Best submarine movies

[REMINGTON700]

Not to pile onto the usual suspects, I will contribute the British war movie... We Dive at Dawn... to the kitty. Not great, but pretty interesting and worth a mention for the genre.

For favorite - Das Boot. Saw it at the theater, and left feeling that it captured the essence of the terror and self-sacrafice I had heard, read, and imagined for submariners of the time. A well done movie.

 

[MaxxVolume]

I`m pretty sure you folks have already nailed down all the good ones, so, just for ha has, I`ll throw a mediocre number into the ring. "The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen" is basically a comic book put to film, but the character Captain Nemo has two very interesting means of conveyance....a sleek automobile, reminiscent of an Auburn Speedster, and his personal submarine, Nautilus, capable of hauling serious ass above or below the waves....

 

[guiller]

~Black Sea~ is a newer one and can be found on Netflix or Amazon (can't remember); pretty good.

Agreed. At least the plot is original!

 

[eteller]

There is only one submarine movie - Das Boot!

 

[reggaenaut]

Revisited "The Enemy Below" last night. You Tube.

"Das Boot" is the submarine movie.

 

[Grenadeslio]

Das boot, means the boat in germen. The best most realistic Germen u boat flick made in my opiion. Highly recommend seeing this one.

Agree wholeheartedly, but as good as the movie was as usual the book was much better.

 

[Quadman2]

After talking with some sub mariners last year, they thought that "Das Boot" was their choice for realism for that time period.

Q

 

[Grenadeslio]

Octonauts - My Grandson loves them

Some type of gummy bear?

 

[nailer]

Das Boot, The Enemy Below, and The Hunt for Red October are my favorites.

 

[lorne]

I enjoyed and was riveted by K-19, The Widow Maker — particularly as the vessel's fate remains a true mystery of the Cold War. But, Das Boot is simply in a different class in so many ways. Moreover, it is above all else operatic in every sense. In that way, it reaches the senses of the audience. It reveals something of the core behaviours of humans — both as individuals and as a tribe that no one but themselves can really understand — unless perhaps they are fellow members of the Kreigsmarine's U-boat force. It was a well-crafted, subtle work of art.

 

[mrdbdigital]

Sorry, but the submarine in Ice Station Zebra was not "trapped under the ice." They were simply going under the ice pack to reach the research station out on the ice pack. They could leave any time they wanted to.

Dave

 

[loopstick]

Portraying the German military of WW II as victims pisses me off. Doubly so when the Germans themselves do it, as in Das Boot and Stalingrad (1993). Historically the Germans exhibit a self pitying paranoia they use to justify their...actions. “The Course of German History” by the English historian A.J.P. Taylor is interesting (and controversial) reading.

A grimmer, more realistic view of the WW II Germans is seen in the Soviet movie “Come and See”.

View attachment 1439827

Virtue signal received.

 

[lorne]

Maudlin self pitying German revisionism.

Re: Das Boot. I guess that is one way of seeing it. But maybe that is is seeing it and placing meaning on it in hindsight. The way I saw it was from the point of view of the crew.

Each member of the crew is marked by their personality. They each react to fear and stress inter own way. They are united in their devotion to duty, and even more to their loyalty to their skipper. We cannot know how dedicated, if at all, they are devoted Nazis. We do see that they are not the same as those who are not Kreigsmarine submariners — those who have not shared the terror, discomfort and the unnatural environment of living together in a grubby, smelly, dangerous steel tube.

The film is demonstratively operatic. It's thematically about heroism. And by that, I refer to Joseph Campbell's definition of the hero [The Hero of a Thousand Faces]. One may not agree with what the hero is fighting for, but the qualities that are commensurate with heroism remain the same, from one struggle to another.

I can't say you are wrong about what you say. I just think the film was more than what you saying.

 

[Hajidub]

i had family in the German military during WWII that fought. They weren’t Nazi party affiliated. They suffered like every other military person, it wasn’t like they had a choice to just quit.

 

[transmaster]

There was an interesting dichotomy in Wyoming during WW2. Near Douglas, Wyoming there was s large German POW camp. The population was divided between the SS, and regular German solders. The SS were fanatical and were a constant problem. They could not be mixed in with the regular Germans as the SS tried to kill Germans they thought were colaberating. There happens to be a large German community in East Central Wyoming and the Nebraskan panhandle. Many of the regular German solders ended up as farmhands in the area. not only did they fit right in to these German communities but after the war many of them returned to marry the daughters of the German farmers they worked for. The point is the NAZI evil was not reflected in the regular military they had no choice. I have talked with German POW!'s from WW2 they told me the happiest day of their lives in WW2 was when they were able to surrender to American forces.

 

[loopstick]

One of my inlaws had a crazy aunt who lived off in the Appalachians somewhere. One afternoon she sees a bunch of guys in uniform digging and clearing some brush. She gets her shotgun and goes up to them and aims it at them. One of them yells something in German and and the "overseer" runs over and tells the lady to aim the gun down. The lady complies and exclaims "Germans? I thought they was Yankees !!!".

 

[Dswankey]

There was an interesting dichotomy in Wyoming during WW2. Near Douglas, Wyoming

Interesting and thanks for sharing.

Several years ago I was up in the Northern Panhandle of Idaho in town called SandPoint which sat on a very large lake called Pend Oreille. I remember renting a Mt Bike and visiting the Farragut Naval Training Station museum. It was a major submarine testing/training center during the WW2 and to some extent is today. Evidently the lake is super deep.

https://museum.mil.idaho.gov/farragut.html

https://www.navsea.navy.mil/Home/Warfare-Centers/NSWC-Carderock/Who-We-Are/Bayview-Idaho/

https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/the-navys-most-vital-and-secretive-submarine-base-is-in-1590794426

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farragut_Naval_Training_Station

 

[transmaster]

There was an escape of several Germans from the Douglas POW camp. They made it South and got as far as Southern Colorado. The were out in the open when recaptured. They were shocked to find out they were still in the US, they thought they were in Mexico.

 

[Christian B]

Lots of great movies on the list here. Time to watch a few I haven't seen in a while.

As a kid growing up our neighborhood mechanic, Pete, was a WWII submarine machinist mate. He never talked about his service, but he could fix anything on wheels or off. He was sometimes known to machine an individual piece to repair a part rather than buy a replacement. Then he would just charge you for his time. He once machined a firing pin for my dad's old shotgun just by looking at the broken remnant and knowing how it should look from that. Worked perfectly on the first try. Pete's picture should be in the dictionary next to the word mechanic.

 

[transmaster]

Operation Pacific (1951) had a basis in fact. One of the biggest scandals in the early submarine war in the Pacific was the defective Mk 14 torpedo. It had a magnetic detonator that did not work. The problem was BuOrd steadfastly maintained that there was nothing wrong with the torpedoes, but that the problem lay with bad approaches and poor maintenance. This caused boat skippers to go up in flames.

Operation Pacific is roughy based on the story of Lieutenant Dan Daspit, captain of the U.S. submarine Tinosa. in early 1943 Out if a total of 15 Mk 14 fired only 2 functioned.