Gallipoli (Special Edition)

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An outstanding drama, Gallipoli resonates with sadness long after you have seen it. Set during World War I, this brutally honest antiwar movie was cowritten by director Peter Weir. Mark Lee and a sinfully handsome Mel Gibson are young, idealistic best friends who put aside their hopes and dreams when they join the war effort. This character study follows them as they enlist and are sent to Gallipoli to fight the Turks. The first half of the film is devoted to their lives and their strong friendship. The second half details the doomed war efforts of the Aussies, who are no match for the powerful and aggressive Turkish army. Because the script pulls us into their lives and forces us to care for these young men, we are devastated by their fate. --Rochelle O'Gorman

Customer Reviews:

monument to incompetence.......2007-08-18

I have no idea how historically accurate this film is, but if it's close to right, then thanks go to Peter Weir for telling the story of these brave young men. Their nation wanted to do the right thing, but wasn't prepared. In their idealistic and over-zealous response to a perceived threat, they wasted many lives. Every military officer should have to watch this. In OCS I learned that "soldiers die tired and confused." May we not die due to incompetence, but only by the inherent risks of waging war. Since war will always be the final means of preserving freedom, it is our duty to stay prepared and proficient.

Idealism and youth destroyed by war.......2007-08-05

Weir is a master when it comes to exploring human behavior and relationships in a confined space or rare situation, and this film is a fine example. Two young men, both runners, become friends who go off to war with the idea of defeating the Germans in WWI, but end up in the trenches fighting the Turks with virtually no way to win or even to stay alive. A horrifying yet necessary reminder of the way we keep sending young people off to die on foreign soil, for whatever cause.

Gallipoli.......2007-07-06

A brilliant, deeply moving re-staging of the World War I invasion and battle of Gallipoli by Australian-New Zealand troops, a young Mel Gibson stands out in a superb Australian cast, and director Weir expertly evokes time and place, using his camera to send the unspoken message: "Never forget." Unquestionably one of the finest anti-war films ever done, and don't miss that unforgettable finish.

Gallipoli - Over The Top Cannon Fodder.......2007-05-14

I just added this one to my collection. A great film. Mel Gibson at his best. A bit over the top with the attitude towards the British Officers. None the less, the fact remains that volunteering for a comabat unit, with all the idealistic notions that war is a glorious affair will get one killed. Throughtout history soldiers have been sent charging forward to meet certain death, as an acceptable loss. This is one of the films I would recommend to a parent trying to discourage a son wanting to volunteer to go off to war. Born On The Fourth of July, Platoon, and Article 99 and also serve as a warning that sometimes even surviving doesn't end the horror. These people will get you killed.

The Tragic Battle Between Australia and Turkey.......2007-05-13

1981's "Gallipoli" was in a wave of post-Vietnam anti-war movies (like "The Deer Hunter") to deal with the futility of war. As the film's back story co-writer and director Peter Weir and co-writer David Williamson chose Australia's fight against the Ottoman Empire in Turkey, at the disastrous Anzac battlefield at Gallipoli and depicts the ill-fated attack at the Nek on the morning of the 7 August 1915 by the 3rd Light Horse Brigade. This battle was to the Australians what the Battle of the Alamo is to Americans. The callousness of the officers is well depicted, as is the disillusionment of the regular soldiers who's lives are being needlessly thrown to the side by the powers that be. The meat of the movie is the friendship between Archie Hamilton (Mark Lee) and Frank Dunne (a very young Mel Gibson), both sprinters, though quiet different; Archie is a little naive but idealistic, while Dunne is a opportunist with the heart of gold. Through happenstance both end up stationed together in Turkey and serve together in the long campaign. I like the scenes where the troops were training in Egypt, showing how even though they are in the army, war still isn't real yet. Though all of the movie is great, the scenes at the battle is what I'll always remember. The men lives in tunnels and caves in the beach head and the cliff. They have to fight malaria, water poisoning, dehydration, and other diseases; and all of that is before they start fighting the Turks. The directing is pretty straight forward, but workable. With the story as powerful as this who need fancy camera tricks. Mel Gibson turns on the charm and shows us how he would one day conquer Hollywood, though these smaller films (like this one and "The Year of Living Dangerously") were every bit as good as his later blockbusters like "Lethal Weapon", and also gets us somewhat ready for his more personal dramas like "Braveheart" and "The Passion of the Christ". Mark Lee is also great in the quieter role, though no less important. He is sensitive and low key, exactly what was needed. A great war movie (that parents will like because it isn't needlessly exploitive or gorily violent) that tells of how war is pointless in all ages, then and now.

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Sometimes, love is an elusive personage!
An old fashioned love story

Incantato
Starring: Neri Marcorè , Giancarlo Giannini , Vanessa Incontrada , Nino D'Angelo , and Cesare Cremonini
Director: Pupi Avati
Manufacturer: Fox Lorber
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000ELJA6U
Release Date: 2006-04-25

Description

Winner of an Italian Academy Award for Best Director, Pupi Avati's latest film is a dazzling comedy with a poignant streak set in the Rome and Bologna of the 1920s. Nello Balocchi (Neri Marcoré), 35, is a shy and clumsy man devoted to the academic world. His lack of interest in women has become an increasing source of anxiety to his womanizing father (Giancarlo Giannini), a tailor for the Pope. He sends Nello to teach in a high school in Bologna with the hopes that he will find a wife. After a series of mishaps, he finds himself at a dance in a home for blind women, where he meets Angela, a beautiful society girl who went blind in an accident. She turns his life upside down and teaches him that there is a lot more to love than meets the eye. Directed by Pupi Avati. Cast: Neri Marcoré, Vanessa Incontrada, Sandra Milo, Giulio Bosetti, Nino D'Angelo, Giancarlo Giannini. Color, 103 Minutes, Italian with English Subtitles, Drama, Not Rated

Customer Reviews:

Sometimes, love is an elusive personage!.......2007-07-11

This is essentially, a lesson of life instead a love story. The main feature is a very talented profesor who dominates in notable extent Latin language as well as classics such as Virgilio and lucrecio among others. He is a very shy man who having reached his 35 still have not gotten a couple worthy of his affection, until that day comes, when a blind woman will engage and inspire in him the best of his feelings. There is a notable appearing of Giannini as his father, sailor of several Popes, who makes a terrfic performance spicing the movie of deserved status.

But additionally the impressive beauty of+this new Goddess of the Italian cinema Vanessa Incontrada, is a very important factor to take it into account.

The secondary roles work out at perfection, Avati immerses the spectator and handles the camera as a silent witness to make us to know those intimate and unsaid details behind stages.

This a priceless author piece that must be seen, and I am very glad because after a decade of modest proposals, Italy seems to reencounter with itself as a real market of artistic possibilities and new stories to tell and enjoy.

After you leave the cinema hall, you will remind that smart reflection of Balzac: "The love: the eternal toy that women pretend to give and men to deserve."

An old fashioned love story.......2006-05-31

There are so many reasons why this is a great film. The hero of the story is a 35 year old man who is attracted to women but
extremely shy of them. His father, the tailor to the Catholic Pope, is very sexual so he cannot understand what the problem is with his son. Nevertheless, he directs him to go to Bologna in the 1920's where the man teaches Greek and Latin to students preparing for university. At a chance encounter, he discovers a beautiful woman without sight who enchants him. He falls in love at first glance.

My favorite part of the movie is the love scene. I have NEVER seen one done properly with an extremely shy man experiencing his first sexual encounter. Too often a film will treat the encounter comically not romantically. The scene is touching, sensitive, and erotic. This European director gets it right.

Finally, the cinematography is gorgeous, particularly the scenes of glittering palaces and restaurants in Italy. In my book the movie is a winner.

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the lighthorsemen
It isn't possible to produce worse video
one of the best war movies ever
Bad Transfer
An Australian Masterpiece

The Lighthorsemen (Import)
Starring: Lighthorsemen
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000CJ2E5I
Release Date: 2007-03-06

Product Description

Brand new DVD produced in Hong Kong. NTSC format. Plays on North American DVD players. This DVD is produced in NTSC only in Asia. Excellent picture quality. Full screen 4:3 ratio. In original English with optional Chinese and English subtitles can be turned off. On screen menus are in English and Chinese and are easy to use. Director: Simon Wincer. Cast: Jon Blake, Peter Phelps, Tony Bonner, Bill Kerr, John Walton, Sigrid Thorton. The following review was written for the VHS release: One of the great cavalry charges in history, September 16, 2005 Reviewer: Patrick J. McNamara (New York) - If you liked "Gallipoli" and "Breaker Morant," you should try this movie. A friend recommended it, and though it's a bit hard to find, it's worth the search. Like "Gallipoli," its focus is on an idealistic young man who volunteers to fight in World War I as part of the Lighthorsemen, an Australian cavalry unit that served in the Middle East . Along the way, he meets a young British nurse and they fall in love. In the meanwhile, the Lighthorsemen are ordered to attack an enemy fortress in the middle of the desert. Based on a real incident, the cavalry charge on Beersheba in 1917 was among the last in history, and it was a success. That charge is the highlight of this movie, and it is marvelously done! It's every bit as good, and as stirring, as the one in "The Charge of the Light Brigade" in 1936. Unlike Gallipoli, this movie is not a downer. It has a happy ending, proving that even if World War I was a depressing moment in world history, not all World War I movies have to be depressing. Recommended!

Customer Reviews:

the lighthorsemen.......2007-09-02

The picture quality of the DVD is poor, you can't turn off the sub-titles and most of the time the sub-titles don't match the dialog. It's too bad the DVD is so poor because the story is so good. If you just have to have it, it maybe the only game in town.

Jim

It isn't possible to produce worse video.......2007-08-23

It isn't possible to produce worse video than you get on this imported DVD of the great movie "The Lighthorsemen". Another reviewer was being generous when he likened it to a bad dub of a VHS tape. It's more like someone copied it from a TV movie with a VHS video camera, then burned it to a disk using a very old PC. Don't waste your money! What a pity that those of us who crave great movies and TV series have to waste time and money on these cheap imports because regular DVD companies can't seem to be bothered with making them.

one of the best war movies ever.......2007-01-11

The capture of Beersheba by the Australian Light Horse was a spectacular, if little known, feat of World War I. Finally, it is documented on the silver screen. Unfortunately, this Chinese edition is not quite up to par in terms of quality, but in the absence of better alternatives...

Bad Transfer.......2006-11-29

This is a fantastic movie! Buy it on VHS and then wait until a real studio releases it before you buy it on DVD. The picture quality is TERRIBLE! It appears that some Chinese dudes got a VHS copy and made a bad transfer to DVD. The picture is fuzzy throughout the entire movie.
What a waste of money and what a shame that some smalltime studio would do this to such a great movie!

An Australian Masterpiece.......2006-10-22

I have this movie on VHS. It is one of the few movies I can watch over and over. The actors are totally believable, as is the story (which is taken from a true event) and action. It's the good old days and a young man feels the need to join the lighthorsemen, an Aussie group of horse bourn light infantry. The story that follows brings you into close touch with the day to day lives of a group of very interesting personalities. Historically accurate, emotionally taxing, visually stunning, and all too real. I've been to war, and this is what it's like.

As a bonus, the film closes by showing, in brief, the rest of the lives of the main characters. Very fulfilling in itself. I believe that you can both enjoy --- and learn from this well done movie.

---Metalsmith

PS I really don't think the movie is worth $99.99!

Average customer rating:

monument to incompetence
Idealism and youth destroyed by war
Gallipoli
Gallipoli - Over The Top Cannon Fodder
The Tragic Battle Between Australia and Turkey

Gallipoli
Starring: Mark Lee , Bill Kerr , Harold Hopkins , Charles Lathalu Yunipingli , and Heath Harris
Director: Peter Weir
Manufacturer: Paramount
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00000J11Z
Release Date: 1999-06-26

Amazon.com essential video

Customer Reviews:

monument to incompetence.......2007-08-18

Idealism and youth destroyed by war.......2007-08-05

Gallipoli.......2007-07-06

Gallipoli - Over The Top Cannon Fodder.......2007-05-14

The Tragic Battle Between Australia and Turkey.......2007-05-13

Average customer rating:

Clarification
Classic Weir film gets improved extras and transfer
SUPER movie

Gallipoli
Starring: Mark Lee , Bill Kerr , Harold Hopkins , Charles Lathalu Yunipingli , and Heath Harris
Director: Peter Weir
Manufacturer: Paramount
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

Drama | Military & War | Genres | DVD | Video

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ASIN: B000BDH6C6
Release Date: 2005-12-13

Product Description

Gallipoli is Australian director Peter Weir's (The Truman Show, Witness) story of how the irresistible lure of adventure and the unknown, combined with national pride, bring two young men (Mel Gibson and Mark Lee) together in the Australian army in 1915. They cross continents and great oceans, climb pyramids and walk through the ancient sands of Egypt to join their regiment at the fateful battle of Gallipoli. The echoes of history blend with the friends' compelling destiny as they become part of a legendary World War 1 confrontation between Australia and the German allied Turks- a battle that is to Australians what the Alamo is to Americans.

Customer Reviews:

Clarification.......2006-01-06

Not sure why this is listed under two ASINs (the other, with picture and details, is B000BDGW0I), but what arrived is also the Special Edition released in 2005. Packaging and features are identical, as far as I can tell.

The six-part documentary is an engrossing look back at the making of this exceptional film. The film has been cleaned up nicely, right down to its theatrical trailer (notice the difference between the trailer's opening moments and the quality of its remainder).

GALLIPOLI remains a poignant film, full of engaging characters. Gibson had done MAD MAX at this point, but this is primarily Mark Lee's show. Lee's Archy Hamilton is keen on doing what's right and honorable, but Gibson's Frank Dunne can't hide his equally doe-eyed innocence behind a city-slicker's cynicism. They are two mates, going off to war.

If your son or daughter is as gung-ho to join some war effort, GALLIPOLI is the film to watch with them before they trot off to the recruiting office. The film takes the view of youth, not the heavy-handedness of aged wisdom.

Classic Weir film gets improved extras and transfer.......2005-12-20

An infamous conflict in history that occurred during WW I, "Gallipoli" comes around for the infamous double dip from Paramount. This time around, though, Paramount gets it right and includes a six part documentary on the real conflict and the making of the movie. This was the first vehicle where I caught my first performance of Mel Gibson who along with Mark Lee create the heart and soul of Weir's terrific film about the brutality of war. The film has aged remarkable well despite the use of early synthesizer music as an occasional score (much like "Chariots of Fire" whose synthesizer score pleasant as it is has aged badly).

Archy Hamilton (Lee) runs like the wind. He's got the speed and ability to be an Olympic caliber athlete but his idealistic beliefs pull him away from running to serve in the war in the Australian cavalry. He's joined by rival Frank Dunne (Mel Gibson) another amazing sprinter who competes for the money. The two strike up an unlikely friendship after their match against each other and end up enlisting despite Dunne's initial disinterest in becoming yet another body trying to outrun flying bullets. This harsh indictment of the b senseless nature of war and how it robs the world of promising young men in their prime allows Weir to wax on the nature of what war costs a nation. Weir avoids the politics of right or wrong regarding the conflict instead focusing on the terrible cost war visits on human life. The visuals are frequent stunning and "Gallipoli" like Weir's earlier films continued to show the breathtaking development of an amazing filmmaker with as much intelligence behind the camera as skill with it.

Paramount's previous release looked extremely good on DVD. This edition looks remarkable sharp and crisp with a nice reproduction of the textures, colors and clarity of the theatrical release. The 5.1 audio sounds fine here although clearly it isn't used to the optimal effect it could be given the film's age.

We get a six part documentary on the making of the film that also includes a bit of history. Featuring interviews with the late Bill Gammage author of "The Broken Years", film director Weir, screenwriter Williamson actors Gibson, Lee and others from the production of the film the documentary focuses initially on the conditions that provoked the country to become involved in WWI despite no direct threat to their nation. It's far from the dry documentaries that many people are accustomed to, the inclusion of those who were involved in the production of the film discussing the circumstances of the conflict at Gallipoli makes the documentary far more entertaining and interesting that one might expect otherwise. Inspired by Kubrick's "Paths of Glory" Weir decided to do the film after visiting Gallipoli in Turkey. There's footage that shows the historically preserved location. Weir discusses the emotional impact of his visit and how it solidified his decision to make the movie. Weir relates how there are still items from the war at the site. Weir brought Williamson on as the writer and the film's genesis actually began in 1977 with their collaboration. They went through many drafts before discovering the core story. Gammage's book which included letters from actual soldiers from the time became the touchstone for Weir and Williamson. We also get the original theatrical trailer for the film. There's no commentary track as Weir isn't a fan of commentary tracks.

A terrific film, this is a bitter reminder of the callousness of war. For those that feel the need to enlist this is an enlightening reminder that the job of the military isn't a game nor is it a frat. Once called into service war is a brutal, nasty business that plucks whole generations and wipes them from the face of the Earth sometimes for a questionable cause. Without going into the politics of the war, Weir brilliant visualizes the destruction of war and the script written by David Williamson provides perfectly realized characters in this powerful film.

SUPER movie.......2005-10-16

This is based on actual historical events during WWI and is MARVELOUS. My daughter and I watched it together many years ago when it was on HBO and to this day it remains as a special event that we shared. It has all the action guys will like yet a story line that will touch anyone. Early Gibson and Lee are simply superb. You will not be sorry getting this one.

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Gallipoli 1915

Manufacturer: Eagle Rock Entertainment
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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Letters from Iwo Jima (Two-Disc Special Edition)

ASIN: B000M5ALMU
Release Date: 2006-12-22

Description

The History of Warfare is the definitive guide to the military history of the world from the Roman Empire to the bloody battles in Normandy during the Second World War. This is military history as it should be: exciting, vivid and action-packed. Featuring authentic, atmospheric large-scale battle reconstructions and re-enactments, recently discovered archive footage and 3D computer generated graphic images, the 'History of Warfare' series leads the way in historical programming. With comment and analysis by leading authorities, period imagery, plus footage of the battlefields as they are today, 'The History of Warfare' provides vivid accounts of the conflicts which have helped to shape our modern world

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Gallipoli [Region 2]
Starring: Mark Lee , Bill Kerr , Harold Hopkins , Charles Lathalu Yunipingli , and Heath Harris
Director: Peter Weir
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( G ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

Average customer rating:

Gallipoli [Region 2]
Starring: Mark Lee , Bill Kerr , Harold Hopkins , Charles Lathalu Yunipingli , and Heath Harris
Director: Peter Weir
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( G ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

Average customer rating:

Gallipoli [Region 2]
Starring: Mark Lee , Bill Kerr , Harold Hopkins , Charles Lathalu Yunipingli , and Heath Harris
Director: Peter Weir
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( G ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

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