Product Description: A movie about the First World War based on a stage musical of the same name portraying the "Game of War" and focusing mainly on the members of one family (last name Smith) who go off to war. Much of the action in the movie revolves around the words of the marching songs of the soldiers and many scenes portray some of the more famous (and infamous) incidents of the war including the assassination of Duke Ferdinand the Christmas meeting between British and German soldiers in no-mans-land and the wiping out by their own side of a force of Irish soldiers newly arrived at the front after successfully capturing a ridge that had been contested for some time. Plot Keywords: Anti War Independent Film Based On PlaySystem Requirements:Run Time: 144 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: MUSICALS/MUSICALS UPC: 097360690149 Manufacturer No: 069014
Amazon.com: 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 stylized 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
Oh! What a lovely war. This was a film which originated as a west end musical play long before being made into a film. More recently it has been playing out in London. It is an anti-war film and it could be superimposed over Irag and the Bush Administration. It shows how the instigators are well away from the action and destruction And how it is fought out by die for your country concepts. The music is sincerely constructed from the minds of the trench soldier with a great deal of resigned vunerability and you must follow the leaders in command or you will be an outcaste. The striking thing about the songs and lyrics are that they are light and bubbly when trenches are so very bad and cruel to these brave men. It is a long film but I enjoyed every minute of it. It can not be purchased by me in my home country Victoria Melbourne Australia so thank you so very much for the copy
How music informed me about world war 1 This war along with the American Civil War displayed how the songs of both wars changed to reflect the horror war and the massive deaths that fell on the ordinary soldiers. While the civil war gave freedom to the slaves,world war 1 settled nothing except for a few border changes, freed Belgian from german occupation,freed poland and led to the communist revolution. It is clearly an antiwar film made during the vietnam war and relects the feelings of actors and filmmakers attitude towards war.
memory I saw this at school 40 years ago and always wanted to see it again. Excellent creative and very different approach. wife and grown up kids accepted it at face value and enjoyed something different.
Ageless Still the best anti war film ever made. Still as fresh as when it was first made.
Not Even A Lovely Film! I remember seeing this film when it first came out. Much of the memory is a blur (and, after seeing the film again, I prefer it that way). Only two things about it do I remember vividly - the very clever way Maggie Smith was presented first at a distance and then in grisly closeup, and how many times I kept checking my watch to see how much longer the bloody thing would last.
The film, of course, is an anti-war piece made at a time when anti-war films were terribly fashionable. This and Richard Lester's How I Won The War are examples of the nonsensical and nearly unwatchable variety. Oh What A Lovely War was Richard Attenborough's first stab at directing and the kid-with-a-new-toy aspect is really apparent. The film is based on a trendy stage play and proves once again that what works sublimely well in a theatre does not necessarily translate well to the screen. While the play could engage its audience, the action on a movie screen remains detached. The mixture of music hall songs and trench warfare both seemed surreal on stage. But the extreme differences in style in Attenborough's vision are uneasy, abrupt, and at times seemingly arbitrary.
One of the big selling points of the film was its all-star cast which seemed to include just about all the big British names of the time as well as a few promising newcomers. All doing their bit to get The Message across. Although it is interesting to note how many of these stars were, at roughly the same time, also appearing in The Battle Of Britain, a war film with quite a different take on the theme.
Oh What A Lovely War makes its anti-war point. Then makes it again. And again. And again. I doubt if any warmongers ever changed their opinions because of a film, or if anyone who did not already have anti-war beliefs went to see the film anyway. In the end, we're left with a bunch of luvvies preaching to the converted in a rather heavy-handed and overly stylised "entertainment". Forty years on, this film is now as much a relic as The Great War itself. Sorry, Dickie, but there is no way I could ever be persuaded to sit through Oh What A Lovely War again!
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