• Caught this yesterday. Not a bad flick but is probably best described as “pedestrian.” I thought Pitt was really good and the thing is “Saving Private Ryan” level graphic. I wouldn’t call it “must see.” I don’t think any one interested will find it a waste of time though.

  • '18 '17 '16 '15 Customizer

    Good to know. Thanks for the brief review.

    I had a suspicion that it would be ‘pedestrian’ as you said. Just seemed a little too commercialized to be otherwise. Still looking forward to seeing it.


  • It isn’t pedestrian because it is commercialized. It just doesn’t really cover any new ground or have a new idea.

    Kids who haven’t seen a lot of war pictures will probably take more out of it than those of us with a shelf of them in our DVD collections.

  • '18 '17 '16 '15 Customizer

    Understood. But does it fall into the ‘rah, rah’ USA war experience film, or does it seem like a war film that happens to be about US soldiers? I was just concerned that it might be overly dramatized (like Pearl Harbor) rather than respectfully gritty (Saving Private Ryan).


  • No not a “Rah, rah, Go Team” war film. It happens to be about US soldiers. It is respectfully gritty. Not by any means a “Pearl Harbor” type of deal. “Unromantic” seems a good word.


  • Good. Thanks Frimmel.

  • '18 '17 '16 '15 Customizer

    Nice. Good to hear. Might go see it tomorrow.

  • '17 '16 '15 '14 '13 '12

    Really good movie, very dark and disturbing at times, but really well done.  Stay for the end credits, you’ll dig the cinamatography.


  • I enjoyed the dark side of war that the film showed.

  • '18 '17 '16 '15 Customizer

    Very good, well made film for the most part. I was surprised at how visceral the movie felt. It made me uncomfortable much more consistently than any other movie I have seen in some time. Certainly more than any other war movie I have seen. It was disturbing really. And it wasn’t the gore that did it (SPR and Blackhawk Down both had more gore). The emotional horror of war was better portrayed than I expected. (And this was the comparatively tame western front in 1945). It was a great film, but I am not sure I want to watch it again.

    I do think it brought a couple new portrayals or elements to war films (WWII films at least):

    • The depiction of tracers and cannon rounds was much closer to descriptions I have read in books and heard from my grandfather about when he was in Korea than is typically shown in war movies. The colors were the most vibrant and unique that I have seen in a film. So much so that it almost seemed surreal. But I think it was really quite accurate.

    • I found the emotional themes, as I said before, better portrayed than in any other war movie I have seen. Maybe that is just my perception, and the gritty numbness is only one aspect of war, but I really felt as though I had been through the war after seeing the film. It was excellently accomplished, but it made me feel like one viewing was more than enough.

    • I don’t know that the tank battle was the best ever filmed, but it had to be the best in the past 30 years, right? I don’t know of any small scale tank v. tank battles in recent movies. This one was extremely well done, not just with Fury vs. the Tiger, but with the other tanks as well. Plus, having a real Tiger in the film is definitely a first for cinema and (while tragically short) the menace of a Pz. VI was dramatically well staged.

    The plot was not particularly unique (pedestrian as Frim said) and there were a few war movie tropes used. But all in all I think it was excellent. If you want to see it, going to see in the theater is a must in my opinion. Will give the best delivery.

    If anything can sum up the movie it would be:

    War is hell.


  • Thanks for the review LHoffman.  The part about the tracers is an interesting point; out of curiosity, have you ever seen the Richard Widmark Technicolor film Hell and High Water?  There’s a night-time scene in which some Chinese machine-gunners are firing at Widmark and his men, and every couple of seconds a colourful tracer round is seen.  I assume that it’s an optical effect (I doubt they were firing real bullets at the actors!), but as far as I can tell it looks convincing and realistic.

  • '18 '17 '16 '15 Customizer

    I have not seen the film, how old is it? I made the comment about the tracers and shells because it really did strike me as very different from what has been portrayed in the past (a generic orange line with very little kinetic feel to it). But from what I have heard, this is what war really looks like. The weapons were bold, loud and bright. Just as if you were riding along in the tank.


  • @LHoffman:

    I have not seen the film, how old is it?

    It was made in 1954.  It was one of the first Cinemascope pictures, and it was apparently made as a way to show off the anamorphic widescreen process, which explains all the early shots in the film that show Paris, London, Rome and so forth (the thin excuse being that we’re hearing news reports from around the world).  Some parts of the film are pretty silly, but it’s a very watchable submarine film / Cold War thriller in which the bad guys are the Chinese Communists rather than the Russians.  Getting back to the tracers: the scene I mentioned shows the ChiCom bad guys spraying their machine gun fire over a wide target area (roughly towards the camera’s viewpoint, which is kind of unnerving for the audience), and as I recall the special effects guys took the rouble of showing the intermittent tracer lines flying around at diffrerent angles as the guns are swivelled.  I think the tracers are shown as being red, but I’m not certain.


  • I saw this last night and was not disappointed. Was a very good war film.
    Of course, Tiger 131 was not in it long enough, but Tigers do need a hell of a lot of maintenance. And this one cannot get broken!
    The ending was a little silly, but not as bad as I had understood it to be.
    I will buy it on DVD when it comes out. I know my dad will like it and I will certainly watch it at least once more.


  • @wittmann:

    I saw this last night and was not disappointed. Was a very good war film.
    Of course, Tiger 131 was not in it long enough, but Tigers do need a hell of a lot of maintenance. And this one cannot get broken!
    The ending was a little silly, but not as bad as I had understood it to be.
    I will buy it on DVD when it comes out. I know my dad will like it and I will certainly watch it at least once more.

    Dad and I watched the film a few weeks ago. Loved the tank warfare, I agree with you about the last 15 minutes of the film.


  • When that under strength Pzg Battalion marched passed watched by the new guy, I counted at least 6 shouldered Panzerfausts. When it came to the veteran Battalion actually using one in this encounter, they appeared from an unopened box.
    I asked myself: where were the 6 (at least) that I saw? Anyone could fire one, so if one were dropped, another man could have picked one up. And used it.
    Goodbye Fury 5 mins earlier!

    Great scenes otherwise. Very happy I went.


  • That Panzerfausts hit should have made “Fury” uninhabitable for the crew. Instead the tank lasted longer than a Maginot line fortress under attack.


  • I just saw “Fury” - it was entertaining and took place in WWII, so I pretty much overall liked it. Here is what did not impress me:

    SPOILERS

    The tank battle result seemed pretty accurate. I’ve read that, on average, it took 5 Shermans to take out one Tiger, and only 2 Shermans would drive away. However, the distance the tanks fought from in the movie was ridiculously short and reminded me of an arcade game like Company of Heroes.

    The Germans firing AT guns from cover earlier in the movie missed too much. They would have been dialed in already on where the tanks would be and would have scored first shot hits.

    I agree on Wittmann’s Panzerfaust comments. The troops were carrying several on their shoulders in the column and then later opened another box. A tank without supporting infantry is a sitting duck. Familiar with fighting the endless soviet armor on the Eastern Front, they would have quickly dispatched the disabled tank before any more than a handful of Germans died.

    The Germans were not that stupid - they would not have all piled into a nearby house so the tank could shoot the house down.

    It was silly to watch an elite German sniper miss a kill shot three times on Brad Pitt. Pitt finally falls into the tank and is able to carry on a conversation and even draw and fire his pistol with three sniper rounds in him - I think not!

    A German, already aware that the Sherman is enemy occupied, opens the top and looks in, allowing Brad Pitt to shoot him. Only after that do the stupid Germans think to throw grenades in first.

    In reality, 300 SS soldiers would be extra cautious in 1945 - short on supplies and manpower - they would have sent a couple of scouts ahead to check out any enemy tank or possible ambush, just like the Americans did earlier.

    Oddly after the final battle, a young SS soldier shines his flashlight on the last US survivor hiding under the tank. Despite this young soldier having seen the tank crew mow down dozens and dozens of his friends in a  bloody ambush in his own country, he doesn’t seem angry at all and just walks off, sparing the American. Huh?

    But what the heck - I’m just glad Hollywood is still making WWII movies.


  • Good work Der Kuenstler.
    The PaK 40s missing pissed me off too. First shot would have undoubtably been a kill, then it would have been a rush to who shot next: them or tank.
    And a tank (Tiger 131) with a better, longer ranged gun, would have kept at a distance. It was up to the Shermans to close the distance. No tank commander would have given up that advantage. They did have reverse gears!


  • I wait untill it is out on dvd and then maybe renting it.
    Good observations Herr der Künstler.
    Without having seen the movie and just reading your post ,I’m allreafy aware of what is going to awaiting me watching Fury.
    I fear we can’t expect any good WW II movies anymore.

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