OT: Favorite War Movies This Weekend

Submitted by UMProud on


As we honor our fallen war heroes this weekend many of us like to watch one, or more, war movies.  What are your favorite military related films/series and/or what will you be watching this weekend?

Fury - just watched this last night...awesome tank WW2 film if you haven't seen it

Patton - anyone not seen this?  George C Scott is amazing

Midway - WW2 Battle of Midway retelling...long but very good

 

 

 

Andy213

May 26th, 2018 at 6:13 PM ^

The unknown war is a series about the Russian liberation of the Baltic states and Ukraine and western Russia on their march to Berlin each episode is about a territory ie Belarus east Prussia and the battlefield is awesome each episode is 2 hours and very in depth

MMBbones

May 26th, 2018 at 7:28 AM ^

From the original All Quiet on the Western Front to the recent Dunkirk, I love most of them, even when they were clear propaganda from WWII, like some of the John Wayne ones.  They still teach a lot about the nation at that moment.

I used to watch them with my dad, who was in occupied Europe in WWII. The only ones he didn't like were comedies/spoofs.

1VaBlue1

May 26th, 2018 at 8:30 AM ^

Dunkirk was very interesting in how it was laid out and told as three separate stories that all came together in the end.  Took me a while to figure it out, but once I did it was fantastic.

mGrowOld

May 26th, 2018 at 7:29 AM ^

Unbelievably fantastic movie from start to finish. Made even greater, to me anyways, cause my father was THERE in WWII serving in the Army Air Corps as a mechanic for the first battle scene at Kasserine Pass.

My dad took me to the movie when it first came out in 1970. Said George C Scott played Patton perfectly.

xtramelanin

May 26th, 2018 at 8:31 AM ^

Image result for patton speech

 

oldest brother brought me along on a date with him and his girlfriend to see this when it came out.  he was in high school, i was a snot-nosed kid.  very cool of oldest brother. 

Navy Wolverine

May 26th, 2018 at 1:16 PM ^

is one of my favorite all-time movie scenes.

"I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor, dumb bastard die for his country."

"Men, all this stuff you've heard about America not wanting to fight, wanting to stay out of the war, is a lot of horse dung. Americans, traditionally, love to fight. All real Americans love the sting of battle. When you were kids, you all admired the champion marble shooters, the fastest runners, big league ball players, the toughest boxers. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Americans play to win all the time."

"Now, we have the finest food and equipment, the best spirit, and the best men in the world. You know, by God I, I actually pity those poor bastards we're going up against, by God, I do. We're not just going to shoot the bastards; we're going to cut out their living guts and use them to grease the treads of our tanks."

"I don't want to get any messages saying that we are holding our position. We're not holding anything. Let the Hun do that. We are advancing constantly and we're not interested in holding onto anything except the enemy. We're going to hold onto him by the nose and we're going to kick him in the ass. We're going to kick the hell out of him all the time and we're going to go through him like crap through a goose."

yoyo

May 26th, 2018 at 8:35 AM ^

This is clearly going to be an unpopular opinion based on other comments here but I though it was very boring. There was almost no dialog and you don't learn the names of almost any characters. I appreciate a good war movie but it's hard to even call this a story. 

evenyoubrutus

May 26th, 2018 at 8:42 AM ^

Lol. My wife is a big fan of war movies. I saw it in the theater with my dad but she didn't see it until we got it on Blu Ray. I was hyping it up all those months and when we finally watched it she said the same thing. In fact I think she fell asleep in the middle of it.

MMBbones

May 26th, 2018 at 8:54 AM ^

I found the lack of dialog in Dunkirk made it more realistic.  In the moment, would you have wanted to learn the name of someone who was probably going to die soon?  I thought it brilliantly conveyed that sense of being trapped and isolated and the growing despair. 

The only detail I'm conflictied about is the refusal to use the word "German" or its variants.

But yeah, if you're looking for a dialog-driven plot, look elsewhere.  It is not a conventional movie in that respect, although it had more dialog than the last Jason Bourne movie by far.

Der Alte

May 26th, 2018 at 10:09 AM ^

My biggest beef with Dunkirk is the absence of any explanation as to how it was that the British gained the nine or so days necessary or organize that flotilla and evacuate some 300,000 British soldiers from the French beach. One explanation is another Hitler tactical error, in which he agreed with Goering that the German ground forces could rest and refit some miles away from the beach while the Luftwaffe took care of the British soldiers on the beach and the British ships in the Channel. That this plan didn't work out gave the British the time to evacuate the better part of their Expeditionary Force. 

The film would have been bettter served with a "Longest Day" or "Tora, Tora, Tora" back and forth, "herringbone" plot progression showing how the British and the Germans viewed and reacted to events.

grumbler

May 26th, 2018 at 2:51 PM ^

No, but it also isn't unfair to fault the film for not even attem[pting to show that there were multiple reasons.

There was no story to the movie, and no characters.  What we were left with was brilliant cinematography.  If it had been a documentary, it would be great.  As a movie, it failed, IMO, because the audience had no emotional attachment to anything on the screen.

PhillipFulmersPants

May 26th, 2018 at 10:34 AM ^

every 3-4 years and rewatch.  My son is now 14 and I'm planning on watching it with him this summer, kicking off this weekend.  Think he's old enough to appreciate what that generation went through and how different his world is now, thanks in most part to some incredible hardship and sacrifice by hundreds of thousands of people around the world.  

 

UM Fan from Sydney

May 26th, 2018 at 7:40 AM ^

In no order and what I can think of now - Fury, Pearl Harbor (I like Michael Bay), Saving Private Ryan, Blackhawk Down (not a war movie per se, as it is just one battle), Gettysburg, Braveheart, Glory, Zero Dark Thirty (if that counts as a war movie), 300, Infinity War, and We Were Soldiers. Likely others I am forgetting.

Eng1980

May 26th, 2018 at 7:55 AM ^

I wasn't sure how i was going to answer but I had to open the thread and contribute.  

Great start with

Patton

Fury

Midway

American Sniper

My thoughts, watched with my dad many years ago

Battleground

Battle of the Bulge

The Gallant Hours (Jimmy Cagney as Adm Bull Halsey).

To Hell and Back (Medal of Honor winner, Audie Murphy)

Maybe Merrill's Maurauders or Operation Burma