Posted on Oct 13, 2014
What ONE incorrectly depicted thing pisses you off most about military movies?
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My question is really no more complicated than that.
For me, it is the rendering of the salute. Hands down. No second place. This pisses me off to no end!
In my opinion, this is THE most important of all military courtesies, and it should always be given with the most possible precision and exacting attention to detail.
FFS! It is something that is taught to every 'cruit in week 1 of basic training! It is perfected throughout training! In a military movie, this should be the EASIEST thing to get right!
It seems to me, that if an actor or actress can spend weeks or months learning hundreds, if not thousands of lines of dialog for a movie, they can at least spend an afternoon or a day, practicing with the advisor (there is ALWAYS an advisor who is a Vet or SM) on the set until they get it right.
I know there are bigger, or more obvious problems with some military movies. Weapons or uniforms or lingo that is anachronistic to the time period of the battle on screen...but DAMMIT, getting the salute wrong in any time period just frosts my shorts!
Usually, it's a fail with what I call the, "I'm shading my eyes from the sun" salute. Your f'n hand doesn't belong on your forehead like you're trying to watch the right fielder shag the fly ball! It belongs where you were TAUGHT to place it!
I find myself commenting out loud to friends, while watching movies that jack this up...they don't seem to understand why it pisses me off so much.
What does it for you?
For me, it is the rendering of the salute. Hands down. No second place. This pisses me off to no end!
In my opinion, this is THE most important of all military courtesies, and it should always be given with the most possible precision and exacting attention to detail.
FFS! It is something that is taught to every 'cruit in week 1 of basic training! It is perfected throughout training! In a military movie, this should be the EASIEST thing to get right!
It seems to me, that if an actor or actress can spend weeks or months learning hundreds, if not thousands of lines of dialog for a movie, they can at least spend an afternoon or a day, practicing with the advisor (there is ALWAYS an advisor who is a Vet or SM) on the set until they get it right.
I know there are bigger, or more obvious problems with some military movies. Weapons or uniforms or lingo that is anachronistic to the time period of the battle on screen...but DAMMIT, getting the salute wrong in any time period just frosts my shorts!
Usually, it's a fail with what I call the, "I'm shading my eyes from the sun" salute. Your f'n hand doesn't belong on your forehead like you're trying to watch the right fielder shag the fly ball! It belongs where you were TAUGHT to place it!
I find myself commenting out loud to friends, while watching movies that jack this up...they don't seem to understand why it pisses me off so much.
What does it for you?
Saluting
Movies
Posted 11 y ago
Responses: 264
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I would have to say that the rank thing usually upsets me there is the occasional stuff they say that makes no sense in military terminology.
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There was a group scene in Stargate where they showed a guy in air force blue uniform with sergeant stripes and major insignia both on the same uniform. We figured, that's correct, he's an air force sergeant major..................
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MSG John Wirts
But really I was stationed with an Army Sergeant whose last name was Major, confusing??
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SPC (Join to see)
I knew a CPT Minor in Germany. How musical he must have been when he was promoted to Major.
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MAJ Ronnie Reams
We had a Chaplain Lord at Ft Meade in 68. He would answer the phone "6th Cavalry Chapel, Lord speaking".
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thought about this a bit more, and though I think the salute is more important, I think military dress uniforms with awards placed wrong probably urks me more than anything, just no reason for ribbons out of order, getting distances at least close to correct, and even having the appropriate ones, I mean unless it's specific to the story you are telling about an individual, seeing an army cook with a pathfinder badge is ridiculous
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SGT Scott Curtice
yeah, the travels slow enough to watch thing probably came from the actual ability to watch a slow ass dragon round :)
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SFC Sean Carlson
Ah the Dragon (I was a 11BC2) and had the misfortune of having to hump that POS. At around 45lbs, it added a nice little wobble to your step. Plus the survival rate was horrible if actually going up against anything. It's 11.2 second flight time to cover 1000 meters, large puff of smoke and as it's pop pop pop' sound as it went down range gave all enough time to engage to origin of the puff of smoke, while the poor hapless guy is sitting on his ass, trying to keep that waltzing round on target. It was actually a relief when I was made a 60 gunner, less weight.
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SGT Scott Curtice
yeah, I was a 11BC2 also, spent a lovely move packing the day & night sights, the fake round, and I was also my teams SAW gunner, all around S Korea for Team Spirit in '89 for 30 days. Wasn't fun thinking about sitting on my ass tracking if I had to real world. Had some fun live fires though
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Cpl Phil Hsueh
SFC Robert Dimitroff - The whole deliberately getting things wrong on the uniform because of laws about impersonating military personnel is entirely a myth. There are no such laws, the reason for the errors is because the costume designer either simply didn't do their homework or the producers wanted the uniform to have no bling regardless of accuracy.
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I'd have to agree with the proper salute, outside of comedies, which I give a pass. I do notice poor spacing of infantry units on foot, and other things, but it's hollywood
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My poor son, every time there is an improper salute he has to hear me say he did it wrong & sometimes he even gets a demonstration of how to salute correctly.
When I was in basic at Lackland when we went to chow we had to salute in a mirror & there was ALWAYS a TI there watching.
When I was in basic at Lackland when we went to chow we had to salute in a mirror & there was ALWAYS a TI there watching.
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SPC (Join to see)
LMAO SrA Marc Haynes! I'm down with your struggle, brother. Anyone within earshot of me gets an impromptu D&C crash course when this happens too. I can't explain why it pisses me off so much...it just does!
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What gets me is inaccurate portrayals of weapon usage, such as firing a M2HB from the hip, A M2HB!! not the M1919 the Ma deuce from the hip...or reversely calling a M1919 a "fifty cal". Berets are always wrong, I've yet to see one properly formed. Of course the Infinity magazines and nuclear grenades or cover that's really concealment with and invisible shield that can stop anything up to a missile.
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Steel grated decks in submarines, and pretty much any depiction of submarine life in movies, with the exception of Down Periscope!
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MSG John Wirts
That was an excellent comedy, no way related to reality. Gust a tension relieving parody of life in the military. The only reality was the political wrangling by thp brass looking for another promotion.
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With an asterisk, I'd have to say my biggest pet-peave regarding military movies and television is scripting completely out-of-this-world situations that are so far-fetched they lose any dramatic impact they may have carried. Take "The Hurt Locker" as an example (disclaimer: I am not EOD, but I did have a bunch of this broken down for me by an EODC augmenting an NSW platoon): you've got an EOD tech who is so much of a cowboy he doesn't even stay in comms with his team while working on a bomb; he takes off from base with no authorization, alone, wearing a hoodie, IN IRAQ to go hunt somebody down for an emotional confrontation, and THEN doesn't get shot or arrested coming back on base?!?! Look, I know some wild shit happens down range. I know excursions into civilian areas get made that are totally under the table. I know alcohol gets smuggled in and folks get shit-faced; but, c'mon!!!
Asterisk: I admit that, before learning anything about the EOD community and their mission, I thought this movie was badass. So, maybe this crapshit has a place entertaining those who never serve and never will, or those who, like me at one point, only served in the most vanilla of billets. It's still crapshit.
Asterisk: I admit that, before learning anything about the EOD community and their mission, I thought this movie was badass. So, maybe this crapshit has a place entertaining those who never serve and never will, or those who, like me at one point, only served in the most vanilla of billets. It's still crapshit.
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I escorted one of the film crews for the movie Private Benjamin as we gather sounds of women in the Army during cadence calls...and worked as a stuntman in the worst hollywood movie ever--Inchon! In both cases the stereotypes were locked in the minds of the writers and embellished by directors who themselves were not veterans.
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