Red Tails

Was going to ask you the same thing...but can understand that its a case of where do you start...But what was the MOST glaringly stupid thing in it Rabid?

 

There are 3 certainties in life: Death, taxes and Hollywood not giving a crap about historical accuracy. Their agenda is never about getting the story right. It's about telling the story they want to tell. A distant second is actually making money on a movie.

 

I'm not so sure about that. Indeed to a large extent I would argue that Hollywood's agenda is very much about "getting the story right" it's just that there definition of right means that it makes money and in some cases (but not by any means all) gets the "correct message" across. The main flops are I think because they misjudge the public in this regard but that tends to be self correcting. Too many flops and you don't get the money to make additional movies.

 

What are Muskogee Airmen?

 

more historical perspective, the 15th AF 31st and 33nd fg's claimed 8 Me 262's shot down of which 3 were in truth were downed, two jets from 11./JG 7 one from ace Alfred Ambs who had a shattered knee bailing out into trees at 6,000ft. and another jet from 9./JG 7. some 5-8 B-17's were shot down by the 262's of JG 7.

 

My god....looks like a computer game...?it would not have been hard to do 10 minutes research to realize 109's and 262's weren't painted in those colours late in the war.....disappointing, another good real life story ruined....

 

If Cuba Gooding Jr. shoots a German pilot in the head with a pistol while in flight (like James Franco did in Flyboys), I'm out.

 

In the early days of WWI Pilots did shoot at each other with handguns. Not with a great deal of success though. Two aircraft flying side by side at aproximately 8o mph would be like two autos on a road, so it isn't impossible, just unlikely.

 

I had enough of Star Wars/WWII hybrids with Pearl Harbor! Why would I want to see a Star Wars/WWII/Boyz II Men hybrid??

I'll tell you why, on principle! I'll tell my wife it's the WWII version of "The Help" for guys, she took me to the latter, I enjoyed it very much, but she still owes me!

Ultimately I believe both are feel-good stories that need to be told, despite the video game, "chocolate-sweet" embellishments for the masses

 

I'm not so sure we are disagreeing here, though I will admit I was using a bit of hyperbole in understating the importance of making money on a film at least from the studios' perspective.

I thought it was pretty clear that I was referring to historical accuracy when I used the phrase "getting the story right". When you say what they mean by it is getting "the correct message across", it is their message they want to get across. That is exactly what I was saying when I said "It's about telling the story they want to tell".

So, I think we agree more than not. Kum-ba-ya.

 

If it has lots of Zeros, I'M GOING TONIGHT!! Seriously, what % of the audience even knows what a 262 is? Bottom line is the Tuskegee Airmen deserve to have their story told in a way that reaches farther than the History Channel can reach.If the paint jobs are incorrect, or plane A is shown to be faster than it really was to make the movie more entertaining to the general public, so be it.It's the NFL style pre-game shouting that has me cringing. I would almost rather have a faster Mustang and more legit interaction between the human characters, than the opposite. Dogfights are often drawn out, tactical, etc. not so great for a feature film.

 

I agree...give the suckers what they deserve. Pity the film-makers couldn't give the Tuskegee Airmen F100 Super Sabres to really kick *ss. I mean, what percentage of the audience would even know ? It'd sure make great entertainment.........

 

Just watched a new documentary called "Double Victory" on the H2 channel. Tells the story of the Tuskegee Airmen, including more in-depth coverage of the racial prejudice they faced. I learned some things and saw some film clips I've never seen. Of course it has some of the standard aerial combat film clips we've all seen but I would recommend it to all with an interest in the topic. It's a Lucasfilm companion to the Red Tails film.

Airmen screen Tuskegee Airmen documentary at Pentagon

 

LOL Well...the most glaringly stupid thing they did was....er....making the movie in the first place. Watch the very beginning, as the sub is pulling away. No crew facing a 3-month deployment goes running, cheering, to the sub. There's no pier speeches. We know what time the boat is pulling out, the nukes have already been there for 4 hours getting the reactor started up, the other departments trickle in. Skipper gives the order, and the boat pulls out. Quietly and competently. Secondly, when the boat is pulling out to sea, it doesn't tend to change TYPES. There's a long bump running down the length of the sub, the towed-array housing. Take a look at the surface shots, and the shots just after it dives. The towed array faring switches sides. Also, all of the shots of the sub on the surface are of fast-attack subs, not ballistic missile subs (one of the shots, with the helicopter circling around the conning tower, was of the USS Cavalla, a few years before I reported for duty. The officer on watch looks up, then they cut to a different scene....because as soon as he realized the helicopter was filming, he started waving it away. OPSEC is trumped by profit, I guess.) The hatches have white paint (big no-no...easy to spot that from the air) in some shots, indicating its a boat that was recently used to test some sort of submersible docking to the escape hatch (like in Hunt for Red October). And the best part....when a sub, especially a boomer, is pulling away from the coast of WASHINGTON STATE, its typically not possible to see DIAMOND HEAD VOLCANO (located in Honolulu, Hawaii) in the background. The whole interaction between officers and crew, the uniforms worn underway (coveralls, not dungarees...and most officers and enlisted were on a first-name basis....its a tight crew, in close quarters, for a long time, so things tend to relax a bit), and the frikkin DOG pissing on the nuclear missile tubes. A boomer's job is to go to sea and disappear. Vanish. Become quieter than a whale fart. A Jack Russel barking could be heard miles away.

Okay, I'm gonna stop before I fill up the server with this movie's stupidities. And mainly because, despite Bollockswood's valiant efforts to screw things up, the Tuskeegee Airmen deserve their thread. They earned it.

 

Im still laughing...In between holding my head to keep it from shaking. Doesnt sound like much was right...i can see why it takes you four hours now! It must eat at you!
I think Subs and submariners are the coolest.

 

I am all for this film. It will be full of inaccurate dog fights and immpossible flight scenes. Like it or not but day by day WW2 is fading into history books. This film will help to preserve WW2 more in recent memory then distant past. And most importently, it will get young kids interested in WW2.

 

Tom, LR, THAT is the only reason I'll go see the movie. I don't get the chance to talk to many kids about WW2 (they're too busy playing Playstation, and the kids on the playground move way too fast for me. Plus, their moms give me the weirdest looks...), but on the rare occasion when someone asked me about a movie ("Enemy At The Gates"), I was able to direct them to several books relating to the matter. I think one actually borrowed one of my books, and enjoyed it.

 

Well, it was the turning radius of the P-51 compared to the Me-262. That was critical to any P=51 shooting down a Me-262 in aerial combat. Not so much as punching on them while the 262 is landing....

 

I'll watch it first before I judge. It will be hard for me to judge if such a move was possible or not since I never flew the kite. I'll try it with beer goggles, maybe it will look realistic.