Just like a rat to crack...

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Mike Irwin

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I flipped through the channels real quickly this evening and found that Zulu was on AMC.

I've seen this movie at least 9 times. I can recite a fair number of the lines along with the cast. I know exactly what's going to happen, and when.

It's a good movie and I like it a lot, but it is kind of labored in places, the battle scenes are kind of funny when you see a British soldier just standing at the parapet with Zulus swarming all around him and he looks like he's a statue, and it's kind of preachy in a couple of spots.

So why the hell can't I turn the TV off and walk away from it?
 
Well for me, its cuz I saw it as a kid in the drive in.....!!!!!!!

Another one...The Naked prey with Cornell Wilde!!!

WildoldiesbutgoodiesAlaska
 
Trivia: I've seen it so many times that I noticed in the firing from ranks scenes that some of the guys have Lee Enfield bolt guns!! The obvious front guys have the MH rifles but look behind em. :uhoh: BTW, if you can get it in WideScreen (not easy) you will see that the surrounding territory was heights. Just beautiful. Roarke's drift was a hole in the mountains, according to the movie, at least.
 
You know, if any of you want to take a really interesting holiday, why not fly out to South Africa and visit the place? There's Rorke's Drift, Isandhlwana, Blood River, and a bunch of First and Second Boer War battlesites (Ladysmith, Majuba, etc.) all within easy reach. Spend a week out there, enjoy the spectacular scenery, and feast your eyes on colonial military history.

In fact, if there's major interest, why don't we organize a THR trip out there? I know the area, and could organize group rates, etc. If you're interested, PM me, and we'll see what we can do.
 
Mike, you probably keep staring at Lt. Chard's collar brass (a flaming grenade) wondering if he's from the Grenadier Guards, whether he's an engineer or not.

Heck, I OWN the movie, and I still watched last night, and called my son and his wife, and they watched it. We've all seen it repeatedly.

Maybe my daughter-in-law likes it because Richard Burton's voice excites her. That was Burton reading the dispatch about Isandlhwana at the first and reading the data on the Victoria Cross winners at the last. They probably chose him partly to have a Welsh actor narrating a glorious event about a Welsh regiment, and because he had one of the great voices in the history of cinema.

The thing that always sticks in my craw about it (other than the fact that the producers wronged the real Pvt. Hook by portraying him as a malingerer) is that they slanted it to give the men a sense of guilt for defending themselves against attack by a vastly superior force. All part of the anti-war movement in those days, I guess?

Lone Star
 
Lone Star:
they slanted it to give the men a sense of guilt for defending themselves against attack by a vastly superior force.
Click to expand...
Your impression may be true but I always thought it was more realistic that a guy would be a little squeamish after such an emotional experience. How many times had the spears missed each guy and found one of their friends? I have been thru experiences that left me saying "why them and not me" and could relate to it on that basis. Still one helluva movie! BTW, the regular soljers had a sphinx on their collar brass. I think a bomb is a mark of an engineer. They blow stuff up, don't they? ;)
 
Big G-

The 24th Foot, the South Wales Borderers, really did have a sphinx as their insignia to commemorate the regiment's prior service in Egypt.

The Grenadier Guards use that flaming grenade insignia. Engineers do blow things up, but it doesn't mean that they have that insignia. US Army Engineer Corps personnel have a sort of castle or building as their insignia, like MP's have the crossed M1806 Harper's Ferry pistols.

I know about "survivor guilt" but the whole movie was infused with anti-war sentiment. Even the surgeon was blaming Chard for the casualties, although if Chard hadn't chosen to stand in the mission station, they'd have been massacred on the plains.

By the way, I love, "Men of Harlech", the song the troops sang back at the chanting Zulu. I finally obtained it on a CD, sung by Charlotte Church, accompanied by the choir of the Welsh Guards. If you have a good music store nearby, look for her first CD, just titled, "Charlotte Church". She sings it in both Welsh and English. I found it in a used music shop...

Lone Star
 
I watched it last night too. It's one of those that's on my list to watch whenever it comes on. I dind't notice the Enfields in the back ranks. Thanks for pointing it out, now I've got a reason to try to find it on DVD so I can check that out :D.

I didn't take the ending as antiwar at all. It seemed more like survivors guilt to me.

Preacherman, I'd love to visit the actual site. Have to dig out some good references and read up on it first.

Jeff
 
Mark Tyson: Martini-Henry caliber .577/450 - single shot falling block lever action rifle with a full forestock chambered for a 45 caliber necked down .577 case. A pretty ugly gun, imho, but effective!
 
"What would be the correct guns for the time period, then?"

On the face, the movie had the "correct" rifles in the Martini-Henry.

However, many of the Martinis shown were simply the wrong model.

The Martini in use at that time was, I believe, the Mk I, the short lever rifle, and many of those shown were the Mk III, the long lever, which was adopted about 10 years after the battle due to extraction problems.
 
I watched it twice yesterday, despite owning the letterbox version on DVD. That's one of several films I can watch over and over.

They were not clear about why they felt guilt at the end. I took it as survivor's guilt rather than guilt over the dead Zulus.
 
I would have to be 1870, imho, as the fight occurred in 1879 before the 1880 model was in circulation.
 
Zulu is one of my all time favorite movies - I don't know why, but it is. The wife hates it. The kids hate it. But I think it is great.

I noticed the Enfields years ago - but I just figured they had trouble rounding up enough of the old M-H's to every trooper.

One of the more funky scences, is when a troop gets shot while walking along one of the ramparts in the middle of a battle - the funky part is that he has his rifle slung on his right shoulder as if he is on sentry duty :D (- all while all the Zulus in the world are jumping over the ramparts and spearing his comrades.)

Also, I believe that the "flaming granade" was a widely used insignia for "granadiers" in many of the worlds armies about that time (but Chard was an engineer, so it begs the question as to why he was wearing it).
 
I'm another one that has watched that movie many times -- at least double digits. I watched it again last night. One of my favorite characters is the NCO (I'm not sure what his actual rank was) who maintains discipline and, several times, urges people to behave like a gentleman despite the circumstances.
 
One of my all time favorite movies, and since I'm an Enfield collector, I'm embarrassed that I never noticed the Lee Enfields in the movie...time for another viewing.

But just for the sake of accuracy, the 24th wasn't a Welsh regiment (per se) at Rorke's Drift. At the time, they were known as the 2nd Warwickshires, mostly English, with Welsh, Scots, and Irishmen. They became the South Wales Borderers some 2 years later.

Everything you wanted to know about Rorke's Drift...
 
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