The Longest Day - 1962

This is another movie that reminds me of my dad. We would tease him if he had it on TV and called it "The Longest Movie." I'd never actually watched it. It's based on a book by Cornelius Ryan and follows the events of June 6, 1944 - D-Day.

The version I watched had everyone speaking in their native language, and I didn't have subtitles. I did get the general idea of what was going on since I could pick up the German here and there. Regardless, I appreciated the way the film was done in that respect. It made it more realistic to have everyone speaking their own language.

There are TONS of big name actor in this movie. I'm not even exaggerating. The poster itself lists 42 international stars. That's insanity. The production of this film was also crazy epic. Battle scenes weren't small in scale and real locations were used in multiple instances. I won't say it was perfect. A few times I saw obvious effects scenes, but overall, it wasn't super distracting.

With so many characters, it was hard to find out what happened to them unless we saw them die. I want to point out that I'm just making up that my favorite characters made it out just fine. You might be surprised at who they are. First is the dog of the German soldier at Normandy. The pooch runs off, and I'm sure he led a happy life with a new family. The other is the Frenchman near the shore when the invasion starts. He's a nut, and I love him. The ships offshore start the bombardment, and the man starts shouting with glee, waving his flag out the window and giggling. His wife thinks he's lost his mind since he's running around the house while items are breaking and things are exploding nearby. Maybe he was the one who brought champagne to the troops. I'm not 100% sure, but I AM sure he was fine.

I did like this movie. It showed how a lot of cogs came together to make D-Day a "success." It's hard to classify it that way without noting the terrible casualties on that day. The brave men who stormed those beaches under heavy fire, the paratroopers who landed behind enemy lines, the resistance workers who risked their lives for their country...all these people were recognized for their efforts. With over three hours of film, the time was there to include those scenes. The one thing that ended up lacking was character development. That was something I understand. The focus of the film was the overarching story. The filmmakers consulted people that were actually involved and some of them were represented in the film. I wish there was a book that went through the making of this movie, but I couldn't find one. Good Movie!