I Like A Good War Movie It’s funny I guess, but one of my favorite types of movies are those about submarines. Submarines have always fascinated me. Even today, if there is an old World War 2 submarine movie on one of the streaming services or cable I am drawn to it like a piece of metal near a magnet. I will watch these movies no matter how many times I have seen them. One really great submarine movie is Das Boat, even if you have to read subtitles. Recently I found one I didn’t like. It was about a haunted submarine in the middle of the war. When it comes to action war movies I usually like them. I also love war movies about tanks, ships and planes, even documentaries. There was a show on one of the services, I believe it was called the History of Tanks. It was a series of true events tied in with original footage. The first tank battle in history had been filmed. The original tank was a British one and there were two types. Some had cannons and some machine guns. The crew was about 11 people and it took two men to steer. One for each tread. The top speed was only about 3 or 4 miles per hour. The first time the tanks appeared, hundreds of them were amassed. The Germans ran when they came their way. They had never seen anything like this before. The tanks were modeled after ships and were originally named Landships. Unfortunately, they were not yet very reliable and on that first attack, many of the tanks broke down. There was a tank before the ones put on the battlefield named Little Willie. It weighed 14 tons and had a top speed of 2 miles per hour. To power this beast there was an incredible 104 horsepower engine. You can imagine the strain this engine was under. In some places the armor was only ½ inch thick. I have seen several good tank movies in my day and one of my favorites is Saraha with Humphrey Bogart but I also like the far new tank movie Fury. When it comes to planes, there are just so many good war movies it is hard to choose. One old movie I loved was Spitfire, the 1943 version. The Battle of Britain is very interesting. Flyboys is a very interesting movie about the battle for the skies in World War 1. I have seen so many of these movies I tend to forget the titles. There were some good movies about bombing raids on Germany and Japan. One which I really loved was about the British trying to blow up German dams. They had a problem, regular bombs couldn’t do the job because the explosive had to be against the front of the dam, not on top. The movie Dam Busters shows how the British developed a bouncing bomb which would bounce along on the water until it hit the dam head on. There have also been some very strange war movies made. One movie which the name has escaped me, was about Nazi zombies who attack American soldiers. It had the maniac German scientist who was creating them. Iron Sky was a movie I really liked. It turned out to be a cult hit. After the war the Nazis went to the moon where they had a base and UFOs they had created. One of our unsuspecting astronauts travels to the moon and meets Nazis. There is a lot more going on but I don’t want to spoil it for those who didn’t see the movie. If I was asked to pick one of the most realistic looking war movies, I think I would pick Saving Private Ryan. It had some of the most realistic scenes and so much equipment from World War 2, it looked like the real thing. One of the most suspenseful World War 2 movies was Inglorious Bastards. The performance of the actor who played a German officer was so real it made your hair stand up on end. The best television series about World War 2 I believe was Band of Brothers. It looked great, the story was very realistic and the acting was very good. Action junkies, like myself, can find plenty of war movies online or on cable. It seems to be a very popular genre. I like most of the ones I see, even the ones about ancient wars. I like anything to do with ancient Greeks or Romans. Did you ever notice all good movies about Romans have British actors? There accents somehow make it more believable, but I don’t know why. Some of the battle scenes in Gladiator where the Romans were sending fireballs against the Germans looked very real. I also loved the movie the 300 Spartans made in 1962. The remake was a little too much Hollywood for me. One movie I liked very much was King Arthur made 2006 and showed how Arthur was a Roman Soldier who helped fight the Germanic tribes in Britain. On a lighter note, I also like some of the comedies about war. I loved the movie M*A*S*H*, and the television show was really good also. The television show had 11 seasons and 255 episodes, which prove it was one of the most successful shows ever made and reruns are still on the air. Another weird but funny war movie was Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Peter Sellers, one of the great comedians of all time, played several different people in the movie. Catch 22 was also a very funny movie and as a side note the book was incredible. There is no lack of movies people can watch on the topic of war movies. Some can be lousy, and some inspiring, but when it comes right down to it, they have to be entertaining. Who would want to look at a movie which was not?
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