Red Tails

I will be seeing it for what it is, an action packed movie. Anything from Hollywood is pretty much worthless from the historical accuracy point of view and I'm not talking about paint schemes or aircraft capabilities. True events were more than likely skewed. I much prefer foreign films. American war films are too 'glorified' for my taste. Let's not forget the overuse of CG.

Today's society gets its education from what they watch. If you think our leaders today haven't a clue, wait until the next batch comes around.

 

I have also pretty much started to view any "hollywood" movie with a "historical backdrop" as what it is; shoot 'em up, blow 'em up, action entertainment. I do know that the Red Tails did tally three Me-262s, but if it was during air combat or catching them taking off or landing is less clear. A "pinch" of salt may be too small a dose, but the trailer seems to show some of the more important parts of the story as well, not just the combat in the air, but the combat with command, and discrimination by fellow airmen/soldiers on the ground. It was written (as I understand it) by a relative of one of the Tuskegee Airmen, what has been done to his script by Lucas for box office appeal is simply for that, entertainment not history lessons.

 

Yeah, they must have been from Oklahoma!

For all the "warts" of the "Pearl Harbor" movie, the exciting combat scenes of the "Battle of Britain" portion were worth watching the movie!

I have come to expect VERY LITTLE in the way of "historical accuracy" in Hollywood filming. Movies are about STORY and CHARACTER and ACTION, and, like an old-timer around the cracker-barrel holding court, a little embellishment is de rigeur!!

 

Clint the action of engagement with the 262's of III./JG 7 is somewhat researched at least by me as plans back in the late 70's was to publish a book in English on JG 7 of course that has been done originally but in breif form from Manfred B's work German/English on the unit. It was an air to air engagement outside the bomber stream where 3 262's were shot down and 5 US bombers were lost, this one action alone dispels the notion of never losing a bomber while the 332nd was on escort. please note my last post on page # 1.

 

I thank you Erich, and I have seen other data that shows that the claim was either mis-understood or misquoted at some time in the past and sort of "gained legs of its own", and was never challenged by or corrected by the Red Tails. I still hold the view that this will be an entertainment rather than history based film as per the air combat scenes, while it should be focusing on the "two front battle" the African-American fought just in order to fight in the war itself.

 

Well they do occasionally get it right or close. Letters from Iwo Jima was pretty good in my book. I thought it did pretty well at the box office as well. Now if only we had couple more like that it might start a trend.

 

Those movies, though, were never portrayed as being "factual", they were pure entertainment and fiction. Clint Eastwood is one of those rare Hollywood directors who actually does his homework before putting pen to paper. So any historical-based movie that he directs, I'll be very happy to see. Do I expect him to get his facts 100% straight every time? No. He's human. Heck, history books can't even agree on everything. But I still respect him for presenting it how it was and not embellishing to make a few extra bucks. War itself is violent and horrific enough to not need anything extra.

 

I stand corrected. It's the 99% I am referring to.

 

Hollywood can get it right. Tora was a great example. I think rebuilding T-6's and BT-13's to look as close as possible to A6M's, Kates and Vals is noteworthy. And they got the story right as it was known at that time.

Band of Brothers, The Pacific, Flags of our Fathers, Letter's from Iwo Jima were also great accomplishments.

Yes, there has been a LOT of crap out of Hollywood, like The Battle of the Bulge, Tobruk, Midway, and the like. Pure drivel.

 

Here's one from The Hunt for Red October you might like. A friend of mine was working for ILM on some of the Die Hard 2 model airliners. There was a call out if anyone wanted to look at the day's "rushes" of HFRO. It was of the Red October being chased by the torp dropped by the Bear, before the CGI bubbles and such had been added. When the lights came up, they asked what everyone thought. My buddy said, "Look nice, but the Typhoon has seven blades on the screw, not six (or something like that)." They asked how he knew that. He told them he was a naval reservist with an anti-sub helo unit, and that what he hunted on weekends, lol.

 

Yeah, its the little details that let moviegoers know that you care.

 

the Typhoon has seven blades on the screw, not six (or something like that)."

Most modern sub screws have odd numbers of blades for noise reduction. Apparently with an even number the vibrations from opposite blades reinforce each other.

On the other hand, even number have their moments. In the 1960s the Navy in its infinite wisdom gave the most valuable ships in the amphib force, the LPHs, single screws; every other 'gator had two. On one occasion the Okinawa managed to drop a blade, which would normally leave a single-shaft ship, well, shafted; but it happened to be a four-bladed propellor, so they had divers cut off the opposite blade, leaving a roughly balanced two-blade screw which was able to get her to port.

 

looks like Hollywood sat this one out

Hollywood Refuses to Back Red Tails Saying “We’ll never make our money back on an all BLACK action movie” !

source

 

Dang. Historical or not, that's about as racist a statement as I've ever heard/read. So, disregarding historical accuracy, I'd see it just to help destroy the very thing the Tuskeegee Airmen were flying against.

 

Nothing to do with the studios being racist...what they are saying is the PUBLIC wont want to see it...is it racist to not be interested? No.

 

Here is an interesting article/interview by Lucas concerning the movie, some of it was on the Daily Show, and done tongue in cheek, but most of it is straight forward.

Goto:

George Lucas: Hollywood Didn't Want To Fund 'Red Tails' Because Of Its Black Cast (VIDEO)

 

I think that with the recent resurgence in interest in WW2 (due to "Band of Brothers", "The Pacific", "Letters From Iwo Jima", "Saving Private Ryan", etc) they would make a decent profit from the movie, all-black pilots or not. Sorry, but saying they don't know how to market an all-black cast, to me, just sounds racist. Just a personal opinion (of which I have many....and occasionally one comes close to being almost right! LOL).

 

I understand your thinking mate...but if they thought there was a quid in it they wouldnt care if it was about the KKK! (jokes.) A movie with all Africans in it would quite possibly be seen as racist in itself. Also, you need characters that ALL can relate to...thats why you have groups of friends on TV that are African American and Asian... Indians have started appearing on American shows, which indicates either a rise in an Indian population or an attempt to woo that corner of the market. In other words the majority white population cant relate, cant put themselves in the scene...The same if it was ALL asians or any other group besides the majority.
But you already know all this Rabid.

 

Hey RabidAlien, pass me some of what you are smokin', since it must be pretty good.

"Letters from Iwo Jima" was only a "commercial" success, because it was filmed on a $13 million dollar budget, and it grossed some $55 million overseas. Here in the US, it was a "flop", bringing in only $13 million. "Flags of Our Fathers" was also a "flop", bringing in $33.6 million in the US on a $53 million dollar budget. The only saving grace for FoOF was it's strong DVD sales. Of course, the production budget does not include marketing and distribution costs, as well as, other associated "behinds the scenes" costs.

So, no, just because a film is about World War II, does not automatically mean it will be a "financial success."

BTW, you never hear anyone talking about the financial success of Steven Spielberg's "Amistad" with good reason.