Amazon.com: Produced for Turner Network Television and originally broadcast in the summer of 1999, The Hunley is a straightforward, engrossing historical drama focusing on a little-known chapter of the Civil War: the introduction of the submarine into American naval warfare off the shore of war-torn Charleston, South Carolina, in 1864. Writer-director John Gray had previously helmed the 1998 TV movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot, and he has a knack for capturing the Civil War era with a heightened sense of authenticity, allowing for the dramatic license of mainstream television. Armand Assante plays Lieutenant Dixon, a traumatized soldier and grieving widower with just the right mixture of bravado and nihilism to skipper the C.S.S. Hunley--essentially an iron boiler cobbled into a hand-powered submersible weapon--with a volunteer crew of nine men who propel the crude sub in an effort to break the Union's coastal blockade. Donald Sutherland is superbly cast as Dixon's Confederate commander, General Beauregard, and the film's best scenes are those between Assante and Sutherland, playing two weary warriors with one final chance for victory. Otherwise, this is a very conventional film made with integrity but no particular flair, faithfully adhering to historical fact while establishing a solid supporting cast. Assante is guilty of moderate overacting, but he compensates with enough charisma to make his ill-fated command dramatically involving. Most effective is the sense of sheer bravery in the pioneering effort to prove the Hunley as a viable tool of war; the final scene within the sub is both haunting and dramatically intense. (Historical note: The C.S.S. Hunley--named after the drowned captain of a previous test vessel--was discovered intact off the coast of Charleston in 1995; efforts were later made to raise and restore this relic of naval history.) --Jeff Shannon
Important events don't need a "theme" This movie shows the first ever successful use of a true submarine in naval combat. Human history (for the literally the entire planet) was changed thereby. The one small drawback of this work may be that the truly profound implications of submarine warfare are not given nearly enough emphasis. Instead the events of the Hunley are sometimes forced to take a back seat to run of the mill movie themes: Dixon's love of his "Queenie", the Politics of Military generals, etc. Be that as it may, I loved this movie and highly recommend it. Five out of five stars!
Hunley History The Hunley, not many people know this but the Hunley was the first prototype submarine in the civil war, that's right the civil war. This is a true story and This movie should be shown in all schools throught out the world. a real eye-opener and a must see movie. we have watched it at least 8 times.
An Admirable Walk into the American Past Actual research on the now-raised Hunley and its crew suggests some of the information in this historical drama may be incorrect, but its spirit is not flawed. It shows well the diverse personalities that would come together in one of the landmark projects of Naval warfare in one of the great desperate attempts to turn the tide of the American Civil War toward southern Independence.
By 1864, the Federal blockade had choked the southern Nation dry of almost all imported goods that could not be carried over land afer arriving in Matamoros, Mexico. The development of a truly practical underwater "torpedo boat" that could break the Union blockade was of necessity--blockade runners could not provide sufficient staples let alone war materiel. It took an ingenious engineer H. L. Hunley and an intrepid group of men to follow a drowned crew to show that underwater stealth warfare on a ship-sinking scale was possible. Unfortunately, it again yielded deadly results for the crew.
Viewers of the film will see excellent performances, absent the gore of parallel production "Andersonville"--inspiring in a way that shows why combatants on opposite sides of many conflicts come together many years later in mutual respect and admiration. Small wonder that tens of thousands attended the final military funeral of the remains of the Hunley crew in 2004, in Charleston, South Carolina, or that a German writer would ask: "Where's the DVD?"
While this is a genre of film that does not appeal to everyone, it will appeal to those who wish to understand what the conflict was like on the home front (Charleston), the types of personalities involved (from an apparently non-military crewman to the ambitious Pierre Toutaint Gustave Beauregard, eager to redeem himself after being shuffled off to South Carolina in the wake of failure at Manassas). Armand Assante puts in a great performance as Lt. Dixon, a part he apparently was not cast for but sought.
All in all, this is much more than a costume drama, and if the viewer will also read the historically accurate accounts of what was found in the actual raised H.L. Hunley craft (e.g. by Mark Ragan), it is an even more worthwhile journey into the past.
Well made film, but where can I get a DVD??? I've seen the film on German television recently - with german dubbed actors. Sounded a bit odd but otherwise the movie was very well made and quite authentic, I found. I browsed every Amazon in Europe and in the United States - but no DVD. US-NTSC Format VHS-Videos don't work in Europe. We've got 220 V/50 Hz, remember that, when selling to an important market in Europe - that is good ol' Deutschland!! When can I reckon with a european compatible Video or a DVD? (Not in years, please...)Thank you for your kind consideration.
Great movie I really enjoyed this movie. Is it ever going to come out on DVD?
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