I just got through watching 'The Battle of the Bulge' on AMC. I first saw it in grade school and it has always been one of my all time favorite movies. I think it has some of the most memorial characters of any war movie ever made. There's Henry Fonda as the squeaky clean American Hero, Telly Savalas at the Anti-Hero who is forced into being a good guy by circumstances, and above all is Rod Steiger who is the perfect characterization of the stereotypical German panzer commander. I love the ending, with Rod Steiger driving his panzer into burning gasoline after his crew bails with 'Panzerleid' playing in the background.

Unfortunately, this film put many inaccurate ideas about WWII in my head at an early age which took years to dispell. I can forgive using Persings (or perhaps Pattons) and Chaffees as Tigers and Shermans since there were probably not very many such tanks around in the 1960's. However, I was stunned to learn the Germans used armor yellow with green and brown splotching instead of grey by 1944. I was just as surprised to hear that 'field grey' of German uniforms is not really grey at all, but more of a green color. And I never even dreamed the Germans used camoflauge uniforms!

I understand General Eisenhower condemned the film for it's lack of historical accuracy. Do you think the producers were really that ignorant technically, or did they ignore historical accuracy on purpose to enhance the dramatic effect of the movie and avoid confusing audiences?

HA :-) i had this film on dvd a few years back.the first time i watched it i did not do any modeling,then i watched it again early this year and had to laugh :-) at them mocked up Tiger IIs.you forgot to mention the best actor in the film ROBERT SHAW as col.hessler. Have you seen a film called the big red one with lee marvin?theres a scene where they try and locate a 88 fireing on the beach,and when they find it its a Tiger well thats what they said in the film but it was a walker bulldog painted in an odd yellow colour with german markings.funny :-) :-) cheers

Hmmm I also never new that our Ardennes had a dessert #:-)

Chuckster

I just finsished watching it too and agree with your frustration with the inaccuracies, but still fun. One of my all time favorites for WW II is "A Bridge Too Far" which has some of the greats Sean Connery, Robert Redford,etc and is a very well and accurately done film. They used some actual period equipment and at least tried to make the German armor look like PzKpfw IVs. It's out, of course, on DVD along with a couple others that have been more "Hollywoodized" but still fun to watch (also use some actual period stuff): "Bridge at Remagen" and "Anzio". Of course there's the "History Channel" programs (and DVDs) for the more serious minded viewing. Always a "mood" inspiration for me and I like to have them on in background as I'm modeling. Bound to be alot more with all the WW II 60th Anniversaries coming up.

Blade48mrd

I agree that on the whole 'A Bridge to Far' is a very good film, I've always thought that the fact that they used Germans for the German roles, Dutch for Dutch etc and everybody speaking in their own language realy made the film. I mean you couldn't make up Peter Fabers accent when he talks english. There are however some inaccuracies.

[

The tanks are the most pathetic attempt and trying to make a Leopard look like something like a Panzer IV or VI. In the later scenes around the bridge they don't even attemt to disguise them anymore!!

Yes, I agree the German Armor in "A Bridge to Far" are poor representations, but I have to say the scenes shot on the road of the Shermies are great. I also like to model with movies or tv in background.

You should see the movie breakthrough that movie has a flak 38 a horch 1 a and a pak 36 and chaffee tanks too and who could forget " copral Kruger deneying the enemy the facilities of the staition sir ! "

You should see the movie breakthrough that movie has a flak 38 a horch 1 a and a pak 36 and chaffee tanks too and who could forget " copral Kruger deneying the enemy the facilities of the staition sir ! "

Jim, that's right, most of the movie is acurate, and shot on location. They realy have the beginning of the movie right. I think that in the 70's there were plenty of preserved/ restored allied vehicles, but not to many German ones as it would probably have been ill regarded to preserve/restore German equipment relativly close after the war. By the way, the bridge in the movie is not actualy the bridge at Arnhem, but an almost identical bridge in Deventer, as the area around the bridge in Arnhem was almost completly raised to the ground. There were to many new, concrete structures around the Arnhem bridge to film it.

Cheers
Henk

I have posed this to the group about 2 months ago and with similar results...But one thing to remember..that came from the previous posting is that...Specialized tanks for movies sets cost BIG $$$....they did that to save on production costs...asuuming most of the viewers are novice in armor styles.

my 2 cents

it was an ok good moive for its time that it was made,
and it did make me laugh when they used M-26s for tiger tanks.but they should remake this moive.
with to days spcieal effects.
i think it would turn out great

I had read that the producers of A Bridge Too Far did make their best attempt to use real equipment. Check out the uiforms alone. THey did note that they elected to use Shermans of any era rather that just the ones that were in use during the period or else they would hav ebeen short of working Shermans. They just had to have 100 rolling Shermans for the breakout scene. Even with 100 working Shermies there were plenty of fiberglass fakes.

The US soldiers were put through two weeks of US boot camp, the Brits went through Brit boot camp as were the Germans.

Even the Horsa gliders were build from drawings. As with every movie since WW2, German armor is difficult to find. It really hasn't been until recently that decent looking fakes have been used.

I must admit I have never seen "battle of the Bulge" Do they have german soldiers speaking english with a fake german accent? even when they speak among them selfs. Any real world war two movie, has this special feature. :-)

Bridge too Far was a great movie, but the thing I remember about it most was that a friend of mine had a part as one of the "extras". We all rushed to see the movie when it came out, and sure enough, there he was as a British soldier (he's American from Va.) Later on, there he was again, this time as a German soldier! What a hoot!

Jesse

You fine folks need to bring this topic to the History Forum. We discuss items like this all the time. Visit us, you'll enjoy the experience!
DJ

PS-- the German commander (is he suppose to be Peiper?) is not Rod Steiger, he is Robert Shaw of "From Russia With Love" and "Jaws" fame.

I remember Canadian, American, British and German airborne troopers jumping for the shots of the mass drops. Some interesting stories about the German parachutes that were used (failure rate etc.) After the movie came out, the Cdn Airborne used the movie as a training aid on how NOT to run an airborne operation. I still liked it though.