Merged: The Movies Thread

[skinsfanthru&thru]

Holy flippin hell that trailer for Iron Man during the SB was freakin awesome.

[BDBohnzie]

The wife and I watched "Balls of Fury" last night. It was pretty good, not as funny as I would have liked, but still decent.

[724Skinsfan]

Having a bad day at work? I think Rambo averages nearly one death per minute (83 deaths to 93 minutes). Very therapeutic. Of course, if you're silly and things like plot and acting are important to you then you may want to pass.

[SmootSmack]

I really want to see "There Will Be Blood"

Who here has seen it? Any reviews?

[KLHJ2]

POSSIBLE SPOILER


I recently saw Stop Loss and I am torn on wheter or not I like this movie. You must realize what it is first, which is a ploy to unite the bleeding hearts of the world to feel sorry for the U.S. servicesmembers who got stop lossed during Iraqi Freedom. It uses nothing but the pathos side of the argument all of the way through, but I will get more into that later. Secondly, this is a film made by Hollywood that attempts to bring you a story that hits home. Of course in Hollywood they have to spice it up a bit, because real life is apparently, boring.

Now before I rip this film to shreds I would like to point out that the acting was dead on. The actors really nailed the mannerisims, speech, and humor posessed by the average Army Soldier (each branch is slightly different). I also like the fact that the enlisted soldiers were getting some love in this movie. Most other military movies are always about those damn officers.

Now, in the beginning of the movie you saw a vehicle rapidly approaching a checkpoint. It would have gotten shot at if it hadn't slowed down within 50ft. In the movie it stopped at the last second, so it didn't get shot, but it would have at least gotten inspected.

When the second vehicle approached, it did get shot at, because it shot at the soldiers. When it drove off the soldiers chased it. Later in the movie they say that it was Standard Operating Proceedure. I can assure you that it is in no-ones proceedures to chase a vehicle away and into an alley. You might call in air support to track it down (if feesable). We are smarter than that.

I could go over all the things wrong in the alley, but that would take too long.

Without going into much more detail here are the rest of the flaws.

A LT. COL and a SSG would not have been buddy buddy like they were in that movie.

A Stop Loss is issued to either an entire MOS or to an entire Unit. In other words, both the Sergeant (Sniper school guy) and the Staff Sergeant (Main character) would have been stop lossed. Both were infantry, both were in the same unit, and both were ETSing (getting out).

Not everybody suffers from PTSD when they come home, but the movie portrayed it that way. (It was excellent acting though)

You will not get kicked out for getting drunk all of the time. You will get busted and your life will be miserable for a while, but you will not get kicked out. At least not as fast as the PFC was.

The Army does not use the old hand to hand techniques displayed in that movie. The old techniques kept getting soldiers asses whooped whenever they went on leave. Combatitives (similar to Bazillian Jujitsu or submission fighting) is used now instead.

The main Character would have been demoted to E-5 or SGT (possibly even E-4 in times of war) after beating up 2 MP's (If not Court Martialed).

And the headlock in the final fight scene at the graveyard was not locked.

Basically they made the main character and SSG's look like Puss***.

Everyone who enlists signs up for an 8 year obligation, and they are aware of it from day 1. The amount of years active duty vs. inactive duty is up to you unless you are at war. After 8 years they cannot stop loss you unless you are indefinate (over 10 and going to retire). The main character had 9 years. He would not have been Stop Lossed.

I can delve into this even deeper, but I have hit most of the points that I wanted to.

[MTK]

Angry, did you see In the Valley of Elah?

If you did what were your thoughts on that?

[KLHJ2]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

Angry, did you see In the Valley of Elah?

If you did what were your thoughts on that?

Havent seen it yet. It is on my list.

[KLHJ2]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

Angry, did you see In the Valley of Elah?

If you did what were your thoughts on that?

I finally watched Valley of Elah last night Matty. I would have to say that it was pretty damn good and more accurate than most military films put on the market. As with all Military films there have to be some flaws because they are not allowed to impersonate soldiers, but it was very close.

I caught the movie from the point that Tommy Lee Jones was being escorted through his sons barracks for the first time. That in itself would have probably not happened, but it would have depended on the Commander.

The Staff Sergeant was wearing a different Combat patch on his right shoulder than the rest of his soldiers were. He was wearing the 82nd Airborne patch. All of the rest of the soldiers had identical unit and combat patches. What this suggests is that every soldier there went to war with that unit and returned to the same duty station. The Staff Sergeant on the other hand went to war with 82nd Airborne out of Ft. Bragg and then transferred to where ever the hell the were in that movie.

You may have noticed that in the movie that they were wearing their combat patches above their American Flags. That is possible in a very unique situation. They would have had to been to combat before Operation Iraqi Freedom. Right after 9/11 we started wearing the US Flag on all uniforms, so in this case they should have had their flags above their combat patches for the most part with a few exceptions of some higher ranking guys that may have been in the first Gulf war.

The new Physical Training uniform (Gray and Black Jogging suit not displayed in movie) and the Black Beret were integrated into the Army around the same time frame. In the movie they were wearing the old gray sweat suit, but also had berets. To be historically accurate they would have had both items.

The black beret is proper headgear any time that you are wearing a uniform in garrison. There are a few exceptions but none of those exceptions were present in the movie. Anytime you saw someone outside (not in Iraq) either not wearing any head gear or wearing the soft cap and not the beret...they were wrong.

The soldier that was wearing the gray PT uniform looked like he was in pretty good shape. Generally those soldiers who are in their PT uniform in the afternoon are those who are on Special Population PT (cannot pass a PT test). The only other reason might be for grass cutting detail, but they usually do that in BDU's.

The "human speed bump" is a scenario that I do not like to think about, but it is a very possible situation and they displayed a very possible reaction. The kid could have been innocent, a decoy, or a bomber. Going off of the road to avoid him may have led you into some IED's. Stopping could have landed you in an ambush. Even hitting him could have been dangerous if he was strapped with a bomb. They didn't have time to think just react. Sad.

The upside down flag at the end was a little puzzling to me. For one, the flag was tattered and should not be displayed. Secondly, Tommy Lee Jones told him to leave it up there and not to take it down at night. Taping the rope to the pole is wrong unless you are illuminating the flag at night. The significance of an upside down flag though could be the reason for all of this. When a flag is displayed upside down on a flag pole it symbolizes that that post or unit is in distress. Maybe it was symbolism for what state our soldiers are in right now.

All in all it was a pretty accurate depiction of a military life. There were some mannerisms and phrases that were a little off for instance we say "guard duty" not "sentry duty", but for the most part was a pretty sound film.

If there is some other things that you may have a question about let me know.

[SmootSmack]

So I finally got around to seeing Juno tonight. Great movie. I laughed, I cried. If you see one movie with Michael Cera this year...make it this one

[onlydarksets]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

So I finally got around to seeing Juno tonight. Great movie. I laughed, I cried. If you see one movie with Michael Cera this year...make it this one

What about Superbad?

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by onlydarksets

What about Superbad?

I didn't cry as much

Seriously though, I liked this one better. Ellen Page (Juno) was fantastic.

[htownskinfan]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

So I finally got around to seeing Juno tonight. Great movie. I laughed, I cried. If you see one movie with Michael Cera this year...make it this one

I am usually a softie for movies but didnt shed any tears for this movie,liked the girls performance,just thought the movie was ok,does anybody still actually wear those kind of shorts? Out of the 3 movies I've seen that were up for oscars I've been dissapointed with all of them,Juno,there will be blood,no country
One that I was pleasantly surprised by was Walk Hard,surprised to see the lead really did all the singing,I'm going to buy the soundtrack

[BDBohnzie]

Originally Posted by htownskinfan

One that I was pleasantly surprised by was Walk Hard,surprised to see the lead really did all the singing,I'm going to buy the soundtrack

John C. Reilly was the man in that movie...my wife wasn't impressed with the movie. Could be because I saw it in the theatre, and was pretty much laughing at parts before they happened.

[onlydarksets]

I saw it in the theater a couple of weeks ago. The concession dude mocked me for seeing it (I can't say I disagree with him, since the movie tix were a Christmas gift from my wife to see any movie that I wanted, and we wound up seeing the movie she wanted to see), but I thought it was pretty good. I'm shallow, though - I liked Superbad better.

[SmootSmack]

You didn't like There Will Be Blood? That sucks, that was next on my list of movies to see.