SPR: Vile brainwashing?

I've got to agree with Eisenhower now...great movie -ish great subplots and morals but we're beginning to sound like a forum for "Matrix Reloaded", trying to dig up answers to questions that may never be answered - ever.

 

Bad influence? According to studies, violent movies have a bigger influence on children than on adults. Which viewing group do you think Spielburg was thinking of when he put man with his intestines spilling out on Omaha Beach?

If we're looking for a moral here, I believe it is that your enemy does not have the morals you do. Which is true. Look at Jessica Lynch! She was tortured, raped, and beaten by our enemies.

 

Hahaha...thank you Bratwurst, but I believe there is a whole lot more to dig up in SPR than Matrix Reloaded. (It makes me shiver to think that the sequel was attributed to school shootings. that's either absurd or frightening...but that's for a different thread... )

 

I'll throw in another comment which I definitely recall seeing in an interview some years ago with Spielberg.

One of his motivations for making SPR was the great success of 'Schindler's List'. Spielberg felt uncomfortable at the enthusiasm with which that movie was greeted by the US 'holocaust industry' and wanted to produce a film which graphically demonstrated that the Jews did not have a monopoly on suffering and sacrifice in WWII. He felt that what the 'vets' did was in danger of being forgotten as their numbers decreased with the years and he wanted to illustrate to a modern cinema audience what they had been through.

Hence the horrific opening scenes which, in my opinion, work brilliantly.

 

Interesting...I think he got people's attentions. The man who's wandering around the beach looking for his own arm is a picture that still haunts me today (i haven't seen the movie in around a year) and I have more respect for veterans than I think I will have for almost anyone else.

 

I think more so the first Matrix movie, remember columbine? Well I *think* about two weeks after I saw the lobby scene and you got 2 people dressed in black with overcoats full of guns and bags full of guns gunning down security guards and Agent Smith's private army...that sent a shudder down my spine.

Oh, and your point on Lynch. I heard from BBC news that was due to her driver crashing the car after it being hit, and not torture, allegations of rape are unclear even by her account and apparently the Iraqis gave her very good care in hospital was that not the case?

Not saying it could not possibly have happened but I get conflicting reports here, what have you heard? I don't want to get off topic and into any heated debate on this just want the facts without any pentagon propaganda

 

Bratwurst, as you can probably tell (through the Revera moron and what-not) the American media is getting more and more smugged. We now have a Washington Sniper mini-series...a Jessica Lynch mini-series, and a mini-series about that girl that was kidnapped from her home (i forgot her name) forgive me if I'm wrong on this subject at times.

 

Don't sweat it mate, its an interesting time in the world at them moment, and I'm taking everything I hear with a pinch of salt.

 

yes, interesting time. it sickens me to think that the trials for the snipers are still going on and yet we already have a mini-series about them. it's all about the entertainment...

 

but anyway, back to the subject of SPR...

 

or not...

 

Hi,
Just by way of info, in a book on the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in WW1, one of the officers tells of a night patrol himself and a colleague were on and captured a German. Flares went up, and they were all stuck in a shell-hole in No Man's Land. The author then tells how he took the decision to shoot the prisoner so they could get back to their own lines, and said that while he regretted it, war was war.
Regards,
Gordon

 

I'm sure that was a heart-wrenching experience...while they were in that shell did they communicate with the prisoner at all before they killed him? But the author is right, war is war: kill or be killed.

 

Ike,
Think they only knew enough German to get name, rank and serial number out of him. If I remember, they already knew who the opposing unit was anyway.
Regards,
Gordon

 

*shell-hole* Still, to talk to someone you kill later, that's kind of depressing.

 

I'm afraid the message of the movie is exactly the opposite. If your decency does not have ANY good results, only bad ones, what may the viewer conclude from this? </font>[/QUOTE]Again, you miss my point, the fact is that despite seeing the negative concequences of initially letting the prisoner go, Upham lets the other prisoners go, he did the decent thing despite knowing it may have negative concequences. Frankly if what you think to be the message is the case, why would Upham have been shown letting the other prisoners go?

 

I don't see the necessity, nor even the possibility to interpret anything in this. Upham sees that the German wose live he had saved now kills Captain Miller - he's desperate. He snaps his gun threatening the Germans - he boils with rage. He shoots the 'ingrate', 'inveterate' guy down... and after that he doesn't care any more, about nothing, being disgusted with himself, the German, the situation, and everything...

And even if your interpretation of Upham's motives is correct - does this mean that the viewer will accept them as the right decision? Does the movie want them to do so? This is the key question.

 

As discussed on the other thread you have to consider the dialoge. IIRC, "Steamboat Willy" said to his surrendering comrades something to the effect, like: "I know this guy, (=Upham), he will not kill us.". Upham was the translater and did understand German (he talked to the Wehrmacht soldier at the radar site) so he understood what the German POW said.

Cheers,

 

Having read the memoirs from our learned friend and British veteran Brian on another thread on this forum, I think we should just take Mr Spielberg's movie for what it is and pay some more attention to the real vets.

The context of this quote can be found on:
http://www.ww2forums.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=6;t=000047;p=4

 

Just watched SPR for the first time in a long time...and I forgot how much they dramatized it! I doubt someone would start crying over a fallen comrade in the middle of a battle. Band of Brothers did a great job about this. The musical silence during battles, the shoot now- cry after philosohpy of a soldier, and the real relationship between soldiers. I kinda laughed when the medic in SPR was talking about his mom and I could almost hear Wild Bill Guarnere saying "What the hell are you talking about? Keep your f***ing family problems at home." Anyway...I also wanted to address the accusations of SPR to be anti-German. I don't think this is the case...surrendering POW's were shown as helpless and were treated harshly and were often times shot in the movie.