Classic War Movie WEAPONS flip flop back & forth

[HILLBILLY-06]

"GUADALCANAL DIARY" 1943, 93 min Anthony Quinn, Lloyd Nolan.
I found this interesting, not sure why they did it this way, but interesting. On Netflix...
Marines start out in the begining of the movie with the M1903 rifle. They cary and use them all the way untill time counter (0:56:00) Then sudenly, out of nowhere, the guys all got M1 Garands at counter (0:56:30). Now calling them battle hardened Veterans, but at counter #
(1:04:16)Army shows up, with 1903's, but see a SGT with another M1 Garand. Then, at
(1:06:16) They all got thier 1903's back somehow. Counter (1:18:50), reinforcements show up with 1903's but at (1:25:00) More garands and a BAR, none of which seem to fire a shot. All of this before December 10th 1942 they say. Then on closing comentary, one more guy seen in reinforcements or replacements that has a single M1 Garand in a squad full of 1903's.
So why do you think they flash scene'd the M1 Garands so quickly and briefly, not even shooting them, but let the troops run ammuck, throwing those 1903's around all over the place, and shooting them in each confrontation. Plus I really hope "all of those bayonets" were rubber, the only thing that scared me bad, was seeing a wounded soldier throw that 1903 behind him, in mid air, bayonet soaring through the air on the end of the rifle, just as he was going down.
Any thoughts here folks?? and can anyone else recall any similar "flip flopping" around with the rifles during any old war movies??

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[DaveN]

Hollywood

[Bob Womack]

A Bridge Too Far features Garands occasionally showing up in the hands of one or two British or German troopers amongst a normally-armed group with no explanation. Now, we know that there were battlefield pickups, but this just kind of stuff just pokes you in the eye.

In the case of early movies, it was often assumed that the movie-going public was ignorant of this sort of distinction. The actors got whatever the property master or armorer brought out on whatever film-shooting day. There are instances of pistols and rifles changing mid-scene because they were shot on different days and either the property master or continuity technician didn't keep good notes.

You have to remember that it was a different world back then: there was no TV, there was only the cinema. People went to the theater for a movie and the Movietone News. Most films were essentially C- or D-rate, low-budget specials that took only a few weeks to make and lasted an even shorter run in the theaters. The budgets were extremely low, especially in the war years. The expectation was that they would survive their initial run, being seen once by any particular customer, and never be seen again. The basic idea was find a location, dress a bunch of guys in green, put pointy shooty sticks in their hands, get one pretty heart-throb girl in there for love interest, and have them run down the script. Really crude stuff. And now we've rescued this stuff from the vault (trash) and are subjecting it to modern standards. Whoop!

Bob

[Bob Seijas]

Happens all the time in Hollywood -- recent clips of Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman" showed her eating a croissant. In the very next scene she is still eating it -- but now it's a pancake! AOL had a whole feature on these gaffes, movie buffs evidently love them.

[DaveN]

Kinda like the scene where the actor lights a cigarette and a few min go by and it's half way down and 10 sec later it's full size again... It's magic? Well that's all I got ,Ive got to go now and clean some of my pointy shooty sticks.. By for now.

[LeagleEagle]

If you've ever watched the movie "Sergeant York", in the scene where he is at the rifle range at Camp Gordon for the first time, the first time he fires and supposedly "misses" the target, Gary Cooper is using an '03 with standard '03 rear sight and the later convex handguard. The drill sergeant then gives him a full clip to fire and he's seen using an '03 with a Krag rear sight and concave high hump handguard.

[teal]

Watched a WW1 documentary on the discovery channel last year some of the British soldiers were carrying no4 lee Enfields, the guy in charge of the props must have been a real history buff ?

[HILLBILLY-06]

Japanese-American soldiers of the 442nd INF Regiment. I really didn't notice any weapons flopping here, but it may have been because I was shocked to see such a fine selection of M1 Garands in the hands of nearly every soldier. There were also some M1 Carbines, and some B.A.R.'s as well. I don't know how accurate the equipment was for the theater of operation, but I gave this movie a high rating on Netflix because I thought it so so well done. The acting was good, and those Garands looked pristine, no mixed up stock parts, no dark oily stocks, good metal, WOW, just think they were only a few years old when they made this movie, well I guess some of them could have been 10 years old at least. But WOW, I thought it was great. I just wish it was in high res. That way I could try to get a better look at the sights, butt plates, bolts, you know the little things that sometimes stick out. I couldn't tell any details at all about the Carbines. I wish I could, but my full size image was just a bit too fuzzy to pick out details on them at all.
One final note, "It showed a wounded soldier take apart a mortar mount" haul the tube over to a pile of mortar rounds, fill his steel pot with dirt, shove that mortar tube in it, and fire away with a hole pile of mortar rounds . I got a real kick out of that one.

[HILLBILLY-06]

I noticed one thing that kept sticking out at me during the whole movie. I wanted to bring this out, because I don't know anything about M1 Garand Grenade launchers. There was one soldier in this movie, running around through out the entire movie with his grenade launcher in place, but shooting that rifle all over the place with it attatched and no grenade. Not until way later in the movie, he finally got asked to send a grenade up a hill. Well, I never noticed the quantrant sight on the rifle. When he was getting ready, he locked open the bolt, the round flew out, he inserted one grenade round in the top of the clip and pushed down hard. He then slapped the bolt home, put that grenade on there & he aimed down the regular sights, and shoulder fired that grenade up that steep hill. "The expected reaction" that I was waiting for, but hoped wouldn't happen, that explosion was way short and to the far left of where he actually aimed it. "funny it was looking good for a minute there"
So I got a couple questions, if anyones still checking the post...
1). Can you shoot the M1 Garand with regular M2 Ball ammo and the grenade launcher installed? I only ask because I saw in one of the manuals, the replacement gas screw that's supposed to be used with that attatchment. I was unsure about the cycling of the rifle under that condition?
2). Can you really or should you, fire the grenade launcher from the shoulder, while standing offhand, pointing nearly straight uphill like that? I mean is there any more felt recoil than the usual ammo M2 Ball under those circumstances?
I hope these questions don't seem dumb, I have never fired one of those, but in other movies they sit the rifle butt on the ground and fire it. Kind of like a mortar, so I have always been oblivious to the facts about how it works. Like I said, sorry if they are dumb questions.

[mdrim13]

In the movie Sniper 2, the main character describes the gun he has as a "7.92 German Mauser, the best the Germans ever made" and he is clearly holding a Mosin Nagant without a scope and a straight bolt handle. In the next scene, the rifle he has is mounted with a scope and has the nessicary bent bolt. Funny huh?

mdrim13