RE: Saving Private Ryan?

RE: Saving Private Ryan? (Full Version)

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BrucePowers -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 1:04:05 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Apollo11 Hi all, quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Apollo11 Hey... the world would be pretty dull place if we all thought the same... many of you guys hate the guts of "The Thin Red Line" while I like it... [:D] BTW, as I wrote before, the "The Thin Red Line" movie by Mallick is very very close to what I felt when I read the original book "The Thin Red Line" by James Jones and to what i felt when I read the "The Naked and the Dead" by Norman Mailer. Leo "Apollo11" Oh I agree! The written word is always chancy because it lacks tone of voice. Mine was purely discussion. When I saw TRL I was ready to leave part way through (stayed though), I hated it that much. I found the thought sequences particularly bad, so when you said you loved them I wanted to put up my observations for discussion. I haven't read those two books, but your recommendation is putting them on my list. My father bought all those nice book in Eglish in 1950's and 1960's in paperback... I still have them... Out of all WWII books that he had I liked most: "The Naked and the Dead" by Norman Mailer "The Thin Red Line" by James Jones "The Young Lions" by Irwin Shaw Leo "Apollo11" The Young Lions was one of the first "war movies" I saw which showed things from such a different perspective. I first saw it when I was about 18.

crsutton -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 2:48:02 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: John 3rd For a man trying to recover from his WitP addiction it sure seems to me that Canoerebel spends a great amount of time on the Forum. For a recovering addict is this a good or bad thing? Worse than that, I think I saw him playing "Keno" in an airport bar last week.[8\|]

Barb -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 8:04:46 PM)
Well TRL is a superb war movie compared with the "movie that shall not be named" [:D]

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 8:41:34 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs Misconduct, you are quite right of course. But let's cut the guys who made SPR some slack. They got to make the movie they chose to make, good for them. The American guys who went there and did that deserved the tribute. Do the Canadians, Brits, etc. who went there and did that deserve the same? Damn straight. Which has nothing whatsoever to do with SPR. As a poster said earlier, if someone wants to go and make that movie (Canadian contributions), or that movie (UK contributions), etc. well that's just fine and certainly no one is stopping them. I feel perhaps that post got misinterpreted into some kind of disrespect, which it clearly wasn't (IMO). I don't think the guys who made SPR wanted to make something else but were forced into making an American war movie because of market forces. Plenty of very fine movies have been made about the WWII experiences of people and nations other than American and I'm sure more will be made. Why the sour grapes about SPR being well-received? Anybody going around saying the Americans did the whole deed in WWII certainly would be full of horse hockey pucks, and there probably are some out there. Still, ignorance of history on the part of some does not and should not diminish the rightful recognition that SPR made of American WWII vets and what they did. I certainly agree that many out there get less credit than they deserve. I just don't see that giving recognition to one should be seen as somehow slighting another. All very true about "Americans getting too much credit" when they barely suffered 600,000 casualties (KIA, MIA, wounded) compared to the millions suffered by other nations/nationalities . . . But . . . what if Japan had NOT DOWed US, and what if political forces in US had kept US out of the war? I know not likely to have happened given how concerted an effort Roosevelt was putting to get events sufficiently manipulated so that the will to fight became an American national consensus, but what if? What if US entry into the war had been delayed by a year, or two? There is that quote by Napoleon along the lines of "When it comes time for battle, throw in every thing you got. Often it will be one 'battalion' (?) that makes the difference." Add to that the issue of timing . . . had the U.S. not been in there when it was, things might not have turned out so rosy for anyone, and the suffering of people in Russia, China, East Europe and other occupied areas might well have been far worse. ADDIT: watched the Lost Battalion recently: just so-so I would say, but nice to get some imagery associated with WWI. The part I liked in PH was were the CGI scenes of the actual attack. It made the devastation of that surprise attack come to life. That and that nurse chick was hot . . . Agree that that line about "if all Americans are like you . ." was cheeseball, but I think it was maybe supposed to be. A line from a movie that I periodically think of, as an inspiration to do my best in life: Toward the end of Saving Pvt Ryan when the Capt is dying on the bridge and he croaks out a message to Ryan, like the voices of those who sacrificed metaphorically whispering to us through the ages, "Earn this." While I agree with the post about how SPR is full of the standard war movie cliches, maybe war itself is cliche? If nothing else SPR made a generation far removed from WWII imagine the sacrifices of their grand parents generation and did so in a way that provokes contemplation and reflection instead of nationalism or idealism.

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 8:52:30 PM)
I quite agree. BTW I was not saying the US gets too much credit, I was acknowledging that there are some folks out there (hopefully few) who do give the US credit for darn near everything. As an aside along the same lines, believe it or not, I have heard (face to face) someone claim that the mafia guys from New York (City) who were drafted into the army in WWII actually won the war in Europe! [8\|] It's a big world. There's someone out there to push practically any crackpot notion that be be imagined, and then a few more. Even though they are sometimes annoying or downright vexing, we should recognize them for what they are and not get too torqued up over them. (Not saying you are, just general commentary.)

anarchyintheuk -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 9:28:00 PM)
Count me in those who liked TRL. With all the internal monologues, Malick is kind of an acquired taste. As mentioned before, great cinematography and music. Liked it also because they actually showed US Army units doing something in the Pacific. Usually, Hollywood just shows the Marines winning the war against Japan. In a movie with that many roles there are going to be casting misfires. Travolta in any war movie is a bad idea, especially ones written by L. Ron Hubbard. Nolte and Cusack looked too old for their parts. Penn, Clooney and Harrelson all had an "I'm still getting paid for this, right?" vibe throughout the movie. Reilly and Jane also looked like they were short on their mortgage payments that month. As far as SPR. Even w/ the infamous tankbusters quote I still liked it (although I hold it almost directly responsible for Vin Diesel and the film atrocities that he has left in his wake).

stuman -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/27/2009 10:15:40 PM)
" Liked it also because they actually showed US Army units doing something in the Pacific. Usually, Hollywood just shows the Marines winning the war against Japan. " Good point. I think a lot of people believe the Pacific was more-or-less a Marine only effort ( taking nothing away from the Marines of course ). I bet many folks might be surprised to know that the US Army actually performed more amphibious landings in WW2 than did the Marines. Although IIRC a lot were more modest operations as Mac moved back towards PI.

bradfordkay -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:58:29 AM)
If you want to talk casting, no film tops A Bridge Too Far in my book. There was one superb cast!

Canoerebel -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 3:37:54 PM)
You guys are giving people too much credit. Anybody under the age of 30 who know ANYTHING about World War II in the Pacific would know the contributions of both the Marines and Army units. That's because NOBODY under the age of 30, except the very few who have an interest in history, have a CLUE about what happened in the Pacific. Not only wouldn't they realize the Army carried its weight, they are just as likely to think the Navy did everything. They probably don't realize there WERE Marines in the Pacific.

gladiatt -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 3:42:25 PM)
They probably (for most european) forget there was a war in the pacific...

John 3rd -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 4:42:50 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: crsutton quote: ORIGINAL: John 3rd For a man trying to recover from his WitP addiction it sure seems to me that Canoerebel spends a great amount of time on the Forum. For a recovering addict is this a good or bad thing? Worse than that, I think I saw him playing "Keno" in an airport bar last week.[8\|] [sm=00000030.gif]

timtom -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 5:52:32 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Apollo11 IMHO the "Thin Red Line" movie by Mallick is, for me, closer to what I felt when I read the book (and other similar books made after WWII - for example "Naked and the Dead") ! Leo "Apollo11" Really? I remember thinking they were nothing alike. The semi-autobiographical novel is superb though. quote: ORIGINAL: BrucePowers Remember Audie Murphie was a war hero. He was awarded the Medal of Honor. He only became an actor when he could not stay in the Army due to his war wounds. More like severe PTSD...[:(] quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid All very true about "Americans getting too much credit" when they barely suffered 600,000 casualties (KIA, MIA, wounded) compared to the millions suffered by other nations/nationalities The official casualty figure is 1,077,245 although these things are slippy depending on the definitions one uses. Not that it has any bearing on the point you're making. ...oh, and the number of VD hospitalisations were 1,324,698 ;)

Yamato hugger -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 6:45:05 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: timtom ...oh, and the number of VD hospitalisations were 1,324,698 ;) Does that count the guys that were already in the hospital on Dec 7th? Or just those admitted after 8am? [:D]

TulliusDetritus -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 6:54:28 PM)
When I was in school I was told the American casualties (dead people) was between 300k and 400k. So if the same soldier is wounded 4 times during the war this makes "4 casualties"? [;)] I prefer the old statistics, the ones I learned in school.

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 6:57:53 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: timtom The official casualty figure is 1,077,245 although these things are slippy depending on the definitions one uses. Not that it has any bearing on the point you're making. ...oh, and the number of VD hospitalisations were 1,324,698 ;) You've got to be kidding!? [:D] _More_ U.S. VD hospitalizations than the sum of all wounded, KIA and MIA!? Obviously those American personnel knew what to do with their 'guns' . . . 1,077,245 no kidding. It is interesting the variation you see in these numbers from different souces though isn't it. I was just browsing some Wiki pages on WWII casualties yesterday and I quoted that sum (~600K) off the top of my head by memory of skimming those pages. The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. As you browse through that stuff, you try to understand what that _meant_ for people alive at that time in those places, to be surrounded by so much death . . . It just boggles this late 20th century, posh-pampered Westerner's mind. So I may well have just not remembered even what I read accurately, let alone that it was an accurate number I was reading. In any event, I'm sure your number is closer or at least close enough. As you say, the point stands: the relative suffering of the U.S. as a population, a nation, a society, a culture was far, far less than so many others. And yet, as I pointed out, it war arguably the U.S. entry into the war that made the difference between a total defeat of fascism (albeit with the unwanted consequence of 'helping' to establish Russo-'Communist'-Totalitarianism).

Terminus -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:15:16 PM)
A casualty is a dead or wounded individual. A dead person is a fatality.

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:16:38 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(]

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:18:03 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: TulliusDetritus When I was in school I was told the American casualties (dead people) was between 300k and 400k. So if the same soldier is wounded 4 times during the war this makes "4 casualties"? [;)] I prefer the old statistics, the ones I learned in school. Here is the wiki page for World War II Casualties. According to this for U.S. 1939 Pop 131,028,000 Sum Milit Deaths 416,800 Sum Civ Deaths 1,700 Total Deaths 418,500 As % of 1939 Pop 0.32% I know some folks are skeptical of Wikipedia, but evidently Nature (highly esteemed peer-review scientific journal) recently published an article in which the stated that Wiki is better (more accurate, more thorough, more inclusive, more detailed) than Encyclopedia Brittanica, at least for natural sciences. I suspect the same is true for many fields, history, and military history in particular. Now granted, figures get updated based on uncovered materials, and updated estimates all the time, and that figure does not include wounded, and may not include MIA/never accounted fors. I suppose with wounded and MIA included as "casualties, the number could well get up above 1m Following the link at the bottom of that wiki page to World War II: Combatants and Casualties (1937 - 1945) (which arguably might just represent the same bias as is on the wiki page itself) we get slightly different numbers on U.S. Pop, and casualties broken into dead+MIA and wounded. US Pop 129m US Dead + MIA 300k US Wounded 300k Total "Casualties" 600k That must have been what I noticed the other day. I'd be curious to check out your sources too TimTom! As somewhat of an epidemiologists, the disparities in different numbers from different sources always amazes me. The other thing that amazes me is how the relative value of life seems to have changed. I'll admit that, during the peak of the conflict in Iraq, the world media frequently annoyed me with how they portrayed daily events and casualty rates among Coalition personnel as being disastrously high and the mission as being hopeless. Total Coalition casualties last time I looked (a year or so ago) was somewhere close to 4K. Now that things have quieted down, I reckon it will never get to 5K. I contrast that with certain events or battles in WWII. The sinking of Junyo Maru for example on Sept 18, 1944; a Friendly Fire incident no-less, in which 5,620 were killed! Not just in "one day" but in the matter of an hour or less! As I said before, the numbers in WWII boggle the mind, and it is perhaps somewhat inappropriate to find irritation when our media keeps us aware of how contemporary events are resulting in deaths. After all, even one death is a tragedy and if it can be avoided, prevented it should be. But arguably, facing a growing threat earlier in its development and accepting relatively casualties that are of debatable 'necessity' may in the historical perspective be far preferable to delaying conflict. That seems to me to be precisely what happened in WWII: for years the allies appeased the Nazis and the Japanese and in the longrun the cost was far greater. Anyway, there I go again getting _way_ off topic . . .

Terminus -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:21:06 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Stalin's total "body count" (sorry for the crassness) will never be known, but is probably somewhere between 50 and 60 million. Hitler was a member of the Vienna Boy's Choir in comparison...

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:22:29 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Yes indeed! And I also seem to recall someone by the name of Chairman Mao, who some claim was responsible for a very large number of deaths of his own Chinese countrymen too.

Canoerebel -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:32:48 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Stalin's total "body count" (sorry for the crassness) will never be known, but is probably somewhere between 50 and 60 million. Hitler was a member of the Vienna Boy's Choir in comparison... The total world population in 1945 was 2.2 billion. There is no way that Stalin was responsible for the deaths of nearly three percent of the entire world's population (that's if he was responsible for the deaths of 60 million people). [This isn't mean to minimize what Stalin did.]

Terminus -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:43:19 PM)
Remember that he took power in 1922. He had 19 years to do his thing, and forced collectivization and purges are estimated to have cost 30 million lives BEFORE Barbarossa. The rest is, I'll admit, a question of assigning guilt, but I'll claim that he was responsible for far more Russian deaths than Hitler. 25 million Soviet citizens died between 6/22/41 and VJ-Day. And why shouldn't one man be responsible for that many atrocities? Especially when he lived by the axiom that "one death is a tragedy, a million deaths a statistic"?

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:46:46 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Canoerebel quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Stalin's total "body count" (sorry for the crassness) will never be known, but is probably somewhere between 50 and 60 million. Hitler was a member of the Vienna Boy's Choir in comparison... The total world population in 1945 was 2.2 billion. There is no way that Stalin was responsible for the deaths of nearly three percent of the entire world's population (that's if he was responsible for the deaths of 60 million people). [This isn't mean to minimize what Stalin did.] Not during WWII, Stalin did his killing over about a 30-year period. Sad to say he did kill 50-60 million.

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:47:41 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Canoerebel quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Stalin's total "body count" (sorry for the crassness) will never be known, but is probably somewhere between 50 and 60 million. Hitler was a member of the Vienna Boy's Choir in comparison... The total world population in 1945 was 2.2 billion. There is no way that Stalin was responsible for the deaths of nearly three percent of the entire world's population (that's if he was responsible for the deaths of 60 million people). [This isn't mean to minimize what Stalin did.] Wiki says The Great Purge resulted in between 600K and ~2million deaths. Holodomor, the word for the Soviet 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine (which arguably was semi-orchestrated by Stalinists as a way to suppress Ukrainian nationalism) is said to have cost between 2.6 and 10 million lives. Official Soviet figures for Gulag deaths are in the 1m ballpark. Just those three aspects of Stalins regime gets us up to a min number of about 6 million and a possible high of 13 or 14 m over a span of 10 or 20 years.. But yeah, 50 or 60 million seems high.

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:48:06 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus Remember that he took power in 1922. He had 19 years to do his thing, and forced collectivization and purges are estimated to have cost 30 million lives BEFORE Barbarossa. The rest is, I'll admit, a question of assigning guilt, but I'll claim that he was responsible for far more Russian deaths than Hitler. 25 million Soviet citizens died between 6/22/41 and VJ-Day. And why shouldn't one man be responsible for that many atrocities? Especially when he lived by the axiom that "one death is a tragedy, a million deaths a statistic"? And he lived on (in brutal command) to 1953...

Terminus -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:49:09 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid quote: ORIGINAL: Canoerebel quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus quote: ORIGINAL: witpqs quote: ORIGINAL: Anthropoid The numbers that really made my eyes google out were the casualty numbers for Russia and China. And yet, IIRC, Stalin killed more Soviet citizens during his reign than did Hitler during WWII. [X(] Stalin's total "body count" (sorry for the crassness) will never be known, but is probably somewhere between 50 and 60 million. Hitler was a member of the Vienna Boy's Choir in comparison... The total world population in 1945 was 2.2 billion. There is no way that Stalin was responsible for the deaths of nearly three percent of the entire world's population (that's if he was responsible for the deaths of 60 million people). [This isn't mean to minimize what Stalin did.] Wiki says The Great Purge resulted in between 600K and ~2million deaths. Holodomor, the word for the Soviet 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine (which arguably was semi-orchestrated by Stalinists as a way to suppress Ukrainian nationalism) is said to have cost between 2.6 and 10 million lives. Official Soviet figures for Gulag deaths are in the 1m ballpark. Just those three aspects of Stalins regime gets us up to a min number of about 6 million and a possible high of 13 or 14 m over a span of 10 or 20 years.. But yeah, 50 or 60 million seems high. You're trusting Wiki and official Soviet figures? Ooookaaayyy...

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 7:56:48 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Terminus You're trusting Wiki and official Soviet figures? Ooookaaayyy... 'Uncle Joe'! [:D]

Anthropoid -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 9:57:07 PM)
What makes you think I'm "trusting" them. I quoted them. Other sources might indicate slightly different numbers. The truth is liable to be somewhere in the middle of an array of reasonable estimates. Admittedly, any official Soviet numbers are liable to be highly problematic. On wiki accuracy and credibility quote: Nature surveyed more than 1,000 of its own authors about their use of encyclopedias. More than 70 percent of respondents said they consult Wikipedia on scientific topics, and more than 80 percent found Wikipedia’s coverage of a topic, relevance of information, accuracy and timeliness to be "Satisfactory" or "Excellent." Nature also encouraged its readers to help improve Wikipedia entries on topics where they have expertise. If I'm curious about something, the first place I look is wiki. I might then follow up with a book or other websites. For a hobby like wargaming that is about as far as I feel I need to go. If I were a game dev or modder, I might go a step or two beyond that. If it is a topic that is central to my professional research work then wiki would probably not even be consulted in the first place, although even there, I might use it just to get a quick rundown on something unfamiliar.

anarchyintheuk -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 9:58:52 PM)
I respect Wiki tremendously, but it's still like quoting National Geographic on a thesis.

witpqs -> RE: Saving Private Ryan? (4/28/2009 10:13:11 PM)
I'm not of a mind to go digging into it right now, but I doubt those three episodes cover the first 20 years adequately. And the official Soviet figures are not credible and would only serve to skew any 'somewhere in the middle' ball-parking you might wish to do. Besides, Anthropoid, shouldn't your primary source be evilpedia or something like that? [:'(]

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