Hart's War - Funny planes or what?

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malleus1
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Hart's War - Funny planes or what?

#1

Post by malleus1 » 07 Apr 2003, 15:26

This has probably been covered elsewhere but I have to comment.

In the opening few minutes of the movie a train of american POW's is strafed by two planes. A soldier comments that they are P-51's. They proceed to shoot the place up and drop a few bombs. I noticed that the first one appears to have the markings of a German aircraft, probably meant to be a 109. After the POW's make it clear they are in fact POW's the planes both fly off. In the commentary(dvd), the director comments that for the film they had two P-51's out from England. Later in the film, what is supposed to be a 109 is shot down by a P-51. Anyone else notice this or can enlighten/correct me?

On the whole I thought it was a good movie, but not a war film as such and this problem with the aircraft annoyed me. A typically 'Americanized Hollywood' film. (all the pow's were americans, you only see some 'russians' at a distance and no other allies make an appearance).

On a different topic, I have heard that there remains only one Lancaster and one B-17 still flying. Can anyone confirm this? I had the good fortune to see a (the?) Lancaster fly past at low altitude and very close to the dockyards we were visiting in England, I think it was Plymouth. It was so low and close that I only saw it for about 10 seconds and didn't have time to take a photo unfortunately. :o

Mike R
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#2

Post by Mike R » 07 Apr 2003, 18:36

There is only 1 flying B-17 that I have seen in person, with 91st Bomb Group markings, but I believe there are actually around 6 or 7 B-17's that can still fly today. If I'm lucky I will have the chance to fly in one this summer!! :D :D

Regards,
-Mike


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Takao
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#3

Post by Takao » 07 Apr 2003, 19:36

We had two B-17's at the Reading, PA WW2 Weekend last year. Save your dough though, rides were going for $450-$600. Total flight time was about 30-45 minutes. I was talking with some of the crew members and they told me it costs them about $1000-$1200 per flight hour.

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dasboot
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#4

Post by dasboot » 07 Apr 2003, 23:29

I live in toronto, Canada. I frequently travel to Hamilton to visit the Canadian heritage warplane museum.

They too have a working flying lancaster and a B-17 among others and are recognized worldwide.

You have to be a member and the flying rate is $1000 /hr for the lancaster. The Harvard trainer is cheaper but I'm not sure what the rate was.

I do have pictures and will post them if I can.

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kobold
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#5

Post by kobold » 08 Apr 2003, 00:28

dasboot wrote:I live in toronto, Canada. I frequently travel to Hamilton to visit the Canadian heritage warplane museum.

They too have a working flying lancaster and a B-17 among others and are recognized worldwide.

You have to be a member and the flying rate is $1000 /hr for the lancaster. The Harvard trainer is cheaper but I'm not sure what the rate was.

I do have pictures and will post them if I can.

This lancaster has just been featured this evening on a uk tv show in which modern RAF personnel train and fly the dam busters raid from ww2 (in simulators), but they met veteran lancaster crew men and flew in the lanc that you mentioned above.
Two of the RAF pilots got to fly it for a while too!

part 2 of the show is next Monday, channel 4-cant remember what time...


Dave

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PanzerKing
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#6

Post by PanzerKing » 08 Apr 2003, 01:08

I've seen three different B-17's at various air shows...so I know there's atleast three.

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mikerock
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#7

Post by mikerock » 08 Apr 2003, 01:19

I saw that Lancaster at the Abbotsford Int'l airshow, about 10 years ago. It flew around Vancouver, and over my house a couple of times before it went to the Abbotsford airport.

--Mike

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dasboot
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#8

Post by dasboot » 08 Apr 2003, 01:35

I remember the maintenance crew at the museum saying that there are only two lancasters in the world that fly. One in Hamilton and the other in England. The rest are static models.

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Aufklarung
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#9

Post by Aufklarung » 09 Apr 2003, 15:52

Mikerock
Chances are it ws the "Mynarski" Lanc you saw. She was named after VC winner (Posthumous) Andy Mynarski. His story can be found here:
http://www.spitcrazy.com/andrewmynarskistory.htm

Dasboot
I believe you are correct about there only being x2 flying Lancs in the world. There are efforts underway in Canada to restore a Halifax to original condition. It was recovered from a lake in Norway a few tears ago:
http://www.halibag.com
Also a link for The Cdn Warplane Heritage:
http://collections.ic.gc.ca/wentworth/warplane.htm

regards
A :)
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Victor
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Re: Hart's War - Funny planes or what?

#10

Post by Victor » 09 Apr 2003, 17:33

malleus1 wrote:Later in the film, what is supposed to be a 109 is shot down by a P-51. Anyone else notice this or can enlighten/correct me?
That was actually a Bf-109 as seen in this picture
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#11

Post by Smert-Fashistam » 10 Apr 2003, 18:01

first of all - that movie was crap, is that a war drama? a court movie? or another screwed up pro-american flick

oh yeah - POW disobeys camp commandant in 1944, and u get a verbal warning, with all the great respect

second - effects were cheesy, when I saw the driver get shot in the head at the beginning of the movie - i knew that right away

three - they should have invested as war advisor someone from this room, because anyone here has a better knowledge of history then whoever they hired

- black captive pilots OMG

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Aufklarung
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#12

Post by Aufklarung » 10 Apr 2003, 19:02

I'll agree it was a bad movie IMHO and leave it at that.
Victor wrote:That was actually a Bf-109 as seen in this picture
Nice picpost from the film. :D You must be a real "techy". :wink:
Do you think Victor, that the 109 is real or ComputerGenerated? In the film it happens quite fast but I myself would say CG. A Frederick or a Gustav?
regards
A :)

Mike R
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#13

Post by Mike R » 10 Apr 2003, 19:18

OK, I just got done watching the movie again. There are a few items that struck me as odd. First off, does the camo on the Bf109 seem strange at all? I don't recall ever seeing any pics of 109's with that same type of camo operating over Germany...maybe the Eastern Front... I could easily be mistaken in this however.

Secondly, to me it looks like the formation of B-17's is flying quite low, definately under 3000 meters. ???

Third, I always had the impression that the 99th squadron flew out of Italy. If they flew out of Italy, isn't it rather strange that the two pilots ended up so far north near Luxembourg and the area of the Ardennes Offensive?

And of course there's the whole issue of why the two pilots are in the same camp as infantrymen...

Regards,
-Mike

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Victor
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#14

Post by Victor » 10 Apr 2003, 20:27

Actually the camp was near Augsburg which isn't near Luxembourg. It's much more to the southeast.The 15th Air Force frequently struck targets in Austria and IIRC in Bavaria, so Augsburg would not be that far-fetched.

The B-17 seems to be damaged, so flying lower could be explained this way.

I liked the movie. It does not pay attention too much to details, but given the fact that the camp CO was Marcel Iures I didn't mind. :D

Just to nit-pick, when did Bruce Willis have time to go through the tunnel, put the bombs inside the plant and return to the camp in a couple of minutes? I could not figure it out. :D

At least he does not "die hard" ;)

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mikerock
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#15

Post by mikerock » 10 Apr 2003, 21:14

Aufklarung,

Its most likely the one. I was quite a bit younger when this happened, maybe 13? This would have been 11 years ago. They hadn't fully restored it I remember, as most of the MGs were just wooden sticks painted black.

--Mike

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