A SOMEWHAT IMPASSIONED PLEA FOR MORE HOLLYWOOD REALISM

This piece focuses on the gentry who churn out movies in assembly line fashion, most pointedly the screenwriters. We hold nothing short of utter contempt for their ceaseless history revising, fact distortion, and classic literature corruption. The industry obviously has no qualms about insulting our alleged intelligence through truth manipulation for entertainment’s sake. It seems the only text they won’t twist around is that which comes from the Bible, perhaps due to inherent fear of recriminations from the Almighty.

Moreover, thanks to needed liberalization of those past days’ ridiculous censorship measures, our more modern film creators now go too far overboard, seldom failing to feature superfluous “in the sack” scenes, before blowing massive structures to bits as a finale. At least the earlier era bluenose-controlled productions couldn’t be overladen with erotic and violent sensationalism. However, we digress, since our current quest is for greater authenticity, not moderation.

Supplementing our above-stated misgivings, we’d like to add a few relatively minor pet peeves, where war and other military life films are concerned. We have no appreciation for lack of realism when portraying either battle scenes or barrack-room dialogue, and thus tend to wince at any of the aspects discussed below.

Military Rank Insignia
Anyone who ever served in direct confrontation combat knows that, beforehand, non-coms will have torn off their stripes, and officers discarded their bars, oak leaves, eagles, or stars. In addition, the facsimiles painted on their helmets get thoroughly coated with mud. To the enemy, such exposed designations signify leadership capacity, thus making the bearers more logical targets for snipers or other close range opponents.

Nevertheless, even in sterling war epics like The Longest Day and The Band of Brothers, among many lesser flicks we’ve watched over the years, no soldier ever appears without his rank prominently displayed for all to see and aim at. From our viewpoint, this lacks essential realism.

Shoulder Patches
The above point applies equally here, and never once have we noted the absence of military unit identification on any actor-soldier’s duds. Standard military procedure calls for such patches to be ripped off and thrown away before reaching the front, in the interest of security. Allowing the enemy to recognize what outfit they are facing has always been strictly taboo, with their forces’ having been thoroughly indoctrinated in noting and reporting any such observations.

Artillery and Mortar Fire
All too often, we witness troops moving forward, while shells keep landing and exploding no more than a few feet away from many of them, yet they carry on, miraculously untouched. The naïve film viewer is to suppose that only direct body hits will be damaging. Even the Rambo movies follow this erroneous pattern. Again, as many of us have learned from bitter experience, a strike that close will send deadly shrapnel flying in every direction.

Soldier, Sailor, Marine, and Air Force Vocabulary
We’re all aware that military personnel are prone to employ salty language as a matter of routine, and our latter-day films do a pretty adequate job in this regard. Although we have no objection to such practice, we have long deplored the unceasing use of two especially inaccurate expressions, both “clean” by nature, and normally applicable to off-duty or between-skirmish scenes.

The first overworked word in army films is sarge, used when addressing a sergeant. Throughout this fellow’s entire military service career, that abbreviation was not heard on a single occasion. The custom has always been to call said person by the full term and/or his name.

Furthermore, in countless army or navy-based movies, we’ve listened to only one word ever applied when reference is made to members of the fair sex. Quite frankly, we’re sick and tired of their being called dames, without exception. Even that classic song from South Pacific, which complained of their absence, exploited such expression to the hilt.

Having participated in an endless number of barracks bull sessions, conversations with college fraternity associates, various stag affairs, poker parties, and the like, this writer has yet to hear the ladies so labeled, either individually or collectively. Although there are words applicable by the dozen, ranging from semi-complimentary to degrading to anatomically vulgar, never has a male colleague of this writer been known to designate them as dames.