Accurate??? - The Lost Battalion (2001) Discussion

[–] lordgalas 20 years ago

Well, I'm not one to judge, I did watch the movie in my 20th century American conflicts class, my teacher preached on and on about how accurate it was.

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[–] xenocide9 19 years ago

Well kind of but there is a part missing about the airmen who tried to resupply them and got Distiguished service medals (The first air resupply in history) as well as the relief forces which were batteling their way everyday to get to them. In the movie it was made as if the general didn't really care and was cool about it but as far as the books go the general was trying to breakthrough the enemy lines to relief them everyday. BTW the major commited suicide in 1921..that was also never mentioned in the movie in the closing credits.

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[–] Col_Hessler 19 years ago

I was impressed with the uniform and weapon accuracy. Also, when the Germans demanded their surrender and Whittlesey just threw the white flag back and said, "Not acceptable", that's accurate. They then show the newspapermen inventing the phrase "Go to blazes." I was very happy they did show that.

well I'm drinking wine and eating cheese and catching some rays, y'know

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[–] sampafelipe 19 years ago

thanks to the hype on this site, i rented the movie and was impressed, esp since it was a TV movie. tho some scenes were stereotypical, it is, after all, a war movie...well worth it! also wanted some scenes of attempts at air supply! seems a natural...not sure about the camo scheme on the se5a...thought the allies all used dark olive or silver?

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[–] overlord_84 17 years ago

not exactly, the germans helmets look like WWII helmets, they do not have the spike on top of the hat

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] overninethousand 17 years ago

Spiked helmets were used in 1914. It was 1918.

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[–] m-a-miller 18 years ago

its very accurate b/c the still have the pigeon that they threw up and it got hit by a bullet in the smithsonian museum and and the whole thing about friendly fire is totally true and like yeah.

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[–] music_gurl_81 18 years ago

good because i have a project to do in English. A historical fiction thing and I remembered this movie, but i didn't remember what war it was. So to hear that its from WWI and is historically accurate makes me really happy. Now i just gotta find this movie and do some research.

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] overninethousand 17 years ago

German Stromtroopers made look like a bunch of boyscouts with a flamethrowers? Big letdown, and not much then.

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[–] holmgrendennis232 15 years ago

The movie is not very accurate at all. The german stormtroopers have the wrong uniforms, helmets etc, and do NOT use the tactics that they were supposed to.

It also contains the typical american hollywood cliche, that it only takes one bullet from an american to take down like 5 germans, but it takes like 12 germans to capture a single american soldier, when in real life, hundreds of american soldiers were captured in that battle alone.

Also, it's really stereotypical, with evil germans, and the usual "oh noes, we can never defeat the freedom loving americans who care and love for every single thing on earth!"

In conclusion: got 1/10 from me, and should NOT be viewed in historical purpose ...

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[–] beisner68 15 years ago

Strange...I was watching pretty closely but couldn't spot a single time where one American bullet took out more than one German, much less five of them. Go grind your ax somewhere else.

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[–] El_Sueco 14 years ago

holmgrendennis232 exagerated on that particular point but I do partially agree with him.

The first German attack in the forest looked OK. By that I mean that both sides used fire-and-move tactics. The Americans appear to be on the verge of collapsing when they are reinforced by another American unit. The important thing is that the director cared enough to make the Germans act credibly.

But the two following German attacks look awful. Half-heartedly strolling up towards the enemy, paying casual attention to the dead on the ground, is not a good portrayal of the presumed "Stosstruppen" that the German officer had requested. And why the hell would they use flame throwers (that appear to have an effective range of maybe five meters in the movie) in a frontal assault on a fixed position?

Nah. The film appeared to be some kind of shallow critique of percieved inequalities in American society, with some minor glorification of working class, multi-ethnic (but still white) New Yorkers.

The American artillery barrage the massacred their own men seemed pretty effective. Wouldn't it have been smarter to send a message that they should adjust the target a few hundred meters (towards the Germans, that is) rather that simply cease fire?

Pojkar vill - killar kan.

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] magic8ball2112 14 years ago

The helmets were, indeed, accurate for 1918!
The pickelhaube, outside of ceremonial affairs, was largely gone by 1915.
And yeah, for all the impending doom one got from the conversation between the German general & Major Prinz about the stosstruppen (i.e stormtroopers) I also expected the storm troopers to do better in the last engagement than be prototype flame-thrower troops that were turned back, relatively quickly, by an exhausted & starved enemy.

I may be off but the impression I got of the real geography of the siege site was that it was a lot steeper, with the Germans at the top of the hill & the battalion caught midway up the hill. That they couldn't go that route is not that big of a deal. After all, its only a TV movie!

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