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Author Topic: Victory at Sea  (Read 2070 times)

deadbeat

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Victory at Sea
« on: January 08, 2016, 01:20:00 pm »

I was given a box set of DVDs at Christmas of the American series Victory at Sea from the early fifties. It has over 10 hours of footage!

Having now seen it all, whilst it may have been a good series at the time, it certainly doesn't meet today's standards for a documentary. The most annoying part is the music, it is constant and loud often drowning out the narrator.

There is some very good rare footage, both from the Allied and Axis sides, obviously pro American, but you'd expect that. Ironically, a lot of the footage of Pearl Harbour comes from the Japanese real footage and also from the movie that the Japanese made shortly after for domestic consumption using models.

The narration is poor, the text is more for dramatic effect than education and the voice of the narrator, an actor called Leonard Graves, grates on you.

The box set comes from Smiths and at £9.99 is a pretty good buy for the footage, If only you could turn the music down or off.
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joppyuk1

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #1 on: January 08, 2016, 03:58:03 pm »

When this first appeared on UK TV in the 50s, my dad took me round to my gran's once a week to watch it, we didn't have a set till a lot later, so this was a regular occurrence at the time. We also did a series by Monty, and one by General Horrocks. As you say, they were very American orientated, but they made the series so that's understandable. If the BBC had done it we may have got to see more of our lads.
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jaymac

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #2 on: January 08, 2016, 07:31:29 pm »

If I recall  the music was by Victor Young  Later with lyrics sang as No other love big hit for Ronnie Hilton they used to show it in the cinemas  as well
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deadbeat

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #3 on: January 09, 2016, 12:54:48 pm »

The music was by Richard Rodgers of Rodgers and Hammerstein fame. He even managed to get tiny clips from South Pacific in it.

I also recall about the same time that Victory at Sea was being aired on UK TV there was an BBC series entitled 'War at Sea' and I think it was narrated by Ludovic Kennedy and I do recall that it was a far superior production than Victory at Sea.
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jaymac

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #4 on: January 09, 2016, 07:07:25 pm »

Richard Rodgers  aye  your right got mixed up Victor Young's was When I fall in Love  the music was in  One Minute to Zero
 
 
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Nemo

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #5 on: January 09, 2016, 07:57:36 pm »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSCWi0ivx9w&list=PLMOJ05TrdIZA7pNQa5YjrHuPIDPdHPIod
I had the whole set on VHS.  Lent it to an ex RN 'mate' but never got it back.
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tigertiger

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #6 on: January 10, 2016, 01:44:02 am »

Last year the BBC produced this http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05qy7nq/episodes/guide
It is no longer on iPlayer, but may be on DVD, there are torrents.


War at Sea:Scotland's story.

The Dreadnoughts of Scapa Flow
War at Sea: Scotland's Story Episode 1 of 2
As the Great War began, the Royal Navy rushed to Orkney's great natural harbour, Scapa Flow.


The Battle of the U-Boats
War at Sea: Scotland's Story
Episode 2 of 2
In April 1917, German U-Boats were sinking a dozen British ships every day. The First Sea Lord, Jellicoe, warned that Britain might not be able to carry on fighting into 1918.
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The only stupid question is the one I didn't ask

jaymac

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Re: Victory at Sea
« Reply #7 on: January 10, 2016, 10:14:52 am »

Saw them Tiger an interesting bit was the use of  opera singers to fine tune the  direction Port/Stbd  on the echo sounders they were shown a couple of months ago also  Allowing the ships crews to disembark before sinking the ships in the early stages of the war
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