Posted on Mar 31, 2017
This movie taught 16,000 Soviet Army extras 150-year-old infantry moves
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This movie taught 16,000 Soviet Army extras 150-year-old infantry moves:
The 1970 movie “Waterloo” was one of the most intricately filmed war movies of all time. A story about Napoleon’s famous last stand could not be told accurately without battle scenes on a grand scale. But these were the days before CGI and other computer wizardry, so Dino De Laurentiis had to get the extras — lots of them.
To save on production costs, necessary to build everything seen in the movies – from palaces to artillery – De Laurentiis decided to film the movie in the Soviet Union, at the height of the Cold War. The USSR agreed to allow the filming of the movie in Ukraine and also gave access to Soviet men and equipment.
The Red Army offered up some 16,000 men to the filmmakers, along with honest-to-Lenin cavalry and civil engineers. The civil engineers recreated the entire Waterloo battlefield, including roads, thousands of trees, and Belgian farmhouses. They even bulldozed a few hills, cultivated rye, barley, and wildflower fields, and piped in water via an irrigation system to recreate the mud of the battlefield.
Russian director Sergei Bondarchuk housed the troops in tents near the battlefield and trained them in the infantry tactics and weapons of the time, 1815. The men were able to grow their facial hair and live like Napoleonic-era troops. They were more than just glorified battle re-enactors, they became bona fide Napoleonic Warriors, learning drills as well as saber and bayonet tactics.
The total price tag of the film came to a whopping $40 million – $247 million adjusted for inflation. The resulting battle scenes are worth every penny. Aside from a few anachronisms, the battles are epic depictions of the French Empereur’s last 100 days.
@ SMSgt Minister Gerald A. Thomas Capt Christopher MuellerCOL Mikel J. BurroughsSgt Joe LaBrancheSSgt (Join to see)Capt Seid WaddellSrA Christopher Wright LTC Stephen F.PO2 Ed C. SFC(P) Hercules Lobo MSG Tom EarleyPVT James Strait Alan K. PO1 William "Chip" NagelSGT John " Mac " McConnell SFC William Farrell LTC (Join to see) SPC Britanny *Winnie* Balthaser SSgt Robert Marx SFC (Join to see)
The 1970 movie “Waterloo” was one of the most intricately filmed war movies of all time. A story about Napoleon’s famous last stand could not be told accurately without battle scenes on a grand scale. But these were the days before CGI and other computer wizardry, so Dino De Laurentiis had to get the extras — lots of them.
To save on production costs, necessary to build everything seen in the movies – from palaces to artillery – De Laurentiis decided to film the movie in the Soviet Union, at the height of the Cold War. The USSR agreed to allow the filming of the movie in Ukraine and also gave access to Soviet men and equipment.
The Red Army offered up some 16,000 men to the filmmakers, along with honest-to-Lenin cavalry and civil engineers. The civil engineers recreated the entire Waterloo battlefield, including roads, thousands of trees, and Belgian farmhouses. They even bulldozed a few hills, cultivated rye, barley, and wildflower fields, and piped in water via an irrigation system to recreate the mud of the battlefield.
Russian director Sergei Bondarchuk housed the troops in tents near the battlefield and trained them in the infantry tactics and weapons of the time, 1815. The men were able to grow their facial hair and live like Napoleonic-era troops. They were more than just glorified battle re-enactors, they became bona fide Napoleonic Warriors, learning drills as well as saber and bayonet tactics.
The total price tag of the film came to a whopping $40 million – $247 million adjusted for inflation. The resulting battle scenes are worth every penny. Aside from a few anachronisms, the battles are epic depictions of the French Empereur’s last 100 days.
@ SMSgt Minister Gerald A. Thomas Capt Christopher MuellerCOL Mikel J. BurroughsSgt Joe LaBrancheSSgt (Join to see)Capt Seid WaddellSrA Christopher Wright LTC Stephen F.PO2 Ed C. SFC(P) Hercules Lobo MSG Tom EarleyPVT James Strait Alan K. PO1 William "Chip" NagelSGT John " Mac " McConnell SFC William Farrell LTC (Join to see) SPC Britanny *Winnie* Balthaser SSgt Robert Marx SFC (Join to see)
This movie taught 16,000 Soviet Army extras 150-year-old infantry moves
Posted from wearethemighty.com
Warfare
Movies
Military History
Posted >1 y ago
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I was stationed at Tripler Army Medical Center in Hawaii, summer of 1967, at the time Tora, Tora, Tora was being filmed. It seemed oddly propitious that the airmen of the USS Forrestal were available to fly the WWII aircraft due to the fire that had disabled their ship at that time. I bet that save the film company a lot of money, don't you think?
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LTC Jason Mackay
My JROTC Senior Instructor was an Air Force Officer at that time, he recalled eating breakfast at the O Club and coyly informing his pilot Commander that the Japanese were attacking Pearl Harbor and pointing out the window to the scene unfolding. he told us There was a huge stink over the Navy and Air Force officers doing the flying on that. They didn't have permission to be in the movie from what he explained. I think he was still a navigator at the time. He started flying the next year...AC47s.
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SSgt Robert Marx
The movie "Tora, Tora, Tora" is a great film. It is heads above that piece of trash "Pearl Harbor" movie from a few years back that incorporated the Doolittle raid over Tokyo into the storyline. It ruined the film totally with the excessively awful love interest baloney.
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Capt Seid Waddell
CPT Jack Durish, I remember seeing this during the 50th Anniversary of Pearl Harbor when the celebration took over television for a week or so. The thing that I found most amusing was that a prominent sponsor of the festivities was Mitsubishi Corp., which had built the Zeros that brought us the attack in first place.
Time is an amazing thing.
Time is an amazing thing.
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PO3 Donald Murphy
SSgt Robert Marx - That was the first film my dad took just me to see on my own (without the rest of the kids). Totally enjoyed it.
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Thanks for letting us know SP5 Mark Kuzinski. Before you mentioned it I did not realize the 1970 movie “Waterloo” was filmed in the Soviet Union in the Soviet republic of Ukraine.
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