I - like most combat veterans - have a real beef with Hollywood for its unrealistic portrayal of war and its effects. Virtually any movie one sees features explosions with gouts of rolling red flame (doesn't happen - that's gasoline, not high explosive); people getting shot and toppling over gracefully, rather than rolling around and screaming; and so on.
One of the very few exceptions to this annoyance was the HBO television miniseries Band Of Brothers, executive-produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks. It was superbly realistic in its portrayal of combat, and that made it all the more enjoyable for me. I bought it on DVD, and this series alone may be enough to make me eventually buy a Blu-Ray DVD player, so that I can buy it again in that format and enjoy it in a larger digital presentation. It's that good.
Now it seems that HBO is trying to repeat the success of Band Of Brothers with a similar series about World War II in the Pacific, titled simply, 'The Pacific'. A 'teaser' trailer for the new series has recently been released, and I watched it with great interest. There seems to be a bit more sex in this one, which isn't something I look for in a war portrayal: but, if it's in the context of the 'home front', and provided it's faithful to the way things really were back then, I guess it won't hurt.
Here's the trailer. Roll on the series!
Peter
1 comment:
Well I get to earn my combat pay starting this month, although things are relatively quiet in Iraq.
But the story I want told is the story of the Japanese and Asian American volunteers of the 100th Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team as they formed, trained, and foot up the boot of Italy.
To few of my generation know anything more about WWII than DDay or dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. You know, while I'm at it I'll admit I want a remake of "Merrill's Marauders".
Post a Comment