From: chance wolf (chance_wolf@shaw.ca)
Date: Sun May 30 2004 - 10:49:08 PDT
----- Original Message -----
From: "Nigel Hay" <Nigel@milweb.net>
To: "Military Vehicles Mailing List" <mil-veh@mil-veh.org>
Sent: Sunday, May 30, 2004 9:45 AM
Subject: Re: [MV] A Bridge Too Far Movie
> Most of The Shermans are actually fakes - on landrover chassis! Most of
> vehicles etc done by Brits in fact by the Late Charlie Mann - Rodney
Rushton
> did the famous jeep drive with the casualty in the woods - An early
edition
> of Wheels and Tracks gives the full story.
> Nige
I think I have that article at work, along with some other interesting stuff
from the film (like Robert Redford pouting and refusing to wear army boots!)
I remember they used an awful lot of plywood to come up with those Shermans,
and godknowswhat to make some of those German vehicles crossing the bridge
into Arnhem. They also evidently couldn't find a single Horsa glider
anywhere for love nor money, and wound up building all the ones you see in
the film. I love that movie.
"There's always something I've wanted to ask you, Johnny, but I didn't want
to give you the satisfaction. Why on earth do you always carry around that
damned umbrella?"
<haltingly>"Could..never..remember..the..password, and knew Jerry would
never carry one.."
Skipping ahead about 20 years, someone on the list (??) mentioned that they
saw a recent episode of Stargate which was supposed to take place in 1969,
remarked that he was irritated that the vehicles sported an anachronistic
camouflage job - and suggested that surely someone up here in Canada where
the series is filmed has vehicles which could've been rented with the
correct paint job and markings for the era. The answer is qualifiedly
"Yes", but it's a great deal more complicated than that.
There are a few of us renting vehicles to the film industry here in B.C.,
and since there's little or no variation in pricing on the whole - that's
seldom an issue. We're also all in the same boat as respects having to
supply what the production company likes the "look" of (anachronistic or
not), and more to the point - what they're willing to *pay* for. Generally
most of the deuces around town sport the three-colour CARC paint jobs
because that's what rents out mostly (90's-now), or because a recent larger
production wanted all the deuces it could get painted that way. When
someone wants to do Vietnam with a bunch of deuces which should be 24087
with white markings, or 1978 with the four-colour cam or USN with the
straight 383 green - we have to repaint the trucks. Problem is, as I've
said, the other 99% of the year there's no demand for an OD deuce, so they
have to be *repainted* back to 383 three-colour after the production. This
information is typically dropped in the lap of the transport coordinator who
then takes it into the production meeting and then on to accounting - and
more often than not, they don't want to foot the bill for the paint/repaint,
and elect to take the truck as-is. We *hate* supplying vehicles like that,
and if the production is renting them long enough, we'll repaint them
properly and just eat the cost - but B.C. is king of the one-day rental, and
there's no way you can paint and repaint a truck for a one-day shoot and eat
the cost out of your rental charge. We'd have a deficit larger than
Uruguay.
Some of you are probably asking yourselves why we don't use "Whiskey Wax" or
"temporary washable paint". The simple answer is that while it will
certainly pressure-wash off a nice, shiny, 2004 Budget Rent-a-Van once
you're done with the production - it won't come off the flat paint typically
found on military hardware. Too porous. It clings like a failing
"Bachelor" contestant. Same goes for the nifty rubber-cement compound
they use to simulate mud while "teching down" your freshly-painted M35 or
6pdr AT gun. It comes off all right. With a sandblaster. :)
Ideally you'd have a stable of 20 deuces and keep six of them 24087 OD for
Vietnam scenarios, but again, you'll suddenly get three movies
simultaneously all wanting a bunch of trucks to play Illinois National Guard
circa 2001 and you're stuck repainting trucks again. And at the last minute
too. No winners.
So, in recap - what they *want* and what they *need* are frequently two very
different things - and what they *need* and what they're willing to *pay*
for are just as frequently not even in the same area code. It's really
depressing on some stuff because you know the gear is around to do a really
*good* job - and you'd like to be part of that really good job - but that's
not the sort of production that comes to British Columbia. Not to say we
don't turn out some nice movies and stuff, it's just that the money gets
spent on things other than picture vehicles almost as some sort of New Age
religion. (Features are generally the exception though.)
One old hand I talked to on set on a recent production just shook his head
after one recent blatant anachronism, and told me that he's always
characterized that fake "cash-strapped" mentality as "tripping over dollar
bills to pick up dimes." I *frequently* hear "80 percent of our audience
won't know the difference anyway", so that too plays a role in all those
"WWII" M38s and "German" M3 Halftracks which cause most of us to cringe when
we see them on screen.
</rant>
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