then) Soviet forces as a genuine offensive threat.
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