MovieChat Forums > U-571 (2000) Discussion > Unmentioned inspiration

Unmentioned inspiration

posted 6 months ago by creamandcrop (45)
2 replies | jump to latest

Quite curious that nobody ever mentioned the similarity between this film's premise (dressing as the adverse party, a war crime called "perfidy" per the Geneva Convention) and the James Bond author Ian Fleming's "honorable" idea which I quote from his Wikipedia page, where you can also find the bibliographical reference:

"Operation Ruthless, a plan aimed at obtaining details of the Enigma codes used by the German Navy, was instigated by a memo written by Fleming to Godfrey on 12 September 1940. The idea was to "obtain" a Nazi bomber, man it with a German-speaking crew dressed in Luftwaffe uniforms, and crash it into the English Channel. The crew would then attack their German rescuers and bring their boat and Enigma machine back to England."

The operation has an entire Wikipedia page for itself:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ruthless

[–] BeaSouth (2908) 6 months ago

Very cool trivia. I guess all is fair in love and war. I never understood why the writers insisted on making the story about an American mission when everything from origin to execution was British. I can understand why this would annoy the hell out of the British and the story gains nothing by substituting Americans in as the heroes

[–] creamandcrop (45) 6 months ago

I guess it was probably a marketing thing, recognizable actors being the engine of success... and you can't really make a believable movie about the British with actors familiar to the American crowd.
If we are already on this topic, I can't help noticing how absurdly close Matthew McConaughey's delivery is to his performance in True Detective Season 1, even some lines being identical (!!!). Not to mention that said a series ends with a subtle parody of British manners.