Battle of Britain (The movie)

[PanzerMeyer]

I hope this doesn't sound corny but this movie was very inspiring. I'm talking about the 1969 classic film with Michael Caine, Robert Shaw, Christopher Plummer and many other great actors. It had been at least 6-7 years since I last saw this movie and I had forgotten many of the great scenes. For a movie dealing with such a serious historical event, I was quite delighted to see so many scenes with great humor and sarcasm. Anyone remember the scene where Goering asks those two Luftwaffe pilots if there was anything they needed? Then one of the officers responded to him by saying "Yes. A squadron of Spitfires". LOL.

I was also glad to see that the 2-disc DVD set has an audio commentary by director Guy Hamilton as well as several "making of" featurettes and historical documentaries. My only minor complaint with the music is that the movie was a bit overdone and bombastic at times. This is definitely one of my top 10 war movie favorites of all time.

[KODIAK]

Yeah, a classic mate. The music being overdone is a feature of a lot of those types of films in that day. The comment made by one of the Luftwaffe pilots does alledgedly carry some truth, an old war story nonetheless.

[Nemisis]

Strangley i just seen a spitfire documentary at the weekend and they mentioned that comment.

Don't know the officers name but after Goering demanded that the 109's stay close to the bombers for escort rather than sitting up above them in wait to drop down on any attacking spitfires, an officers said that he would need a squadron of spitfires to be able to do this and win.

Also it was said that virtually all German pilots that got shot down and survived, said that it was a Spitfire that shot them down when in actual fact two thirds of all aircraft shot down were by Hurricanes that out numbered the spitfires 2 to 1.

One German pilot got shot down over a british airfield in Scotland and crash landed on the airstrip, he than said in german after being pulled from his plane that he got hit by a Spitfire, but the pilot that shot him down in a Hurricane had landed just after him and said "No sorry old chap but i shot you down with my Hurricane and there isn't a Spitfire base near hear for about 200 miles".

The German went into a fit saying NINE NINE SPITFIRE SPITFIRE.

Seems it was to embarassing to be shot down by a hurricane.

[PanzerMeyer]

That's a great and hilarious story about the Luftwaffe pilot getting shot down in Scotland!


Poor ol' Hurricane. It contributed so much towards Allied victory in WWII but it seems that all the glory goes to the Spitfire and the P-51.

[KODIAK]

In actual fact 4/5ths of all German aircraft shot in the Battle of Britain were shot down by Hurricanes.