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World's Worst Warships?

Half an hour for research, no effort at all in the production. Stuff like that breaks the willing suspension of disbelief for me. Like Indiana Jones climbing onto the submerging submarine.
 
Let's remember that this is from the director that though the Tudor Rose was an actual rose!
 
theprestige said:
"Real howler" implies some sort of egregious mistake. Using stock models or reproductions that don't exactly match minor details isn't such a mistake.
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Just to add to the other responses above, first, the mast structure, main armament, and hull form of a battleship are not "minor details." The tail-gunner position on the B-25Bs is arguably a minor detail, as is the Zeros' wasting scarce cannon ammunition on soft targets (plus that one could potentially be excused by the Rule of Cool).

Second, when I was taking anthropology many years ago, the professor said that when he and a colleague had first seen Quest for Fire, they'd laughed themselves silly because they'd assumed that it was supposed to be some sort of parody of life in the era depicted. They were rather nonplussed to learn that it was supposed to be a serious film. Yet QfF currently has an 84% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Were they not allowed to laugh at the absurdities they noticed?

theprestige said:
Nothing in the story depends on getting the look of the ships exactly, historically right. As long as it's close enough to evoke the desired experience in the majority of the audience, it's close enough.
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If I were making a film, I'd certainly want to evoke "the desired experience" in much more than just a simple majority of the audience, so I find your statement a bit perplexing.
 
Apparently the people who make movies don't agree. Or else, movie characters would say 'bye when ending phone calls, and movie computers wouldn't beep for every character typed or display "MATCH NOT FOUND" in giant red letters inside a giant red box in the center of the screen after every unsuccessful database search. And computers and phones are things most people in the audience have actually used themselves.
 
Myriad said:
Apparently the people who make movies don't agree. Or else, movie characters would say 'bye when ending phone calls, and movie computers wouldn't beep for every character typed or display "MATCH NOT FOUND" in giant red letters inside a giant red box in the center of the screen after every unsuccessful database search. And computers and phones are things most people in the audience have actually used themselves.
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When I worked at Boeing, mostly on the 747, my wife bought me Air Force One. Oh, gawd, that was excruciating to watch. Probably even more for her than for me.
 
Trebuchet said:
When I worked at Boeing, mostly on the 747, my wife bought me Air Force One. Oh, gawd, that was excruciating to watch. Probably even more for her than for me.
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There would not be many action films, not based on actual events, that would be anything close to realistic. Even ones that are based on real events frequently have differences between the movie and what happened. Just read earlier posts for an example.
 
I just finished a book about the Bismark, and it's interesting how technology can change so fast that the ship was already a dinosaur before it put to sea, but nobody knew it yet. This is underlined by the Royal Navy sending the HMS Prince of Wales to the Pacific where it met the same fate as Bismark.

Not that battleships didn't have their place. As already stated they were superb in coastal bombardment in all of the allied invasions, and also later in Korea, and Vietnam (Desert Storm was just for nostalgia IMO). Battleships became second string to submarines, and aircraft carriers.

Today the thinking is that aircraft carriers are in the position battleships were in back in 1941 and they may be right. It's possible we'll see the return of pocket carriers in the future where more, smaller vessels give the fleet more flexibility.

We could always try that whole Peace on Earth thing, but where's the fun in that?
 
Trebuchet said:
It won't have Charlton Heston in it, so that alone makes it better than the previous effort.

Since USS Arkansas has been mentioned, I'll bring up both the Wyoming and New York classes, which were not great when they were new and astoundingly obsolete during WWII. Arkansas was the absolute worst battleship retained by any of the great powers under the treaties. At least her sister Wyoming did good service as a training ship during the war.
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I like Charleton Heston as an actor though I strongly disagredd with his politics.
Hating on a actor because you don't like his politics is wrong;the people who still rant about "Hanoi Jane" are just as stupid as those who still hate John Wayne as a "warmonger".
 
Axxman300 said:
I just finished a book about the Bismark, and it's interesting how technology can change so fast that the ship was already a dinosaur before it put to sea, but nobody knew it yet. This is underlined by the Royal Navy sending the HMS Prince of Wales to the Pacific where it met the same fate as Bismark.

Not that battleships didn't have their place. As already stated they were superb in coastal bombardment in all of the allied invasions, and also later in Korea, and Vietnam (Desert Storm was just for nostalgia IMO). Battleships became second string to submarines, and aircraft carriers.

Today the thinking is that aircraft carriers are in the position battleships were in back in 1941 and they may be right. It's possible we'll see the return of pocket carriers in the future where more, smaller vessels give the fleet more flexibility.

We could always try that whole Peace on Earth thing, but where's the fun in that?
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You have to wonder if the money wasted on the Zumwalt could have been better spent just refurbishing one of the Iowa class Battleships.
Interesting fact" Thought they are now Museums they are maintained to be seaworthy in an emergency.
Shore Bombarment has it's place;big guns can still do things that air power cannot do. But no doubt the Zumwalt was a total fiasco.
 
Trebuchet said:
When I worked at Boeing, mostly on the 747, my wife bought me Air Force One. Oh, gawd, that was excruciating to watch. Probably even more for her than for me.
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ANybody who has experience with black powder muzzle loading muskets laughed at the way Mel Gibson used them in "The Patriot" Anybody trying to fire two at one time would end up flat on his butt.
 
dudalb said:
ANybody who has experience with black powder muzzle loading muskets laughed at the way Mel Gibson used them in "The Patriot" Anybody trying to fire two at one time would end up flat on his butt.
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Hmm, I mean the movie is laughably bad in a number of ways, but I've fired some black powder (well Pyrodex actually) muzzle loaders and don't recall the recoil being all that bad. Not as bad as a 98k for example. Although if you didn't have the stock up against your body somehow they'd go flying.

dudalb said:
You have to wonder if the money wasted on the Zumwalt could have been better spent just refurbishing one of the Iowa class Battleships.
Interesting fact" Thought they are now Museums they are maintained to be seaworthy in an emergency.
Shore Bombarment has it's place;big guns can still do things that air power cannot do. But no doubt the Zumwalt was a total fiasco.
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Seaworthy as in able to float? Yes. But, it would take major work to get them steaming under their own power. Let alone get all the electronics working. Your talking moving parts that haven't moved in decades. Missouri couldn't even make it to Pearl Harbor under her own power 25 years ago. I think I saw somewhere that one of her prop shafts is gone. The part in the movie "Battleship" where they get Missouri under power was eye roll inducing, even though I knew what sort of movie I was watching and kinda expected it.

But anyways, money better spent? Yeah probably, its just the cost of crewing and operating them is so huge. But, their 16" gun fire a 2,700lb shell much much more cheaply than a Tomahawk missile which only has a 1000 lb warhead. Compare that to the Zumwalts 155mm gun that was to fire a shell of roughly 100lbs*. And only 40% cheaper than a Tomahawk missile. And there is no way it would be anything like as accurate as a guided missile at beyond horizon ranges.

*I can't find the specs so I'm using about what WW2 era 6" (155mm) guns fired. I see total weight of 225lbs but that includes the propellant and casing.
 
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dudalb said:
You have to wonder if the money wasted on the Zumwalt could have been better spent just refurbishing one of the Iowa class Battleships.
Interesting fact" Thought they are now Museums they are maintained to be seaworthy in an emergency.
Shore Bombarment has it's place;big guns can still do things that air power cannot do. But no doubt the Zumwalt was a total fiasco.
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Bollocks. there is no way one of those old battleships could put to sea under it's own power and operate as a warship without spending many months in drydock and having the boilers and turbines rebuilt.

That's before we get on to other systems.
 
lobosrul5 said:
Hmm, I mean the movie is laughably bad in a number of ways, but I've fired some black powder (well Pyrodex actually) muzzle loaders and don't recall the recoil being all that bad. Not as bad as a 98k for example. Although if you didn't have the stock up against your body somehow they'd go flying.
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With Revolutionary War weapons, its not the recoil, its the sheer weight. A Brown Bess Musket weighs 13 pounds* and is 5 ft long. Taking one in each arm and trying to aim and fire them is a strain for even hard core body builder.

Mind you, Daniel Day Lewis did this in the climax of Last of the Mohicans well before Gibson did it in The Patriot.

* Pennsylvania or Kentucky Rifles were lighter but often longer and so just about as awkward, not to mention much harder to reload. About the only era's non-pistol weapon you might have a chance of doing this with would be a Jeager Rifle.
 
The thing about the battleships being kept usable was true the first time they were retired. And they were even brought back into service after that, then retired again. But even that was a long time ago.
 
They had many millions spent on them and many months in drydock the first time.
 
I seem to recall the Navy had a difficult time finding qualified people to run the boilers the last time they were reactivated
 
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