Category Archives: War Movie

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Der Baader Meinhof Komplex aka The Baader Meinhof Complex (2008)

The Baader Meinhof Complex is another movie on the border between war and terrorism. It takes a close look at Germany’s Red Army Faction (RAF) or Rote Armee Fraktion, one of the earliest terrorist groups that made terrorism their profession. They were responsible for robbings, killings, kidnappings in the late 60s and early 70s. What the movie doesn’t show is the fact that there were different waves. The Baader Meinhof group was the first wave of the RAF. Their initial aim was never to kill people but once that started and got out of hands, more radical groups followed, like the one led by Brigitte Mohnhaupt (portrayed by Nadja Uhl) also called Deutscher Herbst (German Autumn).

Not everything is as it should be in Germany in the 1970s. The children of the Nazi generation are afraid that nothing has changed in Germany. Many of the old National Socialist party got away and are in prominent positions in the government. A group around the enigmatic figures of Andreas Baader (Moritz Bleibtreu), Ulrike Meinhof (Martina Gedeck) and Gudrun Ensslin (Martina Wokalek) are fighting a violent war against what they perceive as the new face of fascism: American imperialism supported by the German establishment.

At first they bomb empty buildings, but get more and more violent in the process. One of their two main enemies are the Axel Springer Verlag and the American bases in Germany. They try to fight the war in Vietnam and bomb an American base which costs the lives of soldiers.

The ideas behind their doings were far from wrong. They wanted to build a new society where there was no room for fascism and totalitarianism. Despite the violence, the support in the German population was huge and the whole nation followed how they were hunted down and captured.

Once the heads were arrested they were isolated and held under inhumane conditions which they fought. But even inside of prison, they still organized terrorist acts  and their collective suicide must be seen as a last attempt to right the wrong.

The Baader Meinhof group is highly interesting. This was the birth of terrorism. Nothing like this has been seen before. They went to training camps in Jordan and fought together with the Palestinians against Israel that was considered to be an enemy like the US.

These were not mindless people, they were students and intellectuals, Ulrike Meinhof was a well-known journalist.

Although I cannot approve of their methods, there were too many killings and kidnappings, I can’t help thinking that they changed the fate of Germany for the good. The German society after WWII was still highly infected by Nazism. Many Nazis got away and played important roles in Germany. The Baader-Meinhof did denounce and unmask this. Without them, who knows what Germany would look like today?

The cast of this movie is excellent. The hunted are well chose and so are the hunters. The head of the police force is played by Bruno Ganz, Heino Ferch stars as his assistant.

The heads of the first wave all died. Meinhof, Ensslin, Baader and Raspe committed suicide in prison. It was rumoured that it was murder but nothing could ever be proven.

The second wave, among them Brigitte Mohnhaupt, left prison a while back (2007), after 25 years of incarceration.

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ANZACS Part II The Somme (1985)

ANZACS part two takes us to the battle fields in France where the lads we met in the first part will take part in the battle of the Somme. Before they start to fight in the trenches they undergo a bit of training and are also shown the way the Germans fight.

There are still humourous episodes when old-world hierarchy meets with Australian insubordination but this clash of attitudes is also very unfortunate. General Haig, as this episode shows, was less than thrilled by the Australian’s lack of obedience and thought it best to send them off to one of the bloodiest battle fields. Surprisingly they are doing very well. Where most other companies achieve nothing they manage to capture some terrain and there are also more and more losses among the Germans. The British high command is surprised by this can-do attitude and the ability to fight demoralization however they still refuse to recognize their valor.

At the end of the episode the heavy fighting has taken its toll anyway. The men return extremely weary and it’s hard to imagine that the ordeal only just begun.

In episode I an Australian journalist had an important role in covering up the senselessness of the battle at Gallipoli. We see the same journalist once more. He is the Australian prime-ministers’ spokesman and has to find out whether the Australians are not just sacrificed. He points out that they haven’t really won a lot of terrain so far. He is informed that it isn’t only about winning terrain but about wearing out the Germans.

The trench scenes are very convincing. These are trenches that crumble, they have been under such heavy fire all the time, that they are merely shallow dug outs. Usually the trenches we see in WWI movies are very high. The fact that they had to be reconstructed constantly and did at times hardly give any shelter isn’t shown very often.

Like in part two, the story moves between the battlefields and the home front which adds to the authenticity.

I enjoyed part II even more than part I (see review here).

I attached chapter two from Episode 2 (2/10)

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ANZACS Part I Gallipoli (1985)

I need to thank Soldier’s Mail who left a comment on my post Australian War Movies: A List mentioning ANZACS. This is really, really worth watching.

ANZACS has five episodes in total and I have just watched the first one that could be called “Gallipoli”. I would say it is easily as good – if in parts not even better – as Peter Weir’s movie Gallipoli (one of my top 10!).

The series starts in Australia where the young guys, full of enthusiasm and inspired by a sense of adventure, enlist. While some of their parents think it is their duty towards their motherland (some can still not fully grasp the idea of being independent by now), the young men see the war as a means to travel and see the world. A bit of fighting will be great as well. Why not bash some Germans? Sounds sporting, right?

They are a composite little group heading off to Europe (as they think). Some are farmers, some are sports heroes, others are students.

When they finally arrive in Gallipoli, they are told that they will fight the Germans by entering the back door. Once they have overrun the Turks there will be no stopping them and victory will be certain.

Gallipoli is one of those names that stands for an unsuccessful campaign and battles in which losses were extremely high. The young lads are mown down by Turkish guns like weeds and the sporting spirit dies as soon as they have lost the first among their ranks. I couldn’t help wondering whether the British sent the Australians on purpose on this futile mission but considering that they lost as many and more of their own in France and Belgium, it seems more likely that high command had simply no clue what they were doing. Anyone reading this who is better informed is welcome to explain/contradict.

I liked the way this first part was told. It seems very accurate, very realistic, not overly emotional. There is a couple of brothers and friends who are devastated by the loss of their siblings and friends but this isn’t overly exploited.

I’m extremely curious to see how this will develop and whether the next episodes will be equally good or even better. At the end of episode one they were ready to move on to France.

Here is part one of episode I

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Battlestar Galactica (2003) The Pilot Movie

It is debatable whether Battlestar Galactica is a war movie or not. Considering that even experts of the field (I’m talking movie historians and critics) think so, I thought I might include it here. Whether you think this is justified or not, is totally up to you.

I started watching the series with the three-hour long pilot movie. I’m not familiar with the old series and haven’t seen any other episodes so far but the pilot made me want to watch at least a few other episodes.

The pilot takes a lot of time introducing the characters and I found some of them to be quite interesting. We also have many conflicts that we usually see in war movies. Leadership is a theme, insubordination, taking responsibilities, going to war or trying to avoid it. In a certain way I found that it combined two war movie subgenres that I usually like, namely air combat and submarine combat. The battleship, although flying in space and really huge, isn’t so much different from a submarine.

Now, what’s the story? The 12 colonies of mankind have last heard from their robotic creations, the Cylons, some 12 years ago. It seems as if the war is definitely over. The old museum-piece battleship, the Galactica, is about to be decommissioned for good and turned into a full-time museum when the unthinkable happens. The Cylons, who have developed into human looking creatures by now, strike again. Number six, an extremely attractive and sexy-looking Cylon, has tricked Gaius Baltar, a scientific genius, into telling her about the human’s defense systems. Without his knowing, this opens the door to one huge strike in which all the colonies are blown up. The Galactica and a few smaller ships, plus some 50’000 humans survive.

Lead by Commander Adama, the Galactia now goes on a mission to find the 13th colony, the Earth. The Cylons will try to destroy them and follow them wherever they can and they have also managed to have one of their own among the crew of the Galactica.

The crew is a group of very composite and quite flawed characters. We have Commander Adama, a wise and thoughtful commander but also a person who is guilt-ridden as his second son has died as a pilot. Capt Lee Adama aka Apollo, his son, a gifted pilot, hates his father’s guts because he thinks he is the reason for his brothers premature death. Lt Kara Thrace aka Starbuck was the girlfriend of Adama’s late son. She clearly has issues with subordination and anger management but she is the most gifted pilot. Starbuck is the type of “soldier” you would never find in a real war movie and she certainly is one of the reasons that makes me like this series. She is gutsy, ballsy, courageous and highly talented. Col Tigh is second in command. Maybe not a bad soldier but someone with an alcohol issue. Aboard are also the newly appointed president of the colonies who has just heard that she has cancer, the sleazy Gaius Balter who is constantly haunted by Number Six and many other more or less interesting characters.

I was surprised to find it this entertaining and will gladly go on watching it.

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All About War Movies is One Year Old or A Best of War Movie List

What started as a simple experiment to fight procrastination and get me back into a daily writing routine has become sort of an institution. Another aim of this blog was to explore the topic of war movies systematically. It ended up being less systematic than intended. For the time being that is. I still have a project in the back of my mind and should I find more time I will pursue it. I have lost a few friends and won a few on the way. What does that mean you wonder, well, I had some funny reactions from people I know in real life. Seems as if my interest in war movies didn’t match the picture they had of me… Do I care? A little bit but not too much.

Ok, now, so this little blogging project is one year old. I have written 220 posts, at first three per week and then, during last summer, almost daily. If I wasn’t writing two other blogs, maybe I would have gone on at that pace.

I could tell you a lot of different things looking back on this year, a lot of things about myself but let’s not go there. In lieu of all that let me give you a best of list. A very personal best of list that takes into consideration what I like, nothing else.

Best movie on the Napoleonic wars

Waterloo

Best Civil War Movie

Glory

Best WWI movie

Gallipoli

Best WWII movie

When Trumpets Fade

Best Vietnam

Platoon

Best Vietnam Vet

Jacknife

Best Korea

Gotta pass, haven’t seen enough

Best Gulf War

Three Kings

Best Iraq

Battle for Haditha

Best other American war movies

Black Hawk Down

Best Resistance

L’armée du crime aka The Army of Crime

Best German war movie

Stalingrad

Best Submarine movie

Das Boot

Best Sniper movie

Enemy at the Gates

Best War Romance

Casablanca

Best least known war movie

When Trumpets Fade

Best female actress in a war movie

Madeleine Stowe in Last of the Mohicans

Best war movie score

Black Hawk Down

Most watched war movie

Black Hawk Down

Best Irish Civil War

The Wind that Shakes the Barley

Best Hitler Movie

Der Untergang aka The Downfall

Best Holocaust movie

The Pianist

Best Remake

Are you joking?

Best epic war movie

King Arthur

Most surprising war movie

My Boy Jack

Best Infantry combat

Saving Private Ryan

Best Cavalry Combat

The Lighthorsemen

Best Air Combat

The Dam Busters

Best Naval Combat

Master and Commander

Funniest war movie

The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

Best Children and War

Voces Inocentes aka Innocent Voices

Best War and Journalism

Welcome to Sarajevo

Best POW

Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence

Best Legal Drama

Judgement at Nuremberg

Best war movie poster

Platoon

Most dreaded war movie (obviously not watched yet)

Tha Battle of Algiers

Yeah well, I could go on but that’s it and since it’s my blog’s birthday, I’m lazy and will not link the movies. Or just not today…