Warbird Information Exchange

directors don't produce movies to make us the airplane geeks happy. They make movies to satisfy their own dramatic urges, and to make money. Neither really allows for realistic aircraft in movies. If an airplane flies too slow they speed it up. If it doesn't act dramatically enough they change reality to suit their needs. You will never convince studios to do it differently as it would affect thier cash flow. They aren't producing movies so that a small number of aircraft geeks can enjoy airplanes flying realistically. They are producing movies in order to satusfy the urges of the mass of people who neither know nor care what an airplane can do. THat is secondary, or worse, to the movie itself.

_________________
"I knew the jig was up when I saw the P-51D-20-NA Mustang blue-nosed bastards from Bodney, and by the way the blue was more of a royal blue than an indigo and the inner landing gear interiors were NOT green, over Berlin."

That was actually done for the Battle of Midway sequences in the TV miniseries "War and Remembrance." Very good movie(s) made from an equally good book..same goes for the preceding "Winds of War." Even though the story follows fictional characters, both author Herman Wouk and the makers of the miniseries went to great pains to get the historical settings and events as accurate as possible. The series contains probably the most graphic and realistic portrayal of the the Holocaust ever put on film (and this was made for TV in the mid 80s!) Those scenes are very hard to watch..but then they should be!

Even though very long, I highly recommend both "Winds of War" and "War and Remembrance." Both the books and the TV miniseries are definitely worth the time.

SN

I know I always take heat for this, BUT the Pearl harbor movie did some good. I had alot of non-aviation friends come up to me after seeing the film and ask things like, "Did a few P-40's really get in the air that day", or "That Doolittle Raid at the end, was that real?" I had one buddies wife come up to me after watching and as we talked about the real events, she almost got chocked up, and said, "Those Doolittle guys...they were told that it was basically a one way mission, and they went anyway". So yes while you and I can sit here and make fun of stuff that they got wrong, it still did some good by spoon feeding some history. There were also alot of good facts in it. Like using coke bottles to hold blood, and using lipstick to mark the patients. So the Zero is the wrong color. That wasn't the point of the movie. I guess I am one of the few that see that it did have some value. Anything that calls attention to the real veterans is a great thing. The movie had screenings with free admission to veterans. They had a special screening in Pittsburgh for WWII vets. The one thing that one I remember one of them saying was that some of the sounds were really taking him back. The sound of the shells as they were running seemed to dust some memories off for him. Funny how something can do that. Now I have to go. A real classic movie is on I can't miss. "Thunder Over Reno"

_________________
Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager

Since Chris brought up PH I'll have to comment on that.
I enjoyed PH and from the start I knew it wouldn't be accurate. It was just a fun, popcorn movie for the public, pure and simple. It wasn't made for us.
If it made some percentage of the public aware of history and they delved into things on their own, then so much the better.
A couple of plus for PH: It did put one more Tora VAL into the air that previously was static and in rough shape. (alas, we later had to subtract one VAL due to the filming accident), it employed some of our favorite Warbird people, Steve Hinton et al., which puts money into the coffers for other future restorations. And there are now a couple of mock-up P-40's on display at various locations.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, it's one of those movies that wouldn't make my top 500 films, but I have a copy of it and when it's on, I still watch the flying scenes.
That's about it for me and PH.
Jerry

_________________
"Always remember that, when you enter the ocean or the forest, you are no longer at the top of the food chain."

Absolutely, Chris is right! Just as a lot was wrong with "The Pacific",
if it got folks interested it was well worth it. They don't teach that
stuff in school any more. Anything that stirs the public's interest is
a good thing and serves a purpose.

Darn straight!!!

_________________
S.

The farcical air situations aside, the things which annoyed me most about PH were the scenes of the attack itself... Spruance-class destroyers erupting in flame, nary a battleship to be seen, and those scenes which DID feature battlewagons had them arranged haphazardly, not even close to reflecting the situation on 7 December. And as any halfway decent historian will tell you, the arrangements of the ships played a critical part in the events of that morning. So, GRRRR to that.

On the plus side, however, we have Kate Beckinsale, whom I'd happily pay 7.50 to watch her read the phone book for two hours. So, we'll call it a draw.

Lynn

Midway has more historical notes then PH. But yes PH helped getting people interested. Midway IMHO has as much historical notes as Torax3. But was not presentant in a good enough manner.

_________________
Shop the Airplane Bunker At
www.warbirdbunker.com