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Oh What A Lovely War: Special Edition [1969] | ![Oh What A Lovely War: Special Edition [1969]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/414EAJADEWL._SL160_.jpg)
 enlarge | Director: Richard Attenborough
Actors: John Gielgud, Phyllis Calvert, Jean-pierre Cassell, Laurence Olivier, Vanessa Redgrave
Studio: Paramount Home Entertainment
Category: DVD
Buy New: £17.99
New (2) from £17.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 4547
Format: Collector's Edition, Pal
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: Parental Guidance
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 138
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
EAN: 5014437897534
ASIN: B000HD100O
Theatrical Release Date: 1969
Release Date: October 30, 2006
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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Amazon.co.uk Review
It's a product of its Vietnam era just as surely as Robert Altman's M*A*S*H, and like that film Oh! What a Lovely War is ostensibly about a different war. Based on a celebrated anti-war stage piece produced by Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop, the film chronicles the various madnesses of the First World War. Along with vignettes involving the members of the fictional Smith family, the movie lands its punches with a two-pronged attack: by using the songs of the war, mostly patriotic; and by using the real-life words of various figures from WWI. You can see how this would have fit a stylised stage show; in the more literal, realistic realm of film, it mostly comes across as heavy-handed pretentiousness. Richard Attenborough, who would later explore the lives of Gandhi and Chaplin, first made his way to the director's chair here, and he enlisted a staggering who's who of his fellow British actors for roles in the large ensemble: Olivier, Gielgud, and Richardson among them. John Mills plays the most bull-headed of the generals, blithely measuring out yards of territory gained by the thousands of casualties involved. The songs are a historically fascinating lot, mostly given an ironic or sinister treatment in this incarnation, as jolly patriotic tunes that mask the utter carnage at the front. Among the high points is Maggie Smith singing (well, declaiming) an ode to recruitment, promising war as a grand adventure. The blending of arch content with Attenborough's realistic staging of trench warfare just doesn't take, but what does hit home are the actual quotes and the statistics of killing; World War I set a bloody standard for sheer, blind slaughter. --Robert Horton
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| Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
 Unique little gem April 27, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
A musical about WW1 ?
Very hard to believe, and I can't imagine how they managed to 'sell' the idea to whoever financed it, but thank goodness they did.
Although this concept should never have worked, it breaks every rule in the book to successfully convey the shift from eager anticipation of a walkover victory, to the anguish and futility of mass slaughter.
Just don't expect 'Saving Private Ryan'. It's not about guns and bloodshed, but about how people actually felt as the fight dragged on and the horrors mounted. And because you associate with the characters, you care about them.
On the off-chance you don't like this film, can I suggest you fast-forward to the final five minutes. The closing shots are amongst the most moving scenes you will ever see. As the camera pans out I guarantee you will be just a little shocked...and just a little wiser.
 A excellent satire May 15, 2007
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
This film has not dated since I first saw it in the late 60s, the height of anti-Vietnam war demonstrations.
From the first scene where we see Maggie Smith on her recruiting drive in a music hall, to the numbing ending panning out on a huge landscape filled with crosses of the war dead, I think that the message here had, and still has, far more impact than so-called anti-war pictures of the time that concentrated purely on the graphic brutal horror of it all.
The subtle, sometimes silly, yet always poignant satire is evident throughout, and it's really well done too. The generals in the Great War, who were often criticised for not being at the front line with their troops, are brilliantly lampooned conducting the campaign from Brighton Pier, with cricket-type scoreboards as back drops- "Battle of the Somme. Today's dead 60,000, ground gained NIL". General Haig, admirably played by John Mills, kneels down in prayer, instead of concentrating on strategy, and says 'I know it didn't go too well today, Lord, but...'
The start of hostilities takes place on a floor-covered map on the pier, and politicians move around as in the game of Risk. The period songs are amusing, yet moving when viewed in the context of soldiers who knew they were heading for unprecedented slaughter.
The switches between the luxury of HQ and the abominable conditions of the trenches are timed perfectly.
A very fine cast, who were unfortunately the sole topic of the Special Feature. Richard 'Dahling' Attenborough in his first DVD interview, is on top form. From 'Larry to Kenny to Johnny to Dicky' and their performances 'Charming, exquisite, wonderful'... well you can just imagine. Actually, the acting was pretty good, nice and over the top in keeping with the format.
Film worth watching, but scan the Special Feature only if you fancy a trip to Luvvydom.
 60's avant-garde musical review mangling the Great War February 18, 2007
5 out of 48 found this review helpful
This film (that started as a radio play) takes a bought as long ad the war and mangles the history and substitutes words (one respirator for the four of us) for standard songs. For a little while one can put up with metaphors and Monty Python skits. However after a while it gets quite boring. You have to know history to keep up with the skits; if you know history then this is a waist of time emulating it.
Very ingenious settings in a pavilion (Brighton) by the sea set up the prolog to describe the positions before the war. The scattered reference to red poppies are quite fascination but not worth plugging through the film. There is a brief but good emulation of the Christmas meeting in no-man's land.
In the tradition of "The Longest Day" we get to see cameos of many famous actors of the day. It is quite fun to guess where we saw them before. Some of the song and dance is reminiscent of the quality that went into "Springtime for Hitler."
Bottom line is if you missed this film you haven't missed much.
The DVD version includes Richard Attenborough's excuse for the way this was displayed.
 Oh What a Lovely War December 5, 2006
14 out of 25 found this review helpful
I watched this film years ago on TV and have waited patiently for the DVD to appear. It really is a fantastic film, one of the all time classics.
I have given it only 3 stars because, as yet, despite many attempts I have not been able to view it without the iritating and unnecessary subtitles. If I find a way around that problem I will upgrade it to 5 stars.
Sign up now for The War Game; Oh! What a Lovely War is a fine film directed by Richard Attenborough November 24, 2006
52 out of 66 found this review helpful
Genetic testing, I think, would show Oh! What a Lovely War and Paths of Glory to be fraternal twins. Both are anti-war, both use the appalling circumstances of World War I to underline the corruption of old men who use war as a way to occupy their time and cause young men to die in the tens of thousands. But where Paths of Glory uses bitterness, Oh! What a Lovely War uses irony and the clever trick of turning our own jingoistic instincts against us. The movie is a pastiche of fantasy, fact, music halls, songs with words often used by the soldiers and the real-life statements of key personalities. There are two threads which connect everything together. The first is the fate of the Smith family and the five sons who eagerly sign up to beat the Hun. The second is the smugness, the certitude, the deadly self-confidence of those who make decisions about war. The fantasy takes place on a great seaside boardwalk with a wonderful wooden pier and ornate pavilions at the end. Here the Smith family and hundreds of others line up at the counter to buy tickets to join in "the ever popular War Game." Inside the music hall Maggie Smith sings "I'll Make a Man of You," a seducing, winking recruiting song...
"The Army and the Navy need attention,
The outlook isn't healthy you'll admit,
But I've got a perfect dream of a new recruiting scheme,
Which I think is absolutely 'it.'
If only other girls would do as I do
I believe that we could manage it alone,
For I turn all suitors from me but the sailor and the Tommy.
I've an army and a navy of my own.
"On Sunday I walk out with a Soldier,
On Monday I'm taken by a Tar,
On Tuesday I'm out with a baby Boy Scout,
On Wednesday a Hussar;
On Thursday a gang oot wi' a Scottie,
On Friday, the Captain of the crew;
But on Saturday I'm willing, if you'll only take the shilling,
To make a man of any one of you."
And off go the first of the Smith sons up to the stage, encouraged by their proud and smiling wives, to take the shilling and walk out into the trenches. While the pier may be fantasy, the trenches are all too realistic. It is at Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig's headquarters at the pier where sports score boards are kept of the battles: "The Somme, 1916. British losses: 607,781 officers and men. Ground gained: Nil." It's at the pier where staff officers, well away from the fighting, play leap frog while sending out orders to attack. "One more frontal assault, gentlemen, and we shall win." And men leave the trenches as ordered to charge forward with rifles and bayonets against machine guns and barbed wire. In a looney atmosphere the troops are lined up for Sunday services and hear from an upper-class preacher, "I'm sure you'll all be glad to hear news from the home front. The Archbishop of Canterbury has made it known it is no sin to labor for the war on the Sabbath. And I'm sure you'll also like to know the Chief Rabbi has absolved your Jewish brethren from abstaining from pork in the trenches. Likewise, His Holiness the Pope has ruled that the eating of flesh on Friday is no longer a mortal sin..." Through it all the home front, energized against the Hun, reads the death lists with trembling but brave lips, and the men who die deal with the absurdity by singing their own morbid versions of songs...
"If you want the old battalion,
We know where they are, we know where they are,
We know where they are.
If you want the old battalion, we know where they are,
They're hanging on the old barbed wire.
We've seen them, we've seen them,
Hanging on the old barbed wire."
Even their laughter at Christmas can have an ironic twist...
"It was Christmas Day in the cookhouse, the happiest time of the year,
Men's hearts were full of gladness and their bellies full of beer,
When up popped Private Shorthouse, his face as bold as brass,
He said We don't want your puddings, you can stick them up your...tidings of co-omfort and joy, comfort and joy, o-oh ti-idings of co-omfort and joy.
"It was Christmas Day in the harem, the eunuchs were standing 'round,
And hundreds of beautiful women were stretched out on the ground,
Along came the wicked Sultan, surveying his marble halls,
He said Whaddya want for Christmas boys, and the eunuchs answered...tidings of co-omfort and joy, comfort and joy, o-oh ti-idings of comfort and joy."
The film ends with one of the most touching and slightly bitter conclusions I've ever seen. The Smith family, now just the women, walk on a fine, sunlit day through a meadow filled with white crosses. The camera pulls back and back until we can only see these four moving white dots in a vast, endless meadow of green grass and white crosses. And we can hear soldiers faintly singing their own version of "They Wouldn't Believe Me."
"And when they ask us, how dangerous it was,
Oh, we'll never tell them, no, we'll never tell them.
We spent our pay in some cafe,
And fought wild women night and day,
'Twas the cushiest job we ever had.
"And when they ask us, and they're certainly going to ask us,
The reason why we didn't win the Croix de Guerre,
Oh, we'll never tell them, oh, we'll never tell them.
There was a front, but damned if we knew where."
This was Richard Attenborough's first job as a director and he pulls it off with great effectiveness. He rounded up the cream of British actors, starting with Lawrence Olivier. These aren't stunt cameos. Even when some of the parts are just a few lines, the actors perform with great effect. They are key to the opening scene when, playing the important rulers and statesmen in 1913 and 1914, they are gathered around inside a fantasy pavilion and Attenborough constructs the background to the war using them.
I think the film is one of the best and oddest of the anti-war movies. It was based on the Joan Littlewood theater piece, which was small-scale, brisk and acerbic. If any, like me, squirm at Paths of Glory's earnestness, they might want to sample its fraternal twin directed by Attenborough.
In keeping with the spirit of both Oh, What a Lovely War and Paths of Glory, it seems appropriate to give Wilfred Owen the last word. He was a young officer in WWI who often wrote poetry when he wasn't fighting. Owen was killed leading yet another charge just four days before the armistice was declared. He was 25. His poems were published posthumously to great acclaim. This excerpt tells the story of a gas attack and of a man who fumbled getting his mask on...
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you, too, could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's, sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues...
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori. *
*Which translates as "It is sweet and honorable to die for one's country."
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