Blackcloud6
Elder Member
I went to see Fury last night. (spoilers)
It is a good movie but it really isn't about a WWII tank crew, it is some sort of comic book tactical fantasy. It is well filmed and acted but the script is on the weak side with a typical shave tail Lieutenant (who make a brief appearance) the life-wise tough grizzled Sergeant (Pitt), a hillbilly loader, a baptist gunner and a Mexican-American driver (this one was not typical as the writers didn't research enough to realize that he likely would not have been in a white crew in the 1940s racist army but likely back in the maintenance battalion turning a wrench). And of course the nice boy clerk typist who is about to lose his innocence (both sexually and morally) seeing the horrors of war.
The crew talks like modern day American idiots with "****" said every other word. The story is odd with a long drawn out breakfast/dinner with two German girls that is ruined by the bawdy members of the crew who then break down and cry because they had to shoot wounded horses in the Falaise Pocket. I think that was to endear me to the crew, it didn't.
The fighting scenes are cool, well done but tactically wrong in all respects such as the Germans digging in the infantry just forward of the tree line (and you can't see the sneaky bastards until you are right on top of them), the well placed AT guns always seemed to shoot high while the rolling Shermans (yes I know they had Gyros) shoot back and blast the Nazis to Valhalla.
The Tiger v Sherman platoon action was nicely done but so tactically wrong. A lone tiger is hidden in a woods off tot he flank and blasts a Sherman (sending its turret in the air which is usually not how Shermans died, especially the Wet stowage ones). So the Shermans fire smoke on the Tiger (not a bad idea) and maneuver on him. So the Tiger charges out of the Smoke and we get a battle og 3 v 1 in and open field as the Shermans try to gain a rear shot. But no one consulted my briefing to realize that the the range of this engagement the 76mm AP round would not have bounced but gone right into the Tiger. The awesome Tiger crew frontally kill two Shermans (one on the move no less) but Fury gets behind the Tiger and puts two rounds into the engine and sets the Supertank on fire. I felt they took this right out of one of the poor History Channel shows of Tank vs, Tank. A side turret shot would have worked but I guess Pitt and crew never read the TechInt bulletin on the Tiger. In reality the awesome Tiger crew would have moved after killing the first Sherman, not forward but backwards using the copse of trees to cover their move to the ridge behind them to engage the Shermans from distance. Range was the true advantage of the Tiger.
Now Pitt's Sherman is alone and he decides to continue on and carry out his mission to secure a crossroads and the damned radio decided to stop working at this crucial juncture. They get tot he crossroads, hit a mine, lose a track and are stuck and a battalion of Nazi SS supermen (not bright ones though)are heading them. So we end up with a night long battle of the Fury crew holding of a battalion of infantry (two have two cases of Panzerfausts but didn't read the tactical manual either) and they just can't seem to realize to attack the tank on all flanks at once. But, the Panzerfaust hit to the turret scene is realistic though. The crew ended up getting killed one by one but the new guy survives apparently to tell the story.
As I said, the movie is well filmed (except for the notion of everyone bunching up in road marches and the happy Nazis signing as they approach a battle). Dump any notion of this being historically accurate and enjoy the ride, this is more a film of a depressing issue of The Haunted Tank (complete with swearing) than it is about US Armor in WWII or a heart wrenching story of a crew in arduous combat. But be careful, the producers try to be authoritative with some crappy historical statement at the start of the movie that Americans crews suffered from inferior tanks throughout the war. I loudly coughed "********" in the theater. I give it 3.5 stars because it is filmed well and has tanks in it.
It is a good movie but it really isn't about a WWII tank crew, it is some sort of comic book tactical fantasy. It is well filmed and acted but the script is on the weak side with a typical shave tail Lieutenant (who make a brief appearance) the life-wise tough grizzled Sergeant (Pitt), a hillbilly loader, a baptist gunner and a Mexican-American driver (this one was not typical as the writers didn't research enough to realize that he likely would not have been in a white crew in the 1940s racist army but likely back in the maintenance battalion turning a wrench). And of course the nice boy clerk typist who is about to lose his innocence (both sexually and morally) seeing the horrors of war.
The crew talks like modern day American idiots with "****" said every other word. The story is odd with a long drawn out breakfast/dinner with two German girls that is ruined by the bawdy members of the crew who then break down and cry because they had to shoot wounded horses in the Falaise Pocket. I think that was to endear me to the crew, it didn't.
The fighting scenes are cool, well done but tactically wrong in all respects such as the Germans digging in the infantry just forward of the tree line (and you can't see the sneaky bastards until you are right on top of them), the well placed AT guns always seemed to shoot high while the rolling Shermans (yes I know they had Gyros) shoot back and blast the Nazis to Valhalla.
The Tiger v Sherman platoon action was nicely done but so tactically wrong. A lone tiger is hidden in a woods off tot he flank and blasts a Sherman (sending its turret in the air which is usually not how Shermans died, especially the Wet stowage ones). So the Shermans fire smoke on the Tiger (not a bad idea) and maneuver on him. So the Tiger charges out of the Smoke and we get a battle og 3 v 1 in and open field as the Shermans try to gain a rear shot. But no one consulted my briefing to realize that the the range of this engagement the 76mm AP round would not have bounced but gone right into the Tiger. The awesome Tiger crew frontally kill two Shermans (one on the move no less) but Fury gets behind the Tiger and puts two rounds into the engine and sets the Supertank on fire. I felt they took this right out of one of the poor History Channel shows of Tank vs, Tank. A side turret shot would have worked but I guess Pitt and crew never read the TechInt bulletin on the Tiger. In reality the awesome Tiger crew would have moved after killing the first Sherman, not forward but backwards using the copse of trees to cover their move to the ridge behind them to engage the Shermans from distance. Range was the true advantage of the Tiger.
Now Pitt's Sherman is alone and he decides to continue on and carry out his mission to secure a crossroads and the damned radio decided to stop working at this crucial juncture. They get tot he crossroads, hit a mine, lose a track and are stuck and a battalion of Nazi SS supermen (not bright ones though)are heading them. So we end up with a night long battle of the Fury crew holding of a battalion of infantry (two have two cases of Panzerfausts but didn't read the tactical manual either) and they just can't seem to realize to attack the tank on all flanks at once. But, the Panzerfaust hit to the turret scene is realistic though. The crew ended up getting killed one by one but the new guy survives apparently to tell the story.
As I said, the movie is well filmed (except for the notion of everyone bunching up in road marches and the happy Nazis signing as they approach a battle). Dump any notion of this being historically accurate and enjoy the ride, this is more a film of a depressing issue of The Haunted Tank (complete with swearing) than it is about US Armor in WWII or a heart wrenching story of a crew in arduous combat. But be careful, the producers try to be authoritative with some crappy historical statement at the start of the movie that Americans crews suffered from inferior tanks throughout the war. I loudly coughed "********" in the theater. I give it 3.5 stars because it is filmed well and has tanks in it.
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