They Were Expendable |  | Studio: Warner Home Video
Category: DVD
List Price: $12.98
Buy New: $4.99
as of 3/19/2010 01:55 EDT details
You Save: $7.99 (62%)
New (35) Used (10) from $3.98
Seller: newbury_comics
Rating:  74 reviews
Sales Rank: 10815
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD, Subtitled, NTSC
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 135 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
MPN: D79862D
UPC: 012569798625
EAN: 0012569798625
ASIN: B000O599VC
Theatrical Release Date: December 20, 1945
Release Date: May 22, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
| |
| Features:
| • | Supplies are dwindling. Troops are hopelessly outnumbered. But even in defeat there is victory. The defenders of the Philippines ? including PT-boat skippers John Brickley (Robert Montgomery) and Rusty Ryan (John Wayne) will give the U.S. war effort time to regroup after the devastation of Pearl Harbor.Director John Ford's World War II tale knows its battle-scarred topic firsthand. Montgomery was |
|
| Similar Items:
| |
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Supplies are dwindling. Troops are hopelessly outnumbered. But even in defeat there is victory. The defenders of the Philippines ? including PT-boat skippers John Brickley (Robert Montgomery) and Rusty Ryan (John Wayne) will give the U.S. war effort time to regroup after the devastation of Pearl Harbor. Director John Ford's World War II tale knows its battle-scarred topic firsthand. Montgomery was himself a Pacific PT-boat commander and a valorous Bronze Star recipient. Ford filmed the Academy Award?-winning* documentary Battle of Midway. And Wayne creates a portrait of patriotic resolve as only he can. They Were Expendable salutes all who expended themselves during some of the war's bleakest hours. Director John Ford's World War II tale knows its battle-scarred topic firsthand. Montgomery was himself a Pacific PT-boat commander and a valorous Bronze Star recipient. Ford filmed the Academy Award -winning* documentary Battle of Midway. And Wayne creates a portrait of patriotic resolve as only he can. They Were Expendable salutes all who expended themselves during some of the war's bleakest hours.Running Time: 135 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: WESTERN/MISC. Rating: NR UPC: 012569798625 Manufacturer No: 79862
Amazon.com essential video
They Were Expendable is the greatest American film of the Second World War, made by America's greatest director, John Ford, who himself saw action from the Battle of Midway through D-day. Yet it's been oddly neglected. Or perhaps not so oddly: for as the matter-of-fact title implies, the film commemorates a period, from the eve of Pearl Harbor up to the impending fall of Bataan, when the Japanese conquest of the Pacific was in full cry and U.S. forces were fighting a desperate holding action. Although stirring movies had been made about these early days (Wake Island, Bataan, Air Force), they were gung ho in their resolve to see the tables turned. They Were Expendable, however, which was made when Allied victory was all but assured, is profoundly elegiac, with the patient grandeur of a tragic poem. "They" are the officers and men of the Navy's PT boat service, an experimental motor-torpedo force relegated to courier duty on Manila Bay but eventually proven effective in combat. Their commander is played by Robert Montgomery, who actually served on a PT and later commanded a destroyer at Normandy; James Agee called his "the one unimprovable performance" of 1945. In addition to giving it, Montgomery codirected the breathtaking second-unit action sequences (and took over the first unit for a week when Ford broke his leg). John Wayne's costarring role as Montgomery's volatile second-in-command initially looks stereotypically blustery, but as the drama unfolds--the death of comrades, a friendship-that-never-gets-to-be-a-romance with an Army nurse (Donna Reed)--Wayne sounds notes of tenderness and vulnerability that will take Duke-bashers by surprise. They Were Expendable is a heartbreakingly beautiful film, full of astonishing images of warfare, grief, courage, and dignity: the artificial "rainfall" that lashes the beached Wayne as his PT boat explodes in the surf; the glow around a communally improvised dinner for nurse Reed; an old ship-repairer (Russell Simpson, The Grapes of Wrath's Pa Joad) settling in grimly to wait for the Japanese, with "Red River Valley" as benediction; the propeller spray that hangs over a jungle inlet, like the dust from one of Ford's cavalry pictures, as the PTs round a bend and disappear into history. This is a masterpiece. --Richard T. Jameson
|
| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 74
 Sober mature war film February 28, 2010
Douglas M
MGM was the Rolls Royce of studios in Hollywood in the thirties and forties. The producers reigned supreme and there was usually not much chance for really creative film making especially after the death of Irving Thalberg in 1936. In the forties, Louis B Mayer dominated and his penchant for family schmaltz meant that much of the studio's product from that period is more dated than other films of the period. When a really creative director like John Ford turned up at MGM and was not curtailed, then his ability combined with the first rate production values in all departments meant something special was assured.
"They were Expendable" is a superb war film, a sober account of the role of the U boats in the fight against the Japanese. There are so many detailed reviews on Amazon so I will only add that, in a faultless film, the only possible complaint is the score is overwrought in a few spots, the print is excellent and the package contains no extras except the original trailer. A commentary would have been welcome. The DVD is best value if purchased as part of one of the John Wayne Collections.
 Wonderful the way people believe in those high powered canoes of yours. February 14, 2010
Muzzlehatch (the walls of Gormenghast)
This was John Wayne's third film with John Ford, and first since The Long Voyage Home, made before the U.S. entered World War II. By the time They Were Expendable was made, the war was finishing up, and director Ford, first lead Robert Montgomery, and cinematographer Joseph H. August among others in the cast and crew had all served in the military during the conflict. But not second lead Wayne, who plays Lt. (Junior Grade) Rusty Ryan as a man full of inner turmoil and doubts likely mirroring the star's own psychological issues at the time. Ford picked on Wayne mercilessly on the set, and the fact that he and his star eventually came to terms with each other (through the intercession of Montgomery) certainly helped to heal the wounds, as they worked together regularly for the next 17 years. But it also left it's mark on Wayne's performance, and perhaps on his acting style as a whole.
Though Montgomery is first-billed here, plays the senior officer and has roughly the same screen time as Wayne, the Duke is certainly the standout. This is not to say anything negative about Montgomery's performance - he's quite good as Lt. John Brickley, the commander of a PT boat squadron who has to deal with the restlessness of his men, particularly Ryan, as they are fed up and without much to do just on the eve of war; the higher brass doesn't see the value in the small, quick boats. Ryan wants to leave and move over to a destroyer, hoping to get his own command at some point, but he doesn't hesitate to follow Montgomery and staying with the PT boat group after war is declared and the men start running mostly support missions in the Phillipines. Eventually, combat missions do come, and early on Ryan is injured and falls for lovely nurse Sandy (Donna Reed) as he recuperates.
With the impending fall of the last American outposts in the islands, Bataan and Corregidor, the boats are ordered to help evacuate the high brass, including General MacArthur, and as combat grows ever more dangerous Ryan becomes more and more frustrated, not being able to see Sandy and eventually not able to communicate with her at all. His conflict between duty and his need to be with her forms much of the drama of the later part of the film, and Wayne conveys it all beautifully in what is the best performance I've seen from him up to this point. Sure there's more than a bit of the typical Wayne bravado and bluster, but he also plays the weariness and fears of the man who has to keep living day to day, never knowing if he'll see this woman again with whom he could only have the briefest of moments.
Like all of the best of Ford that I've seen, this seems to somehow work simultaneously as a star-driven vehicle and an ensemble piece, with Montgomery and Wayne in command but occasionally being upstaged by various members of their crew, notablly Ward Bond, Donald Curtis and Cameron Mitchell. The camaraderie feels very real, the jokes about food, and slacking off, and injuries come off as natural ways to ease tensions - this is one film from this director where the humor is perfectly integrated and never comes off as stupid or overdone. The rah-rah patriotism, particularly in some of the musical choices near the end, seems just a wee much for me at times - after all we'd won the war by the time the film was finished and released - but this is a minor gripe. It's also refreshingly less racist than a lot of American WWII films; apart from references to the enemy as "Jap" or "Nip" a few times there's really little sense of hatred or bigotry - this is a film about soldiering, a job that people had to do, and did it well.
Joseph August's black-and-white cinematography is just gorgeous, with all the shades and textures of great noir in the nighttime and indoor scenes, and the action sequences are amazingly realistic for a film of this period. If the ending were just a little bit tighter, and if I didn't feel that Wayne's character should have been allowed to vent just a bit more on a couple of occasions - he seems close to bursting a few times - this would be perfect. As it is, it's darn close and I wouldn't be surprised to like it more on a repeat viewing. At the moment, probably my favorite WWII film made during the wartime period, and Wayne's performance belongs in the same company as his work in SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON and THE SEARCHERS.
they were expendable January 17, 2010
Paul B. Elwell (Vancouver, WA.)
I have already seen the movie on TV. I ordered it from amazon but never received it. It was lost in the UPS shipment so I canceled the order.
Captures the Pain of Early Pacific-War American Defeats January 11, 2010
Jan Peczkis (Chicago IL, USA)
The situation was grim. Pearl Harbor had been attacked and the US fleet was gone, notably the oft-discussed USS Arizona. American land forces in the Philippines were greatly outnumbered by Japanese forces. The Japanese had aerial supremacy, and had battleships and other large naval vessels. The US Navy, and the naval lieutenant played by John Wayne, had PT boats, which some called "motorized canoes". The Americans were told in no uncertain terms that they were to be sacrificed--in effect, bunting so that some successive American forces could score the home run.
The worth of the PT boats was proved by the sinking of a large Japanese military vessel by sustained torpedo fire. They were also used to evacuate General McArthur and other important military figures.
Bataan fell. The PT boat officers were evacuated by planes to the US to develop PT strategy. McArthur said: "I shall return".
Excellent WWII movie November 13, 2009
Bruce Fox (Lone Tree, Colorado USA)
An excellent movie about early WWII. Not only shows combat for an unusual part of the navy (PT boats), but deals with the difficult decisions that commanders must make. John Wayne, Robert Montgomery and Donna Reed are all very good. One of John Ford's best.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 74
|
|
|
