Hacker Cinema
Waterloo
1970 · Film · 134 min
Directed by Sergei Bondarchuk
After defeating France and imprisoning Napoleon on Elba, ending two decades of war, Europe is shocked to find Napoleon has escaped and has caused the French Army to defect from the King back to him. The best of the British generals, the Duke of Wellington, beat Napolean's best generals in Spain and Portugal, but now must beat Napoleon himself with an Anglo Allied army.
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8 comments on Hacker News
I should watch that one. Not that surprising since it's a British film. There's also Waterloo which cast English as English, Scottish as Scottish, French as American, and German as idk foreign, plus tons of extras either yelling in French or saying nothing in Russian.
> But here's a pivotal soviet comedy about a guy who goes to the future... okay, here's Bob Zemeckis's Back to the Future. Compare the quality of any aspect: story, acting, props, costumes, cinematography, special fx, attention to detail, MUSIC... 1:1 US cinema destroys on every level. There's a Russian saying "no point in comparing finger with a dick". "Ivan Vasilievich Changes His Profession" was made in 1973 on a budget that was modest even by Soviet standards. It looks like a cheap TV movie for a reason: they reused existing sets and decorations from other movies. The few Hollywood sci-fi comedies of the early 1970s are of similar quality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BOnUobhm6U
Non-modest Soviet productions of the era, such as the 1970 "Waterloo", are spectacular by any standard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyytd8HhuME
Nothing tops Waterloo, critics are imbeciles. About as close to a perfect movie as it gets.
I would say Waterloo (1970) is very close to that never-made epic Napoleon film, though it only focuses on one event. The film employed an army of around 15000 extras and 2000 horses, remodeled the entire landscape required for the battle, including transplanting a forest, etc. The scope is certainly more narrow than an all-encompassing biopic, but is that a bad thing? To me, the direction and cinematography are good, but of course not Kubrick-level, because nothing is.
Why doesn't the film mention the incoming german army at waterloo (from what I've read)?
By the way, if anyone likes history flicks, I won’t recommend watching the new Napoleon, unless it’s a pirated hate watch.
The classic “Waterloo” remains undefeated
Hmmm. I'm rewatching Waterloo with Rod Steiger as Napoleon, and wondering whether Putin's been watching the same movie; there's a sort of method-actor hamminess about Putin's public performances that looks a lot like Steiger being Napoleon.
So maybe I'm wrong; maybe he does have a Napoleon complex.
Also Waterloo for that matter. No CGI in 1970.
From Wikipedia [1]:
"To recreate the battlefield authentically, the Soviets bulldozed away two hills, laid five miles of roads, transplanted 5,000 trees, sowed fields of rye, barley and wildflowers and reconstructed four historic buildings. To create the mud, more than six miles of underground irrigation piping was specially laid. [...]
The battle sequences of the film include about 15,000 Soviet foot soldiers and 2,000 cavalrymen as extras and 50 circus stunt riders were used to perform the dangerous horse falls. It has been joked that Sergei Bondarchuk was in command of the seventh-largest army in the world. [...] A selected 2,000 additional men were also taught to load and fire muskets."
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterloo_(1970_film)