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Marlonius
Reviews
Bomb Girls (2012)
A pleasant surprise.
I picked this up, thinking it was another British production in the vein of Foyle's war, which I thought was excellent. Initially, I was quite confused and couldn't understand the lack of accents. Of course, I quickly clued in that it was a Canadian show.
It feels pretty authentic and has lots of great details. The stories are quite compelling and the acting top notch. Cinematography is good too, and the photography looks movie quality to me and doesn't have the "cheap" look of so many Canadian productions.
On the downside, there is just a little too little exterior photography. Obviously this would be expensive, but the show suffers for it and feels a little "sitcom-ish" and confined in the way it tends to cut from interior to interior with very little outdoor footage, especially city scenes. I understand why, but still miss them. Maybe Season 2 will have a bigger budget.
My only other (minor) complaint is that it tries a bit too hard for the drama. It seems that every character has some secret burden, so there is no "everywoman" for the audience to identify with among the main few roles. Instead of seeing how the war and times affected most people, we're seeing what it was like for closeted homosexuals, the victims of evangelicals and oppressed socialites. I suppose the closest to an everyday person is the girl who loses her husband, but she's more supporting cast than lead. Anyway, minor issue.
Overall, a good show, one that Canadians should be proud of.
Storming Juno (2010)
Ambitous, but compromised by clunky narration.
*may contain spoilers* I saw this show at Costco the other day. I'm a sucker for WW2 movies, and when I realized it was a Canadian production, I picked it up.
It covers the D-Day landings at Juno from 3 different points of view, a Canadian Paratrooper, Infantryman, and Tank Commander.
It's of a limited budget, but with modern CGI effects and clever editing, they actually achieved a lot of bang for their buck. The action doesn't outdo Saving Private Ryan, but it still has some good moments. The CGI is well done, on par with shows like Band of Brothers.
The biggest flaw in this show was the narration. It adds very little that couldn't be explained via dialogue, and is often very annoying and distracting.
The scene for me that would have been the most dramatic (spoiler) was the tank's arrival on the beach and the tank commander's decision to take out a machine gun instead of the artillery that was about to kill him, but this moment is lost in cheesy narration. It seems that the writer forgot the key rule of filmmaking, "show, don't tell". Much of the suspense throughout is deflated by a narrator speaking up whenever things start getting interesting.
Nonetheless, well done in most areas and worth a watch, particularly for the documentary/interviews that follow the "movie" reenactment.
Brothers War (2009)
They tried!
I picked this up for $5 from the Bargain bin at Walmart. It had the low/no budget vibe all over it – I didn't recognize a single name, or production company. It also had a very ambitious plot description and box art, replete with many, many airplanes.
I'm a big war movie fan, and I also have made or participated in the making of several local amateur projects. I was curious to see what these guys had achieved with their efforts and ingenuity. Would it be a low budget WWII gem like Keith Gordon's "A Midnight Clear", or would it be unadulterated crap?
As I often do, when I got home, I logged onto IMDb here and saw the reviews, noticing that most, if not all were bad, and actually quite hostile toward the filmmakers. This surprised me as surely anyone else who bought or rented this should have reached the same conclusions as I did before doing so, and decided to view it regardless. So, I'm going to try my best to give it an honest and fair review.
Spoilers Below: The plot itself is not bad per-se. The bones and major plot points are actually pretty well thought out and plausible too. It centers around the closing days of WWII, and the Russian defeat of the German army in Poland, and the eventual occupation of East Germany. A British officer observer with the Russians becomes suspicious of the Russians motives, and as the viewer we learn that they have no intention of leaving "liberated" Poland free in the Post War world order, nor Germany. Meanwhile, the main German guy, for reasons I already forget, finds himself behind the Russian lines and witnesses them murdering the Polish Government officials. The British guy and the German guy team up to escape the Russians and try to evade capture while contacting either the English or American front lines to warn them of the Russian treachery. Along the way they learn to trust each other a bit because they're both Masons, and they also end up with a Polish nurse along for the ride.
The viewer's knowledge of Post WWII world events supports the plot, and I had no problem with the overall idea.
However, it is fairly amateurishly executed. I'm sure a lot of the issues were due to financial constraints, but there was also a fair bit of awkwardness and poorly thought out moments in the script. The frequent refrain of the script is that the "Russians are coming", but in spite of that, the main characters seem to be able to wander through the woods without ever meeting a front line, and only seem to have to avoid enemy soldiers who are wandering through the woods as well.
The whole "Mason" storyline seemed tangential to the story, and was barely exploited as they could have. I wondered why it was in there at all, and speculate that perhaps some funding for the picture came from a lodge or 2 that maybe the filmmakers are affiliated with. Not sure about that one though.
With such a stilted script, the acting isn't great either. However, I would like to mention that I thought the kid who played the young German soldier, Emile, did a good job.
The music is pretty well composed, but mixed in pretty homogeneously over the whole plot, and is often inappropriate to the action on the screen. Plus it was hard to make out the dialogue during many of the scored scenes.
On the plus side, it was a very, very ambitious project, and the filmmakers managed to pull off quite a bit of action with what must have been a very tight budget. They have several tanks, including what looked like a period correct Russian T-34. I was frankly shocked by how much hardware they managed to gather in one place.
The uniforms, weapons and artillery all looked very good and seemed well researched. I'm pretty sure that the small arms fire was all CGI effects, but it was reasonably well done, as was the limited (i.e. not overused) tracer fire. The bullet hits on the soldiers seemed to be CGI as well, and I expect that that was done to expedite filming and also to avoid putting holes in what was probably a finite amount of uniforms used over and over. All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by how much bang for the buck they got on the screen. There were even a few airplane scenes that were again discretely used CGI.
They might have been able to enhance the scale of the battles by some clever split-screen multiplication of their numbers of actors and tanks, but besides that observation, it was as I said well done for what I'm sure was a musicale budget.
Finally, the line by the German that he knew no English besides "A few swear words and the lyrics to Chattanooga Choo-Choo", was a brilliant bit of writing and made me laugh out loud, both at how funny it was, but also how real it felt.
Anyhow, that's my review. It wasn't a great movie, but I went in with my eyes open and still managed to be impressed by what they managed to accomplish. I will say that I'm sure that all involved in its making worked their butts off, and I admire them for getting it done and released.
The Purple Plain (1954)
Surprisingly Good
I hadn't even heard of this movie until recently. I'm an aviation/WW2 fan, and I've always enjoyed Gregory Peck's films, so I figured what the heck.
Peck plays an emotionally scarred Canadian pilot flying with Commonwealth pilots in Burma in WW2. It looks like the planes they fly are done in Australian Air Force Markings, but I'm not certain on that count.
As other reviewers have stated, he meets a nice Burmese girl, and begins to come back emotionally. Unfortunately, he's downed in the wilderness with and injured man and a third uncooperative officer.
The story is somewhat predictable, and by the numbers for sure. I feel that it has aged relatively well though due to the largely excellent characterizations created by the actors and author. Of course, the special effects in this 52 year old film aren't up to today's standards, but I found them passable.
The film is beautifully shot and the location photography often breathtaking.
My only gripes are minor, the kind of thing that prevented the film from being a 10 in my books.: The officer who is burned in the crash lies there like an idiot, screaming until his companions throw sand on him to put out the flames. He had the stop and drop, but neither will do any good without the roll. Plus, the gore/makeup standards of the day prevented the filmmakers from showing anything truly horrific, so his injuries seemed pretty minor. The script required one of the three to be incapacitated, and the could have/should have come up with something better, like 2 broken legs.
The character of Bloor is a little too one dimensional, and the conflict between him and Forrester is much too on the nose. Surely a more subtle rising disagreement could have been created.
Minor mistakes that no person in his right mind would have made if it were real: After Bloor dies, Forrester leaves his hat there. As I watched it, I was saying to myself: "Grab that hat".
When Forrester leaves the navigator to march on by himself, he doesn't move him under shelter so that he'll have shade when the sun comes up. Plus he takes only one empty canteen with him on his quest for water.
On the plus side, there were some nice touches that I found very good. I really enjoyed the interaction between Forrester and Ana. I thought it was well acted, written and filmed.
I also found the picture of Bloor's wife and family very touching. Before dying, the last thing he did was look at this picture of his wife, whom we are previously informed is the love of his life. When we the audience finally see the picture, she's an average to homely looking woman. For me that greatly enhanced the realism of Bloor's character and the finality of his death.
And finally, the movie had excellent production values, good plane footage and dirt under the nails location photography.
Check it out!
633 Squadron (1964)
Pretty bad
It's really a shame. The producers went to the effort of getting enough airworthy Mosquitos together for this film, but didn't bother writing a script, or hiring a director.
In fact, the bones of a good story are there, but the execution is so ham-fisted that it's laughably bad in many spots.
Let's see: Every cliché in the book is used, American Eagle Squadron fighter. Stiff upper lipped Brits, Impossible mission, one armed pilot with extra long hook arm, complete with wrist action. Wisecracking interchangeable secondary characters.
Bad special effects: nothing like cutting from a beautiful air to air shot of a real airplane to an exploding plastic model. The models typically explode, and then the pieces of them swing back like a pendulum on the wire they're suspended by. I laughed out loud many times. I imagine audiences of 1964 did as well.
The cockpit scenes were obviously bluescreen, but the smoke used in the planes interfered with the process, and the background disappears whenever a plane gets hit and has smoke on board.
Bombastic score with no refrain - how could anyone say this music is good? It's the same piece over and over again, every time they cut to a plane.
Sadly, I own this movie. I can't resist the airplanes, which are the only redeeming feature of this otherwise pathetic affair.
Hanover Street (1979)
Almost Great, but merely okay in the end
This is a strange film...
There's a gripping story in there, and the dramatic bones of a great film are all present.
SPOILERS!!
It's the story of a fearless WW-II B-25 pilot (Ford). Fearless, we learn, because he has nothing to lose, and nobody in his life.
Eventually, he becomes involved with Lesley Anne Downe, a British nurse. Suddenly, his life is worth more to him, and he starts to crack under the pressure of being a bomber pilot.
Lesley for her part loves her husband, Christopher Plummer, but is bored by his reliable consistency, and ends up in the affair.
The twist: Plummer is actually a British agent. The second twist: Ford is selected to pilot Plummer behind enemy lines and drop him and his partner into occupied France. (Ford is selected for this mission as punishment for his earlier cowardice and belligerence toward a superior officer).
The mission goes badly, and the two leads are the only survivors of the shot down aircraft. They complete the mission together, becoming friends. Naturally, when Plummer talks about his wife, Ford realizes she's the same girl he's been seeing.
After some action, they escape, and Ford sends Downe back to her husband. Bittersweet ending, fade to black.
Like I said, the bones of the story make for a classic love triangle with plenty of WW2 action thrown in for good measure. There's a fair amount of innovation in the script, as all 3 parties in the triangle are likable, and either way it went, there would be no happy ending. The mission is exciting too.
The problem is the script itself. The dialogue tends to be bad, and that hurts the film badly. A few cliches don't help either (look for the Catch 22 inspired characters in Ford's plane.)
Personally, I feel that this film could have been one of the all time greats if only a little more work had gone into a script polish. I can definitely see why all the talented people involved said yes to it. Unfortunately, it never quite lives up to it's potential.
Mosquito Squadron (1969)
Nothing Worthwhile
I picked up this movie simply because I am a shameless WWII aviation buff, and was enthused to see the famous and rare Mosquito bomber in action. I expected the movie to be cheesy, the sort of thing I would have to watch alone.
That said, it is far worse than I imagined, and completely worthless.
80% of the footage is lifted from "633 Squadron", a superior Mosquito movie released in 1964. If you're like me and love the planes, rent that movie, skip this one.
Summary: Anything good in this movie is actually stolen from another movie altogether.