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Roger Bushell


Richard Acland
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 The Great Escape while a great watch is just an entertainment film with some base in what actually happened.

 Big X in the film played by Richard Attenborough is called Roger Bartlett.

     Escapers did do conversions of RAF officer jackets into escape outfits, battle dress tops were not so useful so there may be some nod to reality there.

  Some of the cast Donald Pleasence for one had been a POW.

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'The Great Escape' is IMHO one of those films that just gets it right. It's not a factual documentary but a mix of fiction and fact and pure entertainment that anyone who has read about the real story will understand and accept. Oddly enough the film hasn't really dated that much in the way that the 'Battle of Britain' certainly has.

 

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I have just found that The Great Escape is on tonight at 9pm on Channel 5.   It says it's episode 2 so I assume this is a new drama not the cinema film.   Whether it's worth spending money to remake old films that were excellent in the old version is a matter of opinion!

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This is not the Great Escape film on channel five. It is a new 3 part documentary with the second part this evening. Although we all know the story, I found it quite interesting and they show the actor playing Bushell as wearing an air gunners brevet as he did in pictures taken when he was at Stalag Luft 111. To get back to my original question why would that be, when in pictures taken before his capture he is wearing pilots wings. 

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2 hours ago, Richard Acland said:

 I found it quite interesting and they show the actor playing Bushell as wearing an air gunners brevet as he did in pictures taken when he was at Stalag Luft 111. To get back to my original question why would that be, when in pictures taken before his capture he is wearing pilots wings. 

The only clothes he would have had would be what he had when he was captured. On laundry days perhaps he & everyone else would have had to wear what was available from a common pool of spare clothing or whatever the Red Cross were able to supply. 

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21 hours ago, Cuban8 said:

'The Great Escape' is IMHO one of those films that just gets it right. It's not a factual documentary but a mix of fiction and fact and pure entertainment that anyone who has read about the real story will understand and accept. Oddly enough the film hasn't really dated that much in the way that the 'Battle of Britain' certainly has.

 

I'd be interested to hear where exactly Battle of Britain has really dated, compared to The Great Escape.

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I watched the episode last night, and it never ceases to amaze me how much time and effort they put in.

 

How on earth did they manage to hide everything from the "goons"?.

 

Civvy clothes, suitcases, rations, forged documents etc. etc. etc.

 

Stuck in that tunnel when the lights went out............beyond terryfying.

 

And the chap pulling the signal rope for over two hours, so his mates could get out.......amazing. He could have been well on his way in that time, instead of laying in a freezing forest.

 

We all know what happened in the end.

 

Such brave, brave guys. RIP.

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I cannot see how the Battle of Britain film could be considered outdated -the flying sequences are outstanding and seem very realistic.   Couldn't be made again today as the supply of old WW2 planes to destroy for film effects has dried up.   Computer generated stuff is never as good.    It's a classic and is so much better seen on a large screen TV than on the tiny TV screen I first saw it.

 

Frankly I found last nights Great Escape destroyed the atmosphere and tension by interspersing the drama with comments from people today.   I prefer to watch old documentaries filmed a few decades ago when the veterans were alive to tell us their story firsthand.  Or to watch the original film or the old TV Colditz series.  

 

If you haven't already noticed the Secret Army series is currently reshown on several TV channels and has almost unbearable tension as you follow the risks taken by the resistance heroes & heroines who rescued aircrew.  Great TV.

 

 

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I've mentioned before...........my friends dad was a Halifax pilot,35 squadron,shot down in 1944 and ended up in stalag luft 111(the great escape camp) cooking on one of the stoves that had a tunnel underneathis dad was a bit of an artist and he showed me a book c/w drawings in he had made during his stay in the camp.it has drawings of the huts and drawings of the men gardening(naked) so they didn't spoil their uniforms. His name didn't get entered into the escape and as such he stayed in the camp.

 

after the war in 1963,the camp survivors were invited to the first showing of the the film "the great escape" at London,when they came out and were comparing notes, they all agreed what a load of Tripe it was.....

 

ken anderson...ne...1....Tripe dept.

 

substitute Tripe for your own words....☠️

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    The film "The Wooden Horse" despite being made with a low budget depicts what it was like being a POW in a more convincing way than the Great Escape film. 

Some years ago met a chap who stayed with us [ came to try out a horse ] who's dad had been in Stalag Luft III [ different compound from the great escape ] and had been involved in making of some of the equipment used.

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3 hours ago, kc said:

Ken that is interesting!     I hope that book your friend has is being preserved for future generations.

your right KC,there was mention of the book going to the national war museum as a unique/priceless record of the camp...to be saved and shared with everyone ..

 

ken anderson...ne...1..war dept.

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On 24/11/2021 at 20:43, PatMc said:

The only clothes he would have had would be what he had when he was captured. On laundry days perhaps he & everyone else would have had to wear what was available from a common pool of spare clothing or whatever the Red Cross were able to supply. 

I find that difficult to believe. If they were capable of turning out a load of clothes for escapees, surely there would have been no problem knocking  up a set of pilots wings.

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Not stalg luft 3 but...I recently organised a celebration dinner for a friend of mine as he turned 100.  He brought with him the actual card the Germans made out, complete with photograph, as they interned him into Stalag Luft 1.  His stories of that place are fresh and awful.  Not exactly a holiday camp.

 

I asked him how he came by it - when the Americans turned up the Germans all scarpered the night before and left them to it.  Ron and his mate had a good mooch about, as you would.

 

David

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11 hours ago, Richard Acland said:

I find that difficult to believe. If they were capable of turning out a load of clothes for escapees, surely there would have been no problem knocking  up a set of pilots wings.

That would have taken th same priority as would rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic between collision and sinking. 

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David,

Surely your friend's story should be recorded for posterity -maybe take a tape recorder ( or modern equivalent!) when you next have a chat.   It is very important to have proper records of what happened and not rely on modern historians to tell us what they think.   The veterans actual words are more worthwhile.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 26/11/2021 at 11:34, kc said:

David,

Surely your friend's story should be recorded for posterity -maybe take a tape recorder ( or modern equivalent!) when you next have a chat.   It is very important to have proper records of what happened and not rely on modern historians to tell us what they think.   The veterans actual words are more worthwhile.

Agood idea and we have considered that.

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