Greatest Navy Movie Ever Made

[MartinJQuinn]

If it had been made in the '70s or '80s it would have been great. In 2005, it was just sad.

I'm easily amused...

[Mark Petersen]

I'll go with "Mr Roberts" although it really isn't about the Navy. Also "Run Silent, Run Deep", "Wing and a Prayer", "Sailor of the King", "Battle of the River Platte/Pursuit of the Graf Spee" for the locations used and "Men of the Fighting Lady" which I prefer over "Bridges at Toko-Ri"

[Navboyry]

IMHO


"The Cain Mutany"
"Mr. Roberts"
"A Glimpse of Hell"
"Top Gun"
"Das Boot"
"Run Silent, Run Deep"

[Dave Wooley]

"The Bedford Incident" Richard Widmark at his best and a cracking good Cold War movie.
Dave Wooley

[gs]

1. Master & Commander - I like the music (Bocherini & Albonini) & special effects, not to mention the story line.
2. Das Boot
3. The Japanese Yamato movie (I saw it in a theater with decent subtitles). Best movie about a bb.
4. The Sand Pebbles

I consider the following over rated:
1. Battleship Potemkin (Highly over rated & I didn't see much in the way of ships.)
2. The Cruel Sea (real ships though)

[Mark Petersen]

Speaking of the Caine MUtiny. I've three steel balls* about 40mm in diameter that I pulled out to give to friend thatliked to go into the strawberries bit

*They are not ball bearings until they are assembled into a complete unit with the inner and outer races plus the gage.

[Sean Hert]

I love Master & Commander as well.

[Lesforan]

While I really liked "K-19, Widowmaker" and "The Hunt for Red Oktober", my vote would have to go to the old-school naval movie "In Harm's Way".

"Bridges of Toko Rii" was very exciting, but was more of an airplane movie. The same could be said for "Flight of the Intruder".

"Sink the Bismarck" stays in my mind, but I may overrate it because I saw it first at such a formative age. Another one I thought was exceptional was "Tora, Tora, Tora". It made its follow-up movie "The Battle of Midway" look poor by comparision.

"30 Seconds over Tokyo" had some great action in the first half, but really petered out after the attack. "Pearl Harbor", for all its technical faults, was good at maintaining momentum.

I think, especially in light of CGI, a great action movie could be based on naval actions in the Spanish-American War. Think of how exciting it would be as Dewey's fleet slipped past the Spanish batteries at Manilla Bay undetected. Scenes could be filmed on the actual flagship!

Another great potential movie could be made about naval/air actions in the Falklands War. Maybe a lead-in involving CGI action in the destruction of Spee's squadron could be worked into the story line, which could include the sinking of the General Belgrano, the devestating Argentine air attacks on the British Fleet, and the recapturing of the islands.

[Zach P.]

All good choices except U-571 where I must Agree with Jorit and Felipe, horrible crud that one.

Personal Favorites are:

The Sand Pebbles (Absolutely my favorite)

and in no particular order:

The Enemy Below
The Caine Mutiny
In Harms Way (a great movie except for the bathtub scenes and a cruiser whose unfortunate name is USS Swayback.....?)
Run SIlent Run Deep
They Were Expendable
Tora Tora Tora

And ones I like but do not neccesarily consider great:

Destination Tokyo
PT 109
Sink the Bismark
the Sea Chase

[winstonshu]

hunt for red october
the enemy below
crimson tide

would be the movies that get my vote.

u-571... ugh... what a butchery of history. the only good thing about that movie is that the equipment looked more right than in pearl harbor (the sight of japanese planes making a bombing run on mothballed spru-cans still makes me wince).

[Lesforan]

Well, Winston,

If they ever made a movie based on "Weapons of Choice", you may get to see that again!

"Final Countdown", a real "what if" classic, came close.

[Zach P.]

Top Gun too.....

[Gone Asiatic]

hunt for red october
the enemy below
crimson tide

would be the movies that get my vote.

u-571... ugh... what a butchery of history. the only good thing about that movie is that the equipment looked more right than in pearl harbor (the sight of japanese planes making a bombing run on mothballed spru-cans still makes me wince).

This movie, a Japanese wartime production titled ?????????? - The Offshore Sea Battles of Hawaii and Malaya, was far more accurate a portrayal of the Pearl Harbour attack with exception of one flagrant error....can anyone figure what it is? The filming of the model ships in a huge water tank set was far more effective than the moth-ball fleet at contemporary Pearl Harbour.

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=zAtoWfTxV ... re=related

[MichelB]

Nice clip. As far as the flagrant errors: Some double-barrelled AA on a BB. A BB floating in the middle of the harbour not being Nevada. Oil tanks attacked and exploding. Planes at airfield lined up far too nicely.
Or did you mean something else? The moustache?

[winstonshu]

This movie, a Japanese wartime production titled ?????????? - The Offshore Sea Battles of Hawaii and Malaya, was far more accurate a portrayal of the Pearl Harbour attack with exception of one flagrant error....can anyone figure what it is? The filming of the model ships in a huge water tank set was far more effective than the moth-ball fleet at contemporary Pearl Harbour.

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=zAtoWfTxV ... re=related

i agree... very nice clip. not sure what the error is though.

the ship scenes definitely work far better than the mothball fleet in pearl harbor. what gets me about the film is that the CGI arizona scenes actually looked pretty good, so i'm just not sure what the reasoning for going with an asstarded mothball fleet attack scene is (other than the fact that bay has this mania for making things go boom in real life).

[chuck]

This movie, a Japanese wartime production titled ?????????? - The Offshore Sea Battles of Hawaii and Malaya, was far more accurate a portrayal of the Pearl Harbour attack with exception of one flagrant error....can anyone figure what it is? The filming of the model ships in a huge water tank set was far more effective than the moth-ball fleet at contemporary Pearl Harbour.

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=zAtoWfTxV ... re=related

1. The take off of the first Pearl Harbor attack wave would have been at dawn, not broad daylight

2. There are no twin barreled light AA guns onboard American ships in Pearl Harbor AFAIK, almost certainly not at the locations shown. Although given real-time intelligence uncertainly, I am willing to forgive this in a Japanese wartime movie.

3. Arizona was destroyed by bombs, not torpedoes, although the Japanese may not have known this.

4. The blasts of the bombs from the horizontal bombers were so massive that it looked like magazine explosions on the American ships.

5. The planes shown making dive bombing attacks on the tank farm look more like Ki-32 land based dive bombers, which, incidentally, were never used in the pacific war.

[Werner]

I don't recall significant damage to tank farms or much damage to non-aviation installations other than Schofield Barracks.

[Lesforan]

What, nobody voted for "The McHale's Navy" movie?

[Werner]

What, nobody voted for "The McHale's Navy" movie?

Because the TV series was more accurate.

How about the TV show Black Sheep, sorta about Pappy Boyington?

[Lesforan]

Well, that was more of an airplane show.

McHale's Navy sort of fizzled out when they had the whole bunch transferred to Italy. The best stories were in the South Pacific. I especially liked the Polynesian Chief. I think he was the inspiration for the capitalist Indians in "Blazing Saddles".