RE: [Leica] SPR: OFF-TOPIC

["B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net>]

Its opinion.  I simply disliked a full 30 minutes of guts flying around.
True to life, yes.  Necessary?  Not for that period of time.  He needs to
lesson shock value and pick up more story.  I realize I am a minority saying
this, but shock value does nothing for me, its the story that counts, and
the re-make of a Sullivan Bros type of flick as Spielberg did was a weak
story line pumped up by the shocking first 30 minutes.

Peter K

- ------
Yes, Peter, the story line was "weak." But this wasn't meant to be a "war
story," rather, it is the story of war. And there is an enormous difference.
My 16-year-old, a blood and guts aficionado, didn't like the first half-hour
because he said it was confusing and he couldn't follow it. He complained
that the images flashed by too quickly, or froze for too long. He thought it
was hokey to have someone staggering up the beach carrying an
arm....Well...Welcome to the real world of carnage and lead meeting flesh.
War is not fun. War is not neat and clean. War is confusion, flashes of
focus, etc. War is, to quote Gen. Sherman, "hell."

And in contrast to my 16-year-old, my 23-year-old commented on the realism,
pointing out that while you always read about how noisy and terrifying a
tank can be up close, in most movies it's a truck with a gun. But in the
later battle scene in SPR, the theater practically shook and the noise was
overwhelming as the tank approached.

No question it wasn't a movie for everyone...but it is a terrific antidote
to the screen violence and glorification of warfare we see everyday - say in
movies like The Thin Red Line of Butterflies and Birds In The Waving Fields
of Bright Green Grass Under The Blue Sky Where The Shadows of Clouds Pass
Meaningfully Over The Hills... :-)

B. D.
From: Marc James Small [mailto:msmall@roanoke.infi.net]
Sent: Thursday, February 18, 1999 6:31 PM
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
Subject: [Leica] SPR: OFF-TOPIC


At 02:27 PM 1999-02-18 -0800, Peter Kotsanedelis wrote:
>It sucked!  Spielberg needs to go back to lighter movies.  Something with a
>storyline. SPR was fabrication in the biggest sense except for the first 30
>minutes which I assume close to accurate considering the expert consultants
>he had for the movie.  Its just that I find it entirely unecessary to
>subject an audience to 30 mins of it when 5 would do.  But that would make
>for a shorted movie and Spielberg likes them long winded....

Peter

I am stunned by this.  If you guys would change the subj:  line, I'd key
into these threads earlier.  DAMN IT:  CHANGE THE SUBJECT LINE WHEN THE
THREAD DRIFTS.  This isn't rocket science, and you guys are all MENSA
candidates, or you'd not be shooting Leica, now, would you?

I am on the WWII-L.  The veterans were horrifically impressed by SAVING
PRIVATE RYAN and hate THE THIN RED LINE.  Me?  I'm a retired light colonel,
but no one ever fired at my sacred body, so what do I know?  But I feel
that SPR is worthy of great respect, the exact opposite to the feeling I
have for that fallacious LIST flick he made.

Marc

msmall@roanoke.infi.net  FAX:  +540/343-7315
Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!