At one point, survivors are giving a German sub the "thumbs up" after having their ship torpedoed. Is (or was) this really an offensive gesture in Germany? The U-boat reaction shot indicates they found it especially disturbing, but I guess it could've been a Hollywood invention. Anybody know?
Last GOOD movie seen:
Captains Courageous - 9/10
No it isn't. Actually it's soemthing positive. The thumb is an old symbol of luck in Germanic folclore. Anyway could you imagine showing the middle finger in a movin from the 40s?
shareHuh. That's not the answer I expected... and it makes the scene even weirder. The filmmakers' replacing a middle finger with a thumbs-up is like changing "character sticks out his tongue" to "character smiles". They would've known beforehand about Code restrictions, so it's not like they had to hurriedly reshoot the scene or anything.
God only knows what they were thinking.
::: shrug :::
Last seen:
Destry Rides Again - 9/10
Middle fingers or thumbs up...wouldn't either just ruin what the U-Boat crew had hoped would be a great "propaganda clip" of defeated and dejected Allied sailors...?
shareIn the 40s, no. Harold Lloyd in "Speedy" (1928) did flip off a fun house mirror.
shareThe Germans are hoping to get film of defeated, dejected, and doomed enemy sailors. The enemy sailors refuse to cooperate, flashing the "thumbs up" to indicate their defiance and refusal to give up.
I always wondered why the script used the thumbs up, rather than the V-for-Victory gesture, especially given that the score that accompanies the thumbs up uses the opening from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (da-da-da-DAAAH, or ...- in Morse Code, which is "V").
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They used the thumb in this movie, but everyone in the theaters knew that it was the middle finger that was meant. And we knew that another word was meant when the bandido in "Treasure of Sierra Madre" said, "We don't need no stinkin' badges." And we strongly suspected that Churchill's famous "V" sign was the famous British two-finger salute made respectable by turning it around. There were lots of ways to outwit the censors back then.
shareNo, they knew the photos they were taking were going to be used to insult America and instead decided to attempt to make the photos insulting to them instead.
A photo of US sailors in their lifeboat defeated injured and grimy OR a photo of some US sailors in a lifeboat smiling and giving the thumbs up.
-- 'you're a good man, sister.' Humphrey Bogart
I'm going with the middle finger substitution explanation on this one, as mentioned by other posters. That makes the most sense and, in the context of the scene, is the most logical.
HOWEVER...I have also recently come across a wartime radio broadcast of a chanteuse singing White Cliffs of Dover with a recitative intro which includes the line "And though I'm far away/I still can hear them say/Thumbs Up.../But when the dawn comes up..."
On a slightly unrelated topic, notice the bit of censorship involved when Alan Hale speaks to Hitler via the radio interviewer. He says "My dear Adolph...(...)" and appears to stick his tongue out.
What he was actually doing is giving him a raspberry, but the sound was deleted because -believe it or not- the censors considered the sound of giving somebody the raspberry too offensive to allow in films.
"If you don't know the answer -change the question."
What he was actually doing is giving him a raspberry, but the sound was deleted because -believe it or not- the censors considered the sound of giving somebody the raspberry too offensive to allow in films.