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Posted on 09/19/2026 2:20:53 PM PDT by Twotone
The end of World War Two didn't mean the end of movies about the war. Far from it – the next decade or so would see what began as propaganda films transform into their own subgenre. First of all, though, American audiences – which included returning veterans – had to find a way to deal with the return to civilian life and peacetime. They had a film like The Best Years of Our Lives to cloak the immediate challenges with the appropriate amount of grit and optimism (along with lesser-known pictures like Edward Dmytryk's Till the End of Time, also released in 1946).
After that Hollywood tried to tell the story of the war with conventional stories of battles and campaigns like Sands of Iwo Jima and Battleground or espionage thrillers like O.S.S., 13 Rue Madelaine and Malaya. The air force got a lot of attention with pictures like Command Decision, Fighter Squadron, Jungle Patrol and Twelve O'Clock High. Lassie fought in the Aleutians and got PTSD in Courage of Lassie. The British echoed these stories with their own – pictures like Theirs is the Glory, School for Secrets, Journey Together, Against the Wind, The Small Back Room and They Were Not Divided – though they didn't have their Lassie picture.
But then a new decade began and with it a new war – the "police action" in Korea, which would soon produce films of its own, and its own crop of veterans. There were a lot more war films coming out of Hollywood; in 1950 alone there was Tyrone Power in Fritz Lang's American Guerilla in the Philippines, Breakthrough, Halls of Montezuma, The Men, When Willie Comes Marching Home, Mystery Submarine and Three Came Home; Francis the Talking Mule unmasked a Japanese spy in Burma in Francis.
(Excerpt) Read more at steynonline.com ...
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What did Gilligan say??
The Germans were had terrible supply issues and when they realized how powerful American manufacturing was, they knew they'd lost.
The Best Years of Our Lives was a great movie, and one can see it online for free:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAfM_1RirWY
What did you do in the war? This reminds me of a scene from the movie “Patton” with George C. Scott.
“At least you won’t have to say you shoveled in Louisiana.”.
Yes I left a word out there.
And now it’s time for a Mel Brooks story:
Mel’s film ‘The Producers’ had scenes of a comical Hitler. The portrayal offended someone and he told Mel that, adding “And I was in World War II.”
Mel’s reply: “So was I. I didn’t see you there.”
(Mel was a combat engineer, and fought in the Battle of the Bulge.)
My 3 favorite WWII movies are Patton, The Battle of Britain, and The Enemy Below. As for tv mini-series goes, The Winds of War is good.
Me... I polished door knobs in Moss Landing. Once I got booted from the CG (asthma from whatever chemicals they used below decks) I did nothing.
Watch SAS Rogue Warriors! Only negative thing I can say about it, is they over emphasize Paddy Mayne’s Irishness. He was Anglo-Irish and of a minor uppperclass background.
One of my favorite episodes was Hans Conreid’s turn as the Japanese sailor who reached the island by midget sub and took everyone prisoner because he thought The War was still on.
That show had just about everything happen to the castaways that was a topic of those days!
Back in the days when any sort of competition required both a winner and a loser.
A beloved and still missed relative of mine was an officer in a Quartermaster Corps truck company that hauled ammo, fuel, food and equipment forward, and a lot of Germans to cages in the rear. He was not often officially involved with the “Red Ball” route, but there were other - less publicized - routes that he and his company moved on.
When I once artlessly asked him if he had ever shot anyone, he just shook his head and said “No... but I got shot AT a lot.” Many years later, I found a letter that recounted some of his near misses from Jerries off their game and some of the ways that being in the wrong place at the wrong time can kill a person in a support role.
A white junior officer in a black motor transport company was not exactly a career-building position in the Army back then. I still remember some of his stories, and some very frank talks about race, courage and what I suppose could be called “the content of one’s character.”
My Dad drove the Red Ball Express. Very interesting stories.
Hoss
For all the propaganda about German gear, much of it was shyt. You could not take parts off of one truck and put it on another. Plus they had dozens of different vehicles. The US had standardized equipment and a limited number of vehicles. No matter where a vehicle was built in the US the parts were the same as the next manufacturer. You could cannibalize any jeep to fix another. Didn’t matter if Willy’s or Ford made it.
The crappy ME262 is a prime example of supposed German superiority that was really a lousy plane. Just fast
I watched this flock on The Twilight Movie when I was ten years old.
I love THE LONGEST DAY. Incredible
Cast and reasonably historically accurate. Up the Ox and Bucks!
Rogue Warriors was great. Read the book if I you can.
I did.
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