October 10, 2025 • 57 mins
In this episode of Rosie the Reviewer, we take on U-571 (2000) with returning guest Katie. This tense, incredibly fictional tale is all about American submariners capturing a German U-boat and its Enigma machine. It's got Matthew McConaughey, Jon Bon Jovi and Matthew Settle and everyone's damp. We explore the claustrophobic depictions and why the British were fuming about this one.
Including some real-life naval details, from the cramped quarters of the U-505 to the history of segregated Black sailors in WWII (because, let's be real, this movie does no historical heavy lifting).
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Welcome to Rosie the Reviewer. We're your host.
I'm Sam. And I'm married you.
And we like World War 2 media and we want to talk about it.
Welcome back everybody to Rosie the reviewer.
This week we are discussing the movie U571 which got in the year
(00:23):
2000. I don't think we've done a movie
from that year before. Directed by Jonathan Mastow from
a screenplay that he Co wrote with Sam Montgomery and David
Ayer, which we know from Fury. If you want to go listen to that
episode video about Fury, it's fun.
This film follows the World War 2 German U belt boarded by
(00:43):
American submarine to capture her Enigma cipher machine.
The plot is entirely fictional, but if you want to learn more
about the Enigma machine, you can check out our episode about
the imitation time. The movie kind of sucks, but our
notes are fun, so go and listen to that.
This movie won an Academy Award,believe it or not, for best
(01:03):
sound everything, and it's available to watch on a variety
of platforms. For me, it's on Prime.
I think it's on Netflix in the US.
So I found it and today we are joining and once again, they are
wonderful friend Katie, who has been previously with us for an
episode about walking with the enemy.
So you can listen to that too. And welcome back, Katie.
(01:24):
Thank you for being on. Thanks for having me back guys.
So shall we just start with somegeneral impressions of this
movie? What did you think about it,
Sam? Well, I'm glad you said that the
plot is fictional, because it's very super super super super
loosely based on a true story, but in a way that kind of just
pissed everyone off. It's got some fun actiony parts,
(01:48):
but I think overall it strugglesto maintain tension and a lot of
the parts should be more tense than they are.
And I think that just generally speaking, I don't know, like, it
really just feels like an actionmovie that came out in the year
2000. Like, it's really strongly has
that vibe for me. I don't think this script is
anything to write home about. I don't think the dialogue is
incredible or the character development is incredible.
(02:10):
But, yeah, I mean, we haven't watched the submarine movie yet,
so that was kind of fun. And I don't think there are any
women with lines in this movie. So that's a distinction as well.
What did you think, Katie? As far as an action movie goes,
I think it was fantastic. I think a couple more explosions
and it would be mistaken for a Jerry Bruckheimer movie.
That's how. Just actiony, you know, action,
(02:32):
action, action. Very much a product of its time
in the early 2000s. Good popcorn movie.
But other than that, that's about it.
Like you said, nothing really towrite home about.
Well, for me, I kind of had forgotten for a second that I'm
claustrophobic and afraid of theocean.
So this was really fun. And by fun, I mean I wanted it
(02:55):
to be over almost immediately, but it took quite a long time,
which is another thing I think the movie definitely struggles
with Face, where certain scenes are very long and other scenes
are very short. So I'm like, maybe this could
have been done a little bit differently.
I think as a thriller it's quitegood.
(03:16):
Like it's quite tense in places.And it did make me understand
that being on a submarine is fucking scary because everybody
looks super scared all the time.And there's some questionable
German in this movie about the German you back and some fun
characters in there for sure, that I liked and that I wanted
to root for. But at the same time, it's just
(03:36):
not my kind of movie. So not exactly a waste of time,
but I would have liked for it tohave been a little bit shorter.
Maybe 19 minutes would have beenfine with me.
I think possibly 2. They threw in one or two too
many wildly improbable things. It's like almost the vibe of
like when you watch a new Fast and the Furious movie and they
(03:56):
like go to space or whatever andyou're like, no, right.
Well, there's only so long I cansuspend my disbelief.
And this is ostensibly a historymovie.
And so like a number of things happen to this movie where
you're like, I don't think that would happen.
I don't think that would happen.Yeah.
And it feels like it does this weird thing where it just, it's
going and then all of a sudden it ends.
(04:19):
And even though it is kind of long, it also feels like there
should be another act to sort ofresolve things a little bit
better. I don't know if you guys had
that feeling as well, but it's just, you know, we're off the
boat and then the credits are rolling.
Yeah, that's that's true. Wrap up for like the characters,
they're like, oh, the plot is done.
You don't need to know about thetie up of what's happening to
(04:40):
any of these people. For me it was kind of the
opposite. I was like wait didn't they just
get a break and it just now be done getting away from but now
that just never got away until the very end.
Spoilers anyway. I think this is a good moment to
get into the plot. I had to sail the high seas to
(05:08):
get access to this movie. And the first version that I
downloaded, I opened it. These opening cards were not on
there. And then when the Germans
started, there was no subtitles and there was no English
subtitles until everyone startedspeaking English, which was not
particularly useful to me. So I had to download another
version that actually had like the stuff, like hard coded into
it. Anyway, it was the whole thing.
(05:29):
So we get an opening card. It's the spring of 1942.
Hitler's U boats wreak havoc in the North Atlantic, sinking over
for 1000 Allied ships and threatening to destroy the
supply line from America to England.
Unable to crack the new U Boat radio codes, the Allies struggle
blindly against the German onslaught.
I mean, I guess. The ugly American thing.
(05:51):
And just point out that nobody has said this is based on a true
story. Nobody is saying that yet.
And that's really important for later on, I feel like Just
saying. This is one of those opening
cards where I'm like, couldn't you have done a little show and
tell instead of just putting this on an opening card?
We have a map, maybe like just something.
(06:14):
Yeah, helpful. Yeah, perhaps.
Yes, some context. But to be fair, it's a movie
sort of based on history, so I guess it needs an opening card
because they all have one anyway.
When the movie opens for real, we open on a German submarine
which is the title submarine destroying a British vessel.
(06:34):
I think it's British only then to be incapacitated themselves
by death charges for a British destroyer.
And all of the engineers and machinists were killed in a
flash fire. And their commander, his name is
Gun to a Bastner and he's playedby Thomas Krautchman.
He manages to transmit distress call because they're basically
(06:56):
stuck out in the ocean. I have to say, I do like this
opening scene because it's very tense.
Like I put you right in there and you immediately know it's
going to be one of those movies.The only thing that was
confusing to me, had I not knownthis was going to be about an
American submarine or crew, was wait, are we rooting for these
(07:18):
people? Are they evil?
But obviously they're Germans, so I guess we're not rooting for
them. But it's not necessarily you
don't immediately know who you're supposed to root for
because the scene is very long. It's like a good 10 minutes long
I think. Yeah, then we kind of switch
over to meet our Americans and they're at this big wedding.
(07:39):
They're all in a 48 hour pass, so they're in their nice fancy
white uniforms and everyone's dancing and having a good time.
So it's Lieutenant Andy Tyler played by Matthew McConaughey,
Lieutenant Pete Emmett played byJon Bon Jovi, whom I simply did
not recognize because he looks 12.
Lieutenant Commander Mike Dahlgren, played by Bill Paxton,
who I did recognize and I was very excited to see him.
(08:01):
Chief Gunner's Mate Henry Keogh,played by Harvey Keitel, and
Ensign Keith Larson, who's played by Matthew Settle, friend
of the Pod Band of Brothers fame, who's getting married and
all these Marines are celebrating at his wedding.
And Matthew McConaughey character is a feeling a little
bit let down because he thought he was going to get command of
his own submarine, but unfortunately that didn't happen
(08:22):
for him. So I do like this running thing.
You get introduced to almost everybody all at once, so it's
like you're not going to immediately know who it's going
to be from that scene. But I do a good job, I think.
But like you said, Tyler's pretty upset that he doesn't get
his own U boat to command. But Commando Delokran thinks
(08:44):
he's not yet ready, which is kind of a theme in this movie.
But he does get to go on a mission because EU boat he's
been surfing on the S 33 will disguise itself as a German
resupply vessel because they have to intercept the U571
because it has an Enigma machineand they need to get it.
(09:04):
So when he is briefed, we learn that another of his crew, Seaman
Bill Wentz, played by Jack Nesworthy, who's already man is
half German. And this kind of becomes a
little thin in this movie. And there's another man called
Lieutenant Michael Hirsch, who'splayed by Jake Barber, who also
(09:25):
speaks German, and he's assignedto this entire operation as its
leader. And to keep going with this list
of names, I'm very sorry, guys. I wrote all these down, but
they're just all introduced all at once.
Another one who's joining them is Major Matthew Coonan, who is
an explosive expert in naval intelligence, if I'm correct,
(09:46):
and he's played by David Keith. So we get like, introduction
after introduction. But it doesn't feel too
confusing, like most of them arequite recognizable, so that's
good. Yeah.
And Hersh and Coonan represent these characters to go on to the
submarine, and they don't know anything about being on a
submarine. So they're kind of our stand in
(10:07):
as the audience. You know, they see a leak and
they're like, oh, is that normal?
And the submariners kind of laugh at them a little bit and
like they're sort of learning new things about the submarine
while we're learning things about being on a submarine.
I also love all of these nicknames, like Trigger, Rabbit,
Tank. I feel like it's not just a
nickname, it's a personality. We're really getting a snapshot
(10:28):
of who these guys are. It's fantastic.
I'm half expecting there to be like, and then this is Sneaky
Pete and then this is Little Jimand this is Big Jim and you
know. Yeah, so I guess we should say
the other members of the crew are Semen Ted Trigger
Fitzgerald, played by Tom Berry for pedo man Ronald Rabbit
Parker, played by Will Estes. Semen Eddie Carson who's a cook,
played by TC Carson, Seaman Anthony Mozzola played by Eric
(10:51):
Palladino, motor machinist Charles Tank Clemens played by
Dave Power and Steaman Herb Griggs played by Dirk Cheatwood.
And you do not have to remember all those names cause a lot of
them are going to kick the bucket at certain points in the
movie. Spoiler alert.
Yeah, the character of Eddie Carson.
He's the only black character. He's symbolic of the black
(11:13):
submariners and sailors who are restricted from combat roles but
sometimes ended up performing combat duty nonetheless.
And we talked about this a little bit when we did our Pearl
Harbor episode. We talked about Dory Miller,
who's in the same kind of similar kind of situation.
The Navy vehemently resisted integration at its height, only
4.8% of the force for black. Prior to June 1942, black men
(11:34):
could only serve as mess men in the Navy and they only went to
see in a limited capacity as officer stewards.
And then for the next two years after June 1942, they could
achieve general service ratings on shore but still not at sea.
Often the jobs as scientists segregated black units also
involved heavy manual labor. So even when they could kind of
branch out into other jobs, theywere still not getting any of
(11:55):
the good stuff. And the Navy began to integrate
some seagoing crews in May 1944,though the proportions were
still capped. So it was like a certain
percentage. And restrictions on shipboard
jobs were not totally removed until after the war.
And there were no black naval officers during World War, too.
So this is our one character, and it's kind of nice that we
get some representation, I suppose, yeah.
(12:16):
I do like him as a character andhe's the first one we really see
talking to Mitchell Mcconaughey's character and you
got a sense that even though Mitchell Mcconaughey's
character, I keep forgetting hisname, what's his name?
Tyler. Tyler.
He's not deemed a good enough leader yet by his superior.
His men all do like him very much, so you got a little
(12:39):
snapshot from different people there.
Yeah, it is kind of cool how they do that where they have
different men coming up to him at different times saying, hey,
sorry to hear you didn't get your boat.
And, you know, you have an enlisted guy saying, hey, you
want to have a drink with the enlisted men leader.
So he's definitely respected by the people under him.
And I think one of the seamen says my mom is here, do you want
(13:00):
to meet her at the wedding or something?
It's really quite straight, likethey're quite familiar with him.
Yeah. On the other hand, I do find
that seeing all of that stuff, you're like, why doesn't Bill
Paxton want him to have his own ship?
You know, like they said, he sort of briefly explains, he's
like, he's I don't think you canmake the tough decisions.
And you're like, I haven't really seen that borne out in
(13:20):
any capacity. So it's really just like Bill
Paxton's character saying a lineand you're like, well, I guess
I'll take his word for it. There needs to be conflict so we
go back to the German South and we see them kill sailors lost at
sea, which is bad. The reason I even wanted to
mention this is because it wasn't very common for a German
(13:43):
you got Cruz to kill people likethat because they were actually
known to help sailors with like food and medical supplies on
directions. But they had to stop doing that
after Admiral Carl Donut issued the Laconia order, which
happened after AUS air attack onU boats transported injured
survivors under a Red Cross flagin 1942.
(14:06):
So German U boat crews were thenunder war or the number 154 not
to rescue any survivors, which apparently paralleled Allied
policy. Yeah, probably doesn't
necessarily mean that you would just machine gun them in their
dinghy. No true.
It seems a bit been made that commander kind of hesitate to do
(14:27):
it at 1st and also the other crew members are like we can't
just shoot them and then he makes them do it anyway.
I mean, they have to be evil, so.
Some we need some classic Nazi just following orders, you know?
Yes. I was just going to say that.
Then we sort of follow our American crew on their way to EU
571. So they've got their own U boat,
(14:48):
I guess. They have their own submarine
that's decked out to look like AU boat, and they're pretending
to be the resupply ship and they're like trying to get there
before the real resupply ship sothey can manage to board this
sub. So this scene is very long, but
not a whole lot happened. But there is one scene where in
the character of Missoula mentions that the S 26 sank in a
(15:11):
test dive. And the S 26 did exist.
But apparently it's not this onebecause the real S 26 did not
sink in a test dive, but it instead sank in a collision with
a patrol combatant in January of1942.
So it's a different story with that name attached.
I don't think it's meant to. That's not necessary, but.
(15:33):
The reason why they included is because he's holding like a raw
egg in his hand and he's like, yeah, they went below a certain
pressure and then he like crushes the egg.
So we all understand that if thesubmarine goes below X 100
meters then it will the pressurewill cause it to like implode in
on itself and that will become relevant later.
Yeah, this movie is a little on the nose.
(15:55):
The bad stuff that will happen later and everything is set up.
I would say I like things being set up, but it's kind of really
obvious that it's going to become relevant later.
You're like, MMM, I wonder if they'll have to take a really
deep dive. Surely this random story doesn't
mean anything for the rest of the two hours we have to go.
The S 33 the decked out pretending to EU boat U boat
(16:19):
arrives at the U571, but the riders abysmall like it's rainy
cats and dogs and it's like why would any everybody do this?
But they send a boarding party over and with them is Hirsch,
who's supposed to be leading andalso speaks German.
But as he approaches the German people on the other yearbook, he
(16:42):
hesitates to start speaking. But then once our half German
crew member decides to speak up first and he saves her assets
and that's the last of his identity being hidden.
And it's also not at all a conflict, which I thought was
kind of sad. Like if you're going to do that,
at least make it. But that's it.
(17:04):
It's not. Yeah, it's really not too.
And also I just want to say it, what cracks me up is they're in
the middle of this like crazy storm.
Like we can see the rain is lashing their faces and
whatever. But for some reason both EU
boats are curiously, extremely still in the water.
I'm like, I got to think it'd bepretty difficult to board that U
boat if there's a big ass storm in the middle of the ocean.
(17:25):
Like you would think it would belike moving around and there'd
be big waves, but it's just likethey're clearly in a tank
somewhere. It also cracks me up that the
guy named Wentz is like please don't tell anybody I'm German,
they'll never know. That's true.
I was like Pete Wentz, the follow up boy's grandfather, Is
that you? That's the plot twist.
(17:46):
Later, Sam. The sequel comes out.
So they just about managed to surprise the Germans, but we
lose our first man, and then I'mGreg.
He dies, but other than that it's fairly easy for them to
just overwhelm everybody and they secure the U571.
But then the American version ofit is repeat out by the German
(18:09):
resupply submarine that they were pretending to be.
I was going to say everybody dies but now Coonan, Emmett and
Arsenal killed. So Emmett is Tylers best friend
and also Bon Jovi and we don't really see him get killed.
I read a little bit of trivia that he was supposed to be
beheaded but then they'd have torated R and they didn't want to
(18:32):
rated R so they just show him not there anymore.
The. Wild.
I just feel like for the confusion of people listening.
So there's their summary, which is the fake U boat.
They're trying to board the realincapacitated U boat.
Meanwhile, the resupply U boat they were trying to beat here
finally arrives, somehow sees all this happening in the dark
(18:54):
and stormy night, perceives whatis happening, and manages to
torpedo the correct U boat. Pretty amazing like skills for
sure. Dubious.
Very dubious. The commander, Dogran, he's just
about hanging on in the water, kind of literally.
He orders Tyler to dive. They captured you back with the
(19:15):
survivor still online, obviously.
And they do. And Dog Grand actually cries
out. Take her down.
And apparently these were the last words of Lieutenant
Commander Howard W Gilmer, who posthumously received the Medal
of Honor for his self sacrifice and saving his bird, the USS
Corridor. And I looked this up.
(19:36):
I don't know anything else aboutit, but I thought it was cool.
But they put that line in there.On the other hand, it's a pretty
generic line, so I don't know ifit's done on purpose or not.
Yeah. I was just going to ask that if
that was on purpose and then like what are the circumstances
of the growler going down? But I guess we'll never know.
(19:57):
Piece meal inclusion of history.And also they had previously had
this very on the nose conversation between Dahlgren
and Tyler. But like leadership and
sacrifice and like you have to be able to sacrifice your men
for the greater good of the team.
And then of course, while Dahlgren's floating in the
water, he has to be like, no, leave me.
And then Tyler has to like make that leadership and sacrifice
(20:19):
decision to. Let Dahlgren die so that he can
rescue everybody else. And we get to see Dahlgren
literally break to drown until the submarine is completely
submerged. I'm like the tongue is perfect.
He's like, I know how to swim but only for like 5 or 6 more
seconds. Watching Matthew Settles
character go down in his stretcher is like, that was like
(20:42):
one of the most terrifying things because you can't help
but feel like, I don't know, I March.
I can feel like you're almost like your claustrophobia with
it. And I'm also terrified of the
ocean. It's monster soup.
I don't, I can't see the bottom of it.
I don't know what's coming at me.
I don't trust it. So to see him go down and
(21:02):
yelling for someone to help him and he's all tied up in his
stretcher is just like one of the most terrifying feelings.
I was not comfortable. There was so much, there was so
much about this movie that I wasso uncomfortable, even down to
watching everybody be damp all the time.
It just made my skin crawl. I am built for comfort, you
guys, not utility. And so like I'm the kind of
(21:26):
person if it's a little bit humid out and my sheets are
maybe a little bit damp feeling because of humidity, I'm just
like, I can't do this. And so to see everyone just
dripping wet, I was like. Apparently the beds, like even
the mattresses were always a little damp.
Like everything was always damp.And the amount of space that
(21:47):
existed for you as a submariner on the boat I think was like 1
cubic meter, which is not a lot of room.
And everything else was taken upby like food supplies, whatever.
So it was like no matter where you were, like even in the area
where the bunks were, it would be crammed with supplies and
stuff and you would just be like, like trying to fit your
way around this like extremely, very crowded little maze.
(22:08):
Yeah, they would actually stack up fans of food in the aisles
and then cover them with planks.So when you were walking, then
not only are you getting the crush from left and right, but
you're getting the crush up and down too.
And then they also have this system called hot racking,
because not everybody can be sleeping at the same time.
(22:29):
So they break up the crews into shifts.
So you actually share your bunk with like one or two other guys
who are off shift while you're on shift.
And so everything's damp. It's probably smells like diesel
fumes and recycled farts, and you're just crammed into these
tiny little areas. It just sounds so very
(22:50):
unappealing to me. I can't.
My skin crawls just thinking about it.
Well, you can't bathe down thereeither, right?
So these guys are not. It smells like sweaty ball sack
for sure in that sense. Oh.
Yeah, it's red farts so. So they do a good job of showing
the supplies being stacked between the banks and the movie
(23:14):
like, but I give them that the way they've shot it, it looks
fucking claustrophobic. And I heard it.
Well, in early in the war to really a submarine was mostly a
surface vessel. They could dive to take
defensive maneuvers, but typically they'd be traveling
along the surface because they could travel a lot faster that
way. And, and it wasn't until later
(23:36):
in the war when they developed submarines that could be
underwater for like 3 days at a time without surfacing.
So it's like, yeah, you are getting this like claustrophobic
feeling, but it's like so often it's just like a tin can
floating on the water, you know,such like a strange
manifestation. The way I've heard it described
is a sewer pipe in the bottom ofthe ocean.
(23:59):
It sounds so pleasant. Yeah.
And there's no windows. You don't have any sunlight
whatsoever. You know, you can't get any
fresh air. The capabilities back then, it
started out as you could only besubmerged for like 48 hours.
And then those S boats were whatdid that.
And then later on, like Sammy said, it could be 3 days I
(24:19):
believe. But you're just running on fumes
at that point because you're running on your batteries.
And those batteries, I forget what they're made out of, but
when they're hit with salt water, they expel chlorinated
gas. Not really the thing that you
want in the middle of salt water.
That's not Yeah. Understand the year.
(24:40):
Yeah, that was what took out most of the crew of the Tang
when they were hit by their own torpedo.
And then as they were trying to get out through the escape
hatches, the hull collapsed. And as soon as that salt water
hit the batteries, it was just poisonous, noxious gas all over
the boat and everyone was asphyxiated.
(25:01):
It's not that we needed that aside.
Sorry, guys. I put a lot of asides in here.
I'll check. Yeah, just it feels like health
and safety were perhaps not top of mind.
No, not at all. Well, decisions were made.
Yeah, Tyler dives EU 570 one. It's fucked up, but he still is
able to dive. Like it still has some capacity
to do some things. And they actually have a
(25:23):
mechanic in their crew so they can make some of the fixes that
the Germans were not able to do.They're underwater and of course
they have to face off against the real resupply submarine that
has torpedoed their submarine. And so they have a little
underwater torpedo duel in the dark.
Which is not accurate. Actually sub on sub action was
really rare, and then there's actually only one instance in
(25:46):
the war of a submerged sub successfully torpedoing another
submerged sub. I guess they're borrowing from
real life. They're the statistical anomaly
for all of the statistics. Yeah, yeah, I think I, well and
I it's hard maybe for us to imagine today, but these aren't
homing torpedoes like you have to aim this torpedo at the
(26:08):
target you would like to hit, which is difficult at night in
the ocean. I also read somewhere that
German resupply your birds did not typically have torpedoes, so
it's a stretch. That's interesting.
I do like this sequence though, when they are diving, just the
kind of the rapid fire and then everybody's running around like
crazy. Like this is in German, this is
(26:29):
in German. And so whence and Hirsch are
just running their minds off, like trying to translate all of
the different gauges for everybody.
I don't understand what Bill Paxton was talking about when it
came to Tyler and his decision making because he's making 20
decisions in probably about 5 seconds amount of time and every
single one of them gets them diving and down to safety.
(26:50):
Yeah, it's not very consistent storytelling on their part.
I was just thinking about, you know, when they're, when they
keep calling the German speakerson board over to like, find me a
thing that says hydraulic or find me whatever.
I'm like, I speak pretty good French, but I wouldn't know the
technical words on a submarine for anything.
After they kind of just about survive, they go to look for
(27:12):
survivors of their own sub, the S 33, and find the cook, Eddie
Carson and Wessner pretending tobe an electrician instead of the
commander of the German slump. So I found this really confusing
because I thought, haven't they seen this man already?
Do they not recognize this guy as being the commander?
(27:35):
But I guess maybe not. Well, they saw him as part of of
the greeting party when they were boarding EU 571.
But I don't think he necessarilywas like, hi, I'm the captain.
And maybe not. Maybe you're right.
So they take this guy in and then they head for England.
This is Tyler's plan. But to do this, though, I have
to cross through you both infested Warners of the North
(27:58):
Atlantic. So it's not easy.
And one of the crew, Missoula, is not a particularly big fan of
this friend. This is the guy who said if you
die too far, you will just die immediately anyway.
He's not a fan of the plan or time of choices in general.
And he's pretty vocal about it. And then the Chief actually
(28:18):
shuts him up. Like he shuts him up against the
wall of that. Your bird is like, shut up.
So I like the scene. I like the Chief.
I do like that character quite alot.
So they're like, this is going to be so hard for us to go
across EU boat infested waters of the North Atlantic.
I'm like, yeah, but you look like AU boat like, and you guys
killed everyone on the resupply U boat.
(28:41):
So theoretically if someone radioed you or whatever, you get
one of your German guys on the line to be like, hey, we met the
resupply, so we're all good now.Our U boat is fine.
I'm like, I don't understand whythat can't happen.
Yeah, that is really confusing. And they do bring up like, well,
if we encounter another U boat, we only have one torpedo like,
but they would be so confused while you're shooting at them
(29:02):
and it would just bring more trouble for you.
Yeah, it is a weird part. Just pretend to be the German
submarine that you look like you're even wearing the correct
uniforms for. God suck, Yeah.
Just keep your head down guys. I did struggle at this part of
the movie because I'm like this his plan is so fucking
convoluted and I'm like am I dumb or could they just pretend
(29:25):
to be a U boat? And then also as they're pulling
up to, you know, the allied dockor whatever the harbor as a U
boat, I mean, wouldn't they alsorun the risk of being torpedoed
by the allies? That I didn't get that, yeah.
I feel like at this point I had almost forgotten that they still
have to Enigma and that's why they're then that's why they
(29:47):
even have to make it back. I'm like, wait, what?
What are their stakes again? That it's the Enigma and it
can't be caught because then theGermans will know they have to
Enigma and then they will changeup the codes.
So there are stakes, but I kept forgetting what they were.
It kind of does take like a backseat, doesn't it?
The ending machine. It does.
(30:08):
Also I think in real life it didn't just happen once like it
happened a few times that Enigmamachines ended up getting
captured so. Yeah, they are in.
A couple of them are in the end notes, the nerd cards at the
end. Fun fact, the because I have to
plug the great city of Chicago, the greatest city in the world.
The only U boat that you can seein North America is in Chicago.
(30:31):
It's EU 505, and it was captured, the only one captured
by the Americans. Yeah.
It's kind of a cool thing. You can go on it.
You can see exactly how cramped this was.
There's also an American S boat,I believe, from that era in
Charleston. You can go on that as well.
And it definitely does smell like World War 2 ball sack and
(30:53):
diesel fuels. Yeah.
I love how that stent just hangsaround over the intervening
decades. I didn't understand it.
I was taking a tour on this thing and I got so lightheaded
and I felt so, yeah, so sick theentire time.
Like, you'd think by now it would have aired out, but Nope.
(31:14):
You know, they were going for authenticity, I think.
Yeah, they didn't want to get one of those, like those little
cardboard things you hang from the rearview mirror in your car
that smells like a pine tree or something.
Just like all over. Yeah, I would like to say no
thank you to all of this. Fair enough.
Fair, Yeah. They see a German destroyer on
the horizon which like sidebar that whatever boat is there is
(31:35):
not a German destroyer. But like for suspension of
disbelief, we'll pretend it is aGerman destroyer and they so
obviously they have to dive because even though they look
fully like a U boat, they just are like we can't be seen.
So they're diving down, but Vosner manages to sabotage them
and he knocks out tank who's supposed to be watching him.
(31:56):
He shoots Mozola, but then Carson the cook stops him from
escaping. And so like, I don't know why
Vosner is being like kept alive at this point because he's being
a huge pain in the ass and fucking everything up.
But anyways, so they're not ableto dive yet.
So they devise this plan where they're going to try and let the
German destroyer get close and then they're going to destroy
(32:16):
the radio communications on the destroyer, which they have to do
because they don't want the German destroyer to radio back
to land and tell everyone that there are Americans on this U
boat. Because then everyone will know
that they have an Enigma machineand then they will dive.
It's a whole thing. And.
Apparently the destroyer is alone.
Yeah. Sure.
(32:37):
I love that tone. Just apparently it's alone and
also I think they can't die. Yep, because they haven't
managed to fix their your body enough yet for them to die, so
they have to solve for time. Yes, that's what it is.
It's just really confusing. So they do manage to take out
that comes for some reason, no one knows why.
(32:58):
And then they do die and. You have to explain how they
take out the radio comms that people need to know.
Do I remember? Do they use that?
What do they do? They use the machine?
No, they don't. What do they do?
They shoot it with like this biggun and they manage to like
pigeonhole this fucking shell into like the exact place where
(33:18):
they need it to go. All right, it's the anti
aircraft condoms. And all the while, you know,
they have this crew from the German destroyer in a little
dinghy kind of trying to rope upnext to the U571, and they're,
you know, trying to speak Germanto who they think are other
fellow Germans. And the guys are like, yeah,
(33:40):
whatever. Yeah, pay no attention to us
getting this big ass gun ready to shoot.
Yeah, no, don't worry. Like it feels so cartoonish.
It feels like literal Looney Tunes, like somebody's going to
go sneaking by dressed as a Bushat some point.
It's like there wasn't even an attempt made to like, let's get
the German speaking dudes up here and like try and trick this
(34:03):
crew in the dinghy into going away.
Let's like not even make that attempt.
I think actually one of them wasWentz and he's just like, yeah,
Glash. And he just keeps moving.
Like, yeah, he doesn't even try to like start just talking to
distract them. He's no, it's let's just sneak
by with our, you know, Acme gun over here.
(34:23):
Oh yeah, and this is part of a longer con, because once they
knock out this ship's radio situation, they're going to dive
and then come back up far away from the ship and then use their
single remaining torpedo. And they're not going to fuck
this up. They're going to torpedo the
ship from far away and then everyone will die and their
secret will be safe. And it's really tense because
(34:45):
they do dive and they go right underneath that destroyer and
it's super tender. Like, are they gonna hit it?
Are they gonna hit it? But they don't, obviously.
And then the destroyer fires a whole bunch of splashers, which
is the nickname for the depth charges to try and destroy them.
And they have to come up with yet another plant to try to get
(35:06):
away and to where they like airspace to try and get safe
that way. So this whole scene takes a long
fucking time and they use so many depth charges.
I don't think they would have had that money because I read
somewhere that it's like 18 if you count them and they didn't
have it on the Destroyer. It's another one of those, how
(35:26):
can we make this even more unbelievable?
This is how. The thing is about depth charges
too. So depth charges are an anti
submarine weapon. It's basically an explosive.
It looks a little bit like a barrel.
You can roll it off a ship and if you're right over top of a
submarine and it falls through the water causes an explosion.
And they were developed originally during World War One.
They improved during World War 2.
(35:47):
They created these head throwingweapons.
If I'm in a boat, I can throw like a spray of them in front of
me instead of just like rolling them off the edge of the boat.
But they fell out of use after World War 2 because they
invented homing torpedoes, whichwere much more accurate because
depth charges had a like a 5% success rate.
So they definitely would not be scoring hit after hit on a
submarine, especially because for like a ship they would have
(36:10):
to use like sonar to find where the submarines are.
But like effectively underneath you is like a blind spot.
So you're dropping deaf charges but like you don't know if
you're hitting anything? So that's why they need AT
clearly, because they just neverget you anyway.
They also tried to do something else, which is eject debris and
(36:31):
also Mazzola's body to try and trick the destroyer into
thinking that they are in fact destroyed.
But this doesn't work yet because it takes time for the
debris and Mazzola's body to surface.
So there's this whole thing where the crews kind of like
we're we're going to eject Mazzola's body after he tried to
(36:52):
maybe save us a little bit toward the end finally after
being a Dick the whole time. But they do end up doing it.
I don't think they executed thisrole in the movie.
It just struck to learn to have effect.
Like either have it work immediately or just don't.
Yeah, I was confused that they brought it up and then a bunch
of other stuff happened and thenthey actually did it.
(37:14):
Yeah. Then it still felt like it took
a long time for the Germans to see it as well.
And I had totally forgotten thatMissoula had that whole scene
where they're basically establishing him as the boat hot
head. Like when that reconnaissance
plane finds them and he's tryingto, he's trying to go down.
I think it's Trigger. Like literally this guy's name
(37:37):
is Trigger and he's on the machine gun and he's trying to
goad him into shooting down thisreconnaissance plane.
And it's all just, I think to establish like, oh, this guy's
got a temper issue. And he doesn't trust Tyler
because he directly deserves an order right in front of him.
Yeah, and then they kill him off, so no longer a source of
(37:57):
conflict. Tied that one up, yeah.
They've dived down about as far as they would reasonably want to
dive in this submarine. And then Tyler's like we're
going to dive even lower. We're going to dive down to
they're at like 160 meters, which is like the Max.
And he's like we're going to dive to 180 meters and then a
few minutes later he's like we're going to dive down to 200
meters. And basically up until like this
(38:21):
like 2 minute span where the pressure of the water actually
starts to affect EU boat. Mostly the proof that we can see
that they're getting deeper underwater and more stressed out
is the fact that everyone is very sweaty.
So they dive down super low. The water pressure eventually
damages the ship and they start to send, but the ballast tanks
have been damaged. So they basically can't slow
(38:42):
their ascent and they are going to surface whether they like it
or not, which was not part of the plan.
And they are like, OK, well we got to have our torpedo ready
when we surface because we're going to have to shoot this
destroyers now or never. But of course their torpedo is
fucked up because it wouldn't beaction movie if that weren't the
case. And so trigger has to go into
the submerged pipe to fix. AI think it's a hydraulic leak,
(39:05):
which is also I would say like probably the most claustrophobic
scene of the movie. Yep, I looked this up.
There was considerable variability in the Max dives of
different classes of submarines.The probably the deepest diving
submarine of World War 2 is the Type 7U boat.
It had a test depth of 270 meters or 890 feet.
The test depth was not necessarily a maximum depth.
(39:26):
Dives of up to 300 meters were sometimes recorded during the
war without crushing. Usually these were not
intentional dives like it would be as a result of submarine
having to go super low to take evasive maneuvers.
Not because they wanted to go that low necessarily, but it
would have been super inadvisable because sometimes
submarines, even at less than their test depth, would have an
(39:46):
adverse reaction to pressure. You're always in a situation
where the water pressure could potentially get you.
And I think the American submarines, at least the early S
boats, only had the capability to do half of what AU vote could
do. So when the guys are freaking
out that Tyler's pushing them further and further, it's
because in their minds they think that this is a sure way to
(40:07):
die. And then?
I love how the chief kind of murmurs to himself, like those
Germans can really make a vote. That's true.
And then before you know it, youneed more conflict because they
suddenly realize they hear something out for the sonar or
on the radio. I mean, and it's not one of
their messages. So they're like, who's sending
(40:29):
this message? And it turns out that Roster has
escaped yet again and he's trying to signal the Germans.
Why the fuck is he still alive? Maybe I misunderstood this.
I thought he was like tapping a Morse code message.
They were all trying to be really quiet and then they could
hear this like Morse code message, and it was him.
Yeah, and I love this part because the two guys who pick up
(40:52):
on it are the two German speakers.
Yeah, as far as action movies. So like I do, I'll get sucked
into an action movie like a mothto a flame.
This is my favorite part of the whole movie because you can, if
you watch Hirsch, he realizes what's going on before everybody
else does and before the audience does, and he just takes
off running out of nowhere. And then the next time you see
(41:14):
him, he's got just like, rage inhis eyes and he bludgeons Vosner
in the face with a wrench, I think it is.
And and then he comes back with,like, blood streaked down his
cheek. And everybody's looking at him
like, sweetie, you got a little,you got a little something.
And he's like blood. He goes from totally freezing in
the beginning to like just this,you know, rabid killer like
(41:39):
totally over Vosner bullshit at that point.
So I think everybody else is like you said, why is he still
alive? This movie is a cautionary tale
and what to do with your Pows? Grim, sorry.
I like this part too because thethey're trying to be so fucking
quiet in this submarine because the boat on the surface can hear
(42:01):
them if you even like, speak tooloudly with the sonar, which I
think is just like that. Adds so much tension to it.
Like they're sort of like speaking very quietly to one
another and trying not to make any noise.
And I guess this was also a thing that boats would do to
each other if they're or like due to submarines is just
whenever you ping this sonar, you can hear it reverberate
(42:23):
through the submarine. So even if it was just a normal
day and a boat was trying to harass you, it would ping the
sonar and just keep you awake. It would annoy the hell out of
you to the point where you wouldjust kind of snap too.
Interesting, that's mean. It reminds me of washing machine
Charlie. The Japanese would fly a plane
(42:43):
over every night in Guadalcanal and just drop bombs in the
jungle to just harass the Marines and their foxholes.
Yeah. Well, unfortunately our young
submariner trigger drowns, but not before he saves the day.
He fixes the leak so they can fire their torpedo and they're
able to successfully blow up thedestroyer.
I guess it's kind of a happy ending.
The remaining crew abandons the ship.
(43:04):
They still have the Enigma, so they're going to be able to
bring it back and help the allies crack the Enigma code and
they are spotted by AUS Navy plane so they know that they're
hopefully going to shortly be rescued.
Hooray, but no trigger don't die.
We liked you. So sad, especially when you see
him reaching. And yeah, poor trigger.
I will be honest that I did findhim interchangeable with the
(43:27):
other young blonde guy up until this moment.
I wanted to make the joke like, oh trigger, we hardly knew you.
They're like, we need a small guy to go down and plug this
leak. And so everybody looks at the
two small guys who happen to be sitting next to each other, and
they're like, why is everyone looking at us?
Yeah, those are. Yeah.
I wonder if that's the other interchangeable blonde small
(43:50):
fellow. He also probably has an
interesting nickname. Yeah, I I just feel like I'm 511
and I feel like I would hate being on a submarine, but in
that moment I would love being 511 and too big to go in that
pipe. I didn't put this in the notes,
but it's Tyler has to make the hard decision to send him in
(44:10):
there. And then he's like, I can't do
it because he comes back out unsuccessful at some point.
And then Tyler has to speak to him and like, encourage him to
come back in there and fix it. And you're like, oh God, no,
he's going to die. Isn't it?
You just know. I like who he's like.
I know you think you can't fix it, but I need you to defy the
laws of physics. Perhaps like snap some of your
(44:32):
bones and get in there. I looked up the plane that
because it looked funny to me and apparently it's a PBY
Catalina which is a flying dog. I thought this was really neat.
I've never seen one before, but cool.
What would it have been doing there?
Do we know? Like does it lot, you know, does
(44:53):
that mean that they were close to Greenland I.
I feel like they make it a pointto like I think Matthew
Mcconaughey's character or something says something like,
oh, it's a long range something or other.
Like we're meant to understand that.
Like they know that typically you wouldn't get like a single
or double engine plane like out that far.
Thankfully, there hasn't been another submarine waiting to
(45:13):
kill them in their day. And EU boat infested waters that
we were warned about. Yes.
Exactly. So we had an opening card.
We also got an end card. It says, well, it's quite long.
There's a couple. It says this film is dedicated
to the bravery of our large sailors and officers who
westernized capturing Enigma materials from you guys during
(45:35):
the Battle of the Atlantic. And then we get a couple of
examples. The first one is May 9, 1941,
Enigma machine accounting documents captured from the U110
by HMS Bulldog and HMS of the third escort group.
So that's the first one we get, which is actually not an
(45:55):
American crew, but a British crew.
And the second one we get is October 30th, 1942, short
weather cipher captured from theU559 by The Age.
And the last one we got is June 4th, 1944, Enigma machine and
guarding documents captured fromthe U5O5 by U.S.
(46:17):
Navy Task Force 22.3. So that's it.
That's the end of the movie. It just ends like you said in
the beginning. That's it.
Just stops. I have some notes on this.
(46:37):
So the film Sam has already mentioned it, but it's very,
very, very, very loosely based on the story of the year 110,
which we just mentioned in the end cards.
But it's a British crew, not theAmericans that captured the
first Enigma cards on sea. And that's perhaps the reason
that the British didn't really like this film.
(46:59):
And this actually made it all arranged in the House of
Commons, where Labour MP Brian Jenkins stated that the film
was, quote, UN quote, an affrontto the memories of British
sailors who lost their lives on this action.
And Prime Minister Johnny Blair at the time agreed.
And when we say very loosely based, it's because the 110 crew
(47:21):
had actually left EU boat and they thought it was going to
sink, but it didn't. And that's when the crew of the
HMS Boulder was able to board itand grab the Enigma and the
goat. So it's not quite as exciting as
we job in this movie. No, that would have been like a
15 minute movie they would have done.
EU boat is empty. Let's get on there and grab the
Enigma. I do like I said, I hate to say
(47:44):
the ugly American thing but theydon't really make any claims
though to be based on anything so I don't want to make any
British friends of the pod mad but I don't get it.
Sorry I had to say it. I just don't understand the
frustration. Very little dead in the market
(48:06):
quite a bit. Oh, OK, I was because I was also
wondering too if maybe I was watching it on Netflix.
So I was wondering if it was something that Netflix removed,
you know, was like an inspired by title at the beginning.
So I tried to find like a DVD ofit and was unsuccessful but so
(48:26):
that makes sense. I think I remember reading too
that I don't remember if it was the director.
I think maybe it was, but he hadactually spoken with some of the
actual crew members. And then when the movie was
about to come out, one of the guys that he'd been talking to
was like, would it be cool if you mentioned the actual guys
who did the stuff? And he was like, OK, so the end
(48:47):
cards were actually sort of added as like an afterthought,
which I almost wonder if, like, if it would be easier to
attribute this movie entirely tofiction if they just hadn't
added those end cards. I think that would have been a
better idea for sure. In 2009, this film was first on
the list of the most historically inaccurate movies
in the Times. So it's not very accurate.
(49:10):
And David Ayer was later quoted to regret making the movie like
this and changing the British crew to an American crew.
And yet injected assault to fury.
Yeah, I thought that was funny too, that he actually said like,
I wouldn't have done it this waytoday.
And then Fury is super weird andinaccurate.
(49:32):
Yeah, it's funny because it's like, I don't know, the vibes of
this are almost like, you know how in Fury, what's historically
accurate is like the Super technical stuff.
A lot of the time it's like, oh,this specific Control Board is
100% historically accurate, or like this piece of the tank is
100% historically accurate or whatever, but then it's like the
actual everything happening around it has like nothing to do
(49:54):
with actually what happened in history.
Yeah, that's definitely U571. And I think I read somewhere too
that the people who made the film toured the U5O5 and took a
crapload of notes. And so yeah, all that technical
stuff when they call out different instrumentation and
different procedures, that's all100% correct.
(50:18):
So I feel like Ayer has a style then going from this to Fury.
Yeah, but there wasn't a like a 20 minute long super sexual
assault scene in this movie, so I did appreciate that.
I knew there's a reason I haven't seen Fury.
Yeah, you can give it a miss. I went through a really like
anti Brad Pitt stage. I don't, I can't pinpoint why,
(50:42):
like don't ask me. I just kind of was like, oh,
he's in it. I can pass right now.
And then I just never revisited it.
So I'm glad you gave me that trigger warning though.
Yeah, I made to say that one outof 10 in whatever we were
writing a lot of and it. Kind of sucks because like it
has Jon Bernthal in it. It has Shia La Boeuf who like
sucks as a human being but is like a pretty good actor.
(51:03):
It has like, you know, it has like the makings of potentially
being a good movie and then it is simply not a good movie.
Speaking of writings, we need towrite this movie, guys.
I'm going to go to our guest first.
Katie, what do you rate it? It's definitely a solid action
movie, but that's about it. It's not solid in any sort of
history whatsoever, so I'm goingto split the difference and say
(51:26):
I give it a 5. So that's five improbable as
good scenarios out of. Yes.
I mean, I'd say there were about5 in there, so.
I was going to say like, that's still probably less than what
was in the movie, but. How about you some?
Gosh. Well, it was fun to see Matt
settle, It was fun to see Bon Jovi even though I did not
recognize him, It was fun to seeMatthew McConaughey doing his
(51:50):
usual Matthew McConaughey thing.And it was fun to see Bill
Paxton RIP, but it's simply not that great of a movie.
It was nice to see a submarine movie.
Like I feel like there's not a ton of them.
So that was kind of cool and it gave me an opportunity to look
into that. But yeah, I'll give this movie.
I think I'll agree. I'll give it 5 and probable
escape scenarios out of 10. It's like if you want to like
(52:13):
throw something on and maybe notpay that much attention to it,
it's not the worst or anything, but I don't think that you need
to run out and watch it. I don't think it's a crucial
part of the World War 2 Canon. I'm going to rate it like as a
movie it's not bad. I'm going to give it maybe 4.5
improper escape scenarios out of10, only because I had a
(52:35):
terrible time being claustrophobic and in front of
the sea. It's a decent thriller.
It's pretty 10s in some places, which I enjoyed.
I don't remember any of the music.
I do remember some of the music actually, and I don't think
about it at the opening of it. I thought it was quite
triumphant, like we're we're celebrating World War 2 again.
(52:57):
It's almost like it almost gave me like Indiana Jones vibes and
places. Yeah, but yeah, I don't think I
would watch it again for all thereasons I've already named.
So not a waste of time, but alsonot a great movie.
I'll definitely put it on if I'mlike, folding laundry or
something, but there are other movies that I can watch to fill
(53:19):
a couple of hours of my life. Yeah.
Katie, are you reading anything?I am.
So I'm doing two different bookskind of in fits and starts.
I'm alternating between the two.One is called D-Day through
(53:40):
Franchise, and it's this incredibly well researched
collection of interviews and diary entries and things like
that of the French who were living in Normandy and their
experiences of the day before the landing and then after that.
And another collection of memoirs called And If I Shall
(54:02):
Perish, which is about combat nurses in World War 2,
alternating between the two because it's pretty heavy on
both sides and sometimes you need a break.
Sounds about right. Are you reading other things on?
Yeah, I am reading The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, Herman
Goering, Doctor Douglas M Kelly and A Fatal Meeting of the Minds
at the end of World War 2 by Jack L Hi.
(54:24):
And it's interesting because I am also reading a book that I
talked about last week about theBattle of Britain.
So I'm getting like Herman Goering 1940, the RAF are going
to be wiped out in a few days. We're going to have air
superiority, no problem. And then I'm also get Herman
Goering at like Nuremberg where he's just like, I'm still the
head Nazi in charge, damn it. So it's a super neat read so
(54:47):
far. I mean, just like a really
interesting topic, I guess. And they're making a movie
that's coming out in November where I think Russell is it
Russell Crowe who plays Goering anyway.
Yeah, it's got Russell Crowe, it's got our friend Rami Relek.
I say our friend, he's not our friend.
We've never met him. And it's got also he's got a
Dutch actress in it, which I think is neat.
(55:09):
So hopefully we'll get to cover it on the show and maybe get
some of the actors on. I'm just putting that out.
They are into the universe rightnow.
Manifest it. Are you reading anything?
I am not to no one surprise are you could probably watching
anything. I have watched a lot of things
recently. I what am I?
The last thing I watched was Foundation, which is a sci-fi
(55:34):
show but can't even tell you what it's about.
It's too confusing. But it's good and it's one of
those that you can kind of get lost in, and the world building
is really neat, so I enjoyed that.
Nice. Yeah, I feel like you watch a
lot of sci-fi stuff or like I feel like you've mentioned some
sci-fi stuff before. I love sci-fi if it's good and
(55:55):
if I don't have to look at spacetoo much because I'm also afraid
of space. Have you seen Altered Carbon?
Yes, I loved Altered Carbon. This again.
I liked that one too. Yeah, anyway.
I think we're kind of to the point where we can round up this
episode. Katie, thank you so much for
being on with us today and beingunder the bed submarines.
(56:16):
Thanks for having me, it was a pleasure.
And everybody else, thank you somuch for listening.
You can find us wherever you getyour podcast.
You can rate us on a bunch of platforms.
You can send this episode to a friend who likes submarines.
You can follow us on Instagram at Rosie the Reviewer Podcast.
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(56:38):
information and we'll see you next week.
Bye.
Welcome to Rosie the Reviewer. We're your host.
I'm Sam. And I'm married you.
And we like World War 2 media and we want to talk about it.
Welcome back everybody to Rosie the reviewer.
This week we are discussing the movie U571 which got in the year
(00:23):
2000. I don't think we've done a movie
from that year before. Directed by Jonathan Mastow from
a screenplay that he Co wrote with Sam Montgomery and David
Ayer, which we know from Fury. If you want to go listen to that
episode video about Fury, it's fun.
This film follows the World War 2 German U belt boarded by
(00:43):
American submarine to capture her Enigma cipher machine.
The plot is entirely fictional, but if you want to learn more
about the Enigma machine, you can check out our episode about
the imitation time. The movie kind of sucks, but our
notes are fun, so go and listen to that.
This movie won an Academy Award,believe it or not, for best
(01:03):
sound everything, and it's available to watch on a variety
of platforms. For me, it's on Prime.
I think it's on Netflix in the US.
So I found it and today we are joining and once again, they are
wonderful friend Katie, who has been previously with us for an
episode about walking with the enemy.
So you can listen to that too. And welcome back, Katie.
(01:24):
Thank you for being on. Thanks for having me back guys.
So shall we just start with somegeneral impressions of this
movie? What did you think about it,
Sam? Well, I'm glad you said that the
plot is fictional, because it's very super super super super
loosely based on a true story, but in a way that kind of just
pissed everyone off. It's got some fun actiony parts,
(01:48):
but I think overall it strugglesto maintain tension and a lot of
the parts should be more tense than they are.
And I think that just generally speaking, I don't know, like, it
really just feels like an actionmovie that came out in the year
2000. Like, it's really strongly has
that vibe for me. I don't think this script is
anything to write home about. I don't think the dialogue is
incredible or the character development is incredible.
(02:10):
But, yeah, I mean, we haven't watched the submarine movie yet,
so that was kind of fun. And I don't think there are any
women with lines in this movie. So that's a distinction as well.
What did you think, Katie? As far as an action movie goes,
I think it was fantastic. I think a couple more explosions
and it would be mistaken for a Jerry Bruckheimer movie.
That's how. Just actiony, you know, action,
(02:32):
action, action. Very much a product of its time
in the early 2000s. Good popcorn movie.
But other than that, that's about it.
Like you said, nothing really towrite home about.
Well, for me, I kind of had forgotten for a second that I'm
claustrophobic and afraid of theocean.
So this was really fun. And by fun, I mean I wanted it
(02:55):
to be over almost immediately, but it took quite a long time,
which is another thing I think the movie definitely struggles
with Face, where certain scenes are very long and other scenes
are very short. So I'm like, maybe this could
have been done a little bit differently.
I think as a thriller it's quitegood.
(03:16):
Like it's quite tense in places.And it did make me understand
that being on a submarine is fucking scary because everybody
looks super scared all the time.And there's some questionable
German in this movie about the German you back and some fun
characters in there for sure, that I liked and that I wanted
to root for. But at the same time, it's just
(03:36):
not my kind of movie. So not exactly a waste of time,
but I would have liked for it tohave been a little bit shorter.
Maybe 19 minutes would have beenfine with me.
I think possibly 2. They threw in one or two too
many wildly improbable things. It's like almost the vibe of
like when you watch a new Fast and the Furious movie and they
(03:56):
like go to space or whatever andyou're like, no, right.
Well, there's only so long I cansuspend my disbelief.
And this is ostensibly a historymovie.
And so like a number of things happen to this movie where
you're like, I don't think that would happen.
I don't think that would happen.Yeah.
And it feels like it does this weird thing where it just, it's
going and then all of a sudden it ends.
(04:19):
And even though it is kind of long, it also feels like there
should be another act to sort ofresolve things a little bit
better. I don't know if you guys had
that feeling as well, but it's just, you know, we're off the
boat and then the credits are rolling.
Yeah, that's that's true. Wrap up for like the characters,
they're like, oh, the plot is done.
You don't need to know about thetie up of what's happening to
(04:40):
any of these people. For me it was kind of the
opposite. I was like wait didn't they just
get a break and it just now be done getting away from but now
that just never got away until the very end.
Spoilers anyway. I think this is a good moment to
get into the plot. I had to sail the high seas to
(05:08):
get access to this movie. And the first version that I
downloaded, I opened it. These opening cards were not on
there. And then when the Germans
started, there was no subtitles and there was no English
subtitles until everyone startedspeaking English, which was not
particularly useful to me. So I had to download another
version that actually had like the stuff, like hard coded into
it. Anyway, it was the whole thing.
(05:29):
So we get an opening card. It's the spring of 1942.
Hitler's U boats wreak havoc in the North Atlantic, sinking over
for 1000 Allied ships and threatening to destroy the
supply line from America to England.
Unable to crack the new U Boat radio codes, the Allies struggle
blindly against the German onslaught.
I mean, I guess. The ugly American thing.
(05:51):
And just point out that nobody has said this is based on a true
story. Nobody is saying that yet.
And that's really important for later on, I feel like Just
saying. This is one of those opening
cards where I'm like, couldn't you have done a little show and
tell instead of just putting this on an opening card?
We have a map, maybe like just something.
(06:14):
Yeah, helpful. Yeah, perhaps.
Yes, some context. But to be fair, it's a movie
sort of based on history, so I guess it needs an opening card
because they all have one anyway.
When the movie opens for real, we open on a German submarine
which is the title submarine destroying a British vessel.
(06:34):
I think it's British only then to be incapacitated themselves
by death charges for a British destroyer.
And all of the engineers and machinists were killed in a
flash fire. And their commander, his name is
Gun to a Bastner and he's playedby Thomas Krautchman.
He manages to transmit distress call because they're basically
(06:56):
stuck out in the ocean. I have to say, I do like this
opening scene because it's very tense.
Like I put you right in there and you immediately know it's
going to be one of those movies.The only thing that was
confusing to me, had I not knownthis was going to be about an
American submarine or crew, was wait, are we rooting for these
(07:18):
people? Are they evil?
But obviously they're Germans, so I guess we're not rooting for
them. But it's not necessarily you
don't immediately know who you're supposed to root for
because the scene is very long. It's like a good 10 minutes long
I think. Yeah, then we kind of switch
over to meet our Americans and they're at this big wedding.
(07:39):
They're all in a 48 hour pass, so they're in their nice fancy
white uniforms and everyone's dancing and having a good time.
So it's Lieutenant Andy Tyler played by Matthew McConaughey,
Lieutenant Pete Emmett played byJon Bon Jovi, whom I simply did
not recognize because he looks 12.
Lieutenant Commander Mike Dahlgren, played by Bill Paxton,
who I did recognize and I was very excited to see him.
(08:01):
Chief Gunner's Mate Henry Keogh,played by Harvey Keitel, and
Ensign Keith Larson, who's played by Matthew Settle, friend
of the Pod Band of Brothers fame, who's getting married and
all these Marines are celebrating at his wedding.
And Matthew McConaughey character is a feeling a little
bit let down because he thought he was going to get command of
his own submarine, but unfortunately that didn't happen
(08:22):
for him. So I do like this running thing.
You get introduced to almost everybody all at once, so it's
like you're not going to immediately know who it's going
to be from that scene. But I do a good job, I think.
But like you said, Tyler's pretty upset that he doesn't get
his own U boat to command. But Commando Delokran thinks
(08:44):
he's not yet ready, which is kind of a theme in this movie.
But he does get to go on a mission because EU boat he's
been surfing on the S 33 will disguise itself as a German
resupply vessel because they have to intercept the U571
because it has an Enigma machineand they need to get it.
(09:04):
So when he is briefed, we learn that another of his crew, Seaman
Bill Wentz, played by Jack Nesworthy, who's already man is
half German. And this kind of becomes a
little thin in this movie. And there's another man called
Lieutenant Michael Hirsch, who'splayed by Jake Barber, who also
(09:25):
speaks German, and he's assignedto this entire operation as its
leader. And to keep going with this list
of names, I'm very sorry, guys. I wrote all these down, but
they're just all introduced all at once.
Another one who's joining them is Major Matthew Coonan, who is
an explosive expert in naval intelligence, if I'm correct,
(09:46):
and he's played by David Keith. So we get like, introduction
after introduction. But it doesn't feel too
confusing, like most of them arequite recognizable, so that's
good. Yeah.
And Hersh and Coonan represent these characters to go on to the
submarine, and they don't know anything about being on a
submarine. So they're kind of our stand in
(10:07):
as the audience. You know, they see a leak and
they're like, oh, is that normal?
And the submariners kind of laugh at them a little bit and
like they're sort of learning new things about the submarine
while we're learning things about being on a submarine.
I also love all of these nicknames, like Trigger, Rabbit,
Tank. I feel like it's not just a
nickname, it's a personality. We're really getting a snapshot
(10:28):
of who these guys are. It's fantastic.
I'm half expecting there to be like, and then this is Sneaky
Pete and then this is Little Jimand this is Big Jim and you
know. Yeah, so I guess we should say
the other members of the crew are Semen Ted Trigger
Fitzgerald, played by Tom Berry for pedo man Ronald Rabbit
Parker, played by Will Estes. Semen Eddie Carson who's a cook,
played by TC Carson, Seaman Anthony Mozzola played by Eric
(10:51):
Palladino, motor machinist Charles Tank Clemens played by
Dave Power and Steaman Herb Griggs played by Dirk Cheatwood.
And you do not have to remember all those names cause a lot of
them are going to kick the bucket at certain points in the
movie. Spoiler alert.
Yeah, the character of Eddie Carson.
He's the only black character. He's symbolic of the black
(11:13):
submariners and sailors who are restricted from combat roles but
sometimes ended up performing combat duty nonetheless.
And we talked about this a little bit when we did our Pearl
Harbor episode. We talked about Dory Miller,
who's in the same kind of similar kind of situation.
The Navy vehemently resisted integration at its height, only
4.8% of the force for black. Prior to June 1942, black men
(11:34):
could only serve as mess men in the Navy and they only went to
see in a limited capacity as officer stewards.
And then for the next two years after June 1942, they could
achieve general service ratings on shore but still not at sea.
Often the jobs as scientists segregated black units also
involved heavy manual labor. So even when they could kind of
branch out into other jobs, theywere still not getting any of
(11:55):
the good stuff. And the Navy began to integrate
some seagoing crews in May 1944,though the proportions were
still capped. So it was like a certain
percentage. And restrictions on shipboard
jobs were not totally removed until after the war.
And there were no black naval officers during World War, too.
So this is our one character, and it's kind of nice that we
get some representation, I suppose, yeah.
(12:16):
I do like him as a character andhe's the first one we really see
talking to Mitchell Mcconaughey's character and you
got a sense that even though Mitchell Mcconaughey's
character, I keep forgetting hisname, what's his name?
Tyler. Tyler.
He's not deemed a good enough leader yet by his superior.
His men all do like him very much, so you got a little
(12:39):
snapshot from different people there.
Yeah, it is kind of cool how they do that where they have
different men coming up to him at different times saying, hey,
sorry to hear you didn't get your boat.
And, you know, you have an enlisted guy saying, hey, you
want to have a drink with the enlisted men leader.
So he's definitely respected by the people under him.
And I think one of the seamen says my mom is here, do you want
(13:00):
to meet her at the wedding or something?
It's really quite straight, likethey're quite familiar with him.
Yeah. On the other hand, I do find
that seeing all of that stuff, you're like, why doesn't Bill
Paxton want him to have his own ship?
You know, like they said, he sort of briefly explains, he's
like, he's I don't think you canmake the tough decisions.
And you're like, I haven't really seen that borne out in
(13:20):
any capacity. So it's really just like Bill
Paxton's character saying a lineand you're like, well, I guess
I'll take his word for it. There needs to be conflict so we
go back to the German South and we see them kill sailors lost at
sea, which is bad. The reason I even wanted to
mention this is because it wasn't very common for a German
(13:43):
you got Cruz to kill people likethat because they were actually
known to help sailors with like food and medical supplies on
directions. But they had to stop doing that
after Admiral Carl Donut issued the Laconia order, which
happened after AUS air attack onU boats transported injured
survivors under a Red Cross flagin 1942.
(14:06):
So German U boat crews were thenunder war or the number 154 not
to rescue any survivors, which apparently paralleled Allied
policy. Yeah, probably doesn't
necessarily mean that you would just machine gun them in their
dinghy. No true.
It seems a bit been made that commander kind of hesitate to do
(14:27):
it at 1st and also the other crew members are like we can't
just shoot them and then he makes them do it anyway.
I mean, they have to be evil, so.
Some we need some classic Nazi just following orders, you know?
Yes. I was just going to say that.
Then we sort of follow our American crew on their way to EU
571. So they've got their own U boat,
(14:48):
I guess. They have their own submarine
that's decked out to look like AU boat, and they're pretending
to be the resupply ship and they're like trying to get there
before the real resupply ship sothey can manage to board this
sub. So this scene is very long, but
not a whole lot happened. But there is one scene where in
the character of Missoula mentions that the S 26 sank in a
(15:11):
test dive. And the S 26 did exist.
But apparently it's not this onebecause the real S 26 did not
sink in a test dive, but it instead sank in a collision with
a patrol combatant in January of1942.
So it's a different story with that name attached.
I don't think it's meant to. That's not necessary, but.
(15:33):
The reason why they included is because he's holding like a raw
egg in his hand and he's like, yeah, they went below a certain
pressure and then he like crushes the egg.
So we all understand that if thesubmarine goes below X 100
meters then it will the pressurewill cause it to like implode in
on itself and that will become relevant later.
Yeah, this movie is a little on the nose.
(15:55):
The bad stuff that will happen later and everything is set up.
I would say I like things being set up, but it's kind of really
obvious that it's going to become relevant later.
You're like, MMM, I wonder if they'll have to take a really
deep dive. Surely this random story doesn't
mean anything for the rest of the two hours we have to go.
The S 33 the decked out pretending to EU boat U boat
(16:19):
arrives at the U571, but the riders abysmall like it's rainy
cats and dogs and it's like why would any everybody do this?
But they send a boarding party over and with them is Hirsch,
who's supposed to be leading andalso speaks German.
But as he approaches the German people on the other yearbook, he
(16:42):
hesitates to start speaking. But then once our half German
crew member decides to speak up first and he saves her assets
and that's the last of his identity being hidden.
And it's also not at all a conflict, which I thought was
kind of sad. Like if you're going to do that,
at least make it. But that's it.
(17:04):
It's not. Yeah, it's really not too.
And also I just want to say it, what cracks me up is they're in
the middle of this like crazy storm.
Like we can see the rain is lashing their faces and
whatever. But for some reason both EU
boats are curiously, extremely still in the water.
I'm like, I got to think it'd bepretty difficult to board that U
boat if there's a big ass storm in the middle of the ocean.
(17:25):
Like you would think it would belike moving around and there'd
be big waves, but it's just likethey're clearly in a tank
somewhere. It also cracks me up that the
guy named Wentz is like please don't tell anybody I'm German,
they'll never know. That's true.
I was like Pete Wentz, the follow up boy's grandfather, Is
that you? That's the plot twist.
(17:46):
Later, Sam. The sequel comes out.
So they just about managed to surprise the Germans, but we
lose our first man, and then I'mGreg.
He dies, but other than that it's fairly easy for them to
just overwhelm everybody and they secure the U571.
But then the American version ofit is repeat out by the German
(18:09):
resupply submarine that they were pretending to be.
I was going to say everybody dies but now Coonan, Emmett and
Arsenal killed. So Emmett is Tylers best friend
and also Bon Jovi and we don't really see him get killed.
I read a little bit of trivia that he was supposed to be
beheaded but then they'd have torated R and they didn't want to
(18:32):
rated R so they just show him not there anymore.
The. Wild.
I just feel like for the confusion of people listening.
So there's their summary, which is the fake U boat.
They're trying to board the realincapacitated U boat.
Meanwhile, the resupply U boat they were trying to beat here
finally arrives, somehow sees all this happening in the dark
(18:54):
and stormy night, perceives whatis happening, and manages to
torpedo the correct U boat. Pretty amazing like skills for
sure. Dubious.
Very dubious. The commander, Dogran, he's just
about hanging on in the water, kind of literally.
He orders Tyler to dive. They captured you back with the
(19:15):
survivor still online, obviously.
And they do. And Dog Grand actually cries
out. Take her down.
And apparently these were the last words of Lieutenant
Commander Howard W Gilmer, who posthumously received the Medal
of Honor for his self sacrifice and saving his bird, the USS
Corridor. And I looked this up.
(19:36):
I don't know anything else aboutit, but I thought it was cool.
But they put that line in there.On the other hand, it's a pretty
generic line, so I don't know ifit's done on purpose or not.
Yeah. I was just going to ask that if
that was on purpose and then like what are the circumstances
of the growler going down? But I guess we'll never know.
(19:57):
Piece meal inclusion of history.And also they had previously had
this very on the nose conversation between Dahlgren
and Tyler. But like leadership and
sacrifice and like you have to be able to sacrifice your men
for the greater good of the team.
And then of course, while Dahlgren's floating in the
water, he has to be like, no, leave me.
And then Tyler has to like make that leadership and sacrifice
(20:19):
decision to. Let Dahlgren die so that he can
rescue everybody else. And we get to see Dahlgren
literally break to drown until the submarine is completely
submerged. I'm like the tongue is perfect.
He's like, I know how to swim but only for like 5 or 6 more
seconds. Watching Matthew Settles
character go down in his stretcher is like, that was like
(20:42):
one of the most terrifying things because you can't help
but feel like, I don't know, I March.
I can feel like you're almost like your claustrophobia with
it. And I'm also terrified of the
ocean. It's monster soup.
I don't, I can't see the bottom of it.
I don't know what's coming at me.
I don't trust it. So to see him go down and
(21:02):
yelling for someone to help him and he's all tied up in his
stretcher is just like one of the most terrifying feelings.
I was not comfortable. There was so much, there was so
much about this movie that I wasso uncomfortable, even down to
watching everybody be damp all the time.
It just made my skin crawl. I am built for comfort, you
guys, not utility. And so like I'm the kind of
(21:26):
person if it's a little bit humid out and my sheets are
maybe a little bit damp feeling because of humidity, I'm just
like, I can't do this. And so to see everyone just
dripping wet, I was like. Apparently the beds, like even
the mattresses were always a little damp.
Like everything was always damp.And the amount of space that
(21:47):
existed for you as a submariner on the boat I think was like 1
cubic meter, which is not a lot of room.
And everything else was taken upby like food supplies, whatever.
So it was like no matter where you were, like even in the area
where the bunks were, it would be crammed with supplies and
stuff and you would just be like, like trying to fit your
way around this like extremely, very crowded little maze.
(22:08):
Yeah, they would actually stack up fans of food in the aisles
and then cover them with planks.So when you were walking, then
not only are you getting the crush from left and right, but
you're getting the crush up and down too.
And then they also have this system called hot racking,
because not everybody can be sleeping at the same time.
(22:29):
So they break up the crews into shifts.
So you actually share your bunk with like one or two other guys
who are off shift while you're on shift.
And so everything's damp. It's probably smells like diesel
fumes and recycled farts, and you're just crammed into these
tiny little areas. It just sounds so very
(22:50):
unappealing to me. I can't.
My skin crawls just thinking about it.
Well, you can't bathe down thereeither, right?
So these guys are not. It smells like sweaty ball sack
for sure in that sense. Oh.
Yeah, it's red farts so. So they do a good job of showing
the supplies being stacked between the banks and the movie
(23:14):
like, but I give them that the way they've shot it, it looks
fucking claustrophobic. And I heard it.
Well, in early in the war to really a submarine was mostly a
surface vessel. They could dive to take
defensive maneuvers, but typically they'd be traveling
along the surface because they could travel a lot faster that
way. And, and it wasn't until later
(23:36):
in the war when they developed submarines that could be
underwater for like 3 days at a time without surfacing.
So it's like, yeah, you are getting this like claustrophobic
feeling, but it's like so often it's just like a tin can
floating on the water, you know,such like a strange
manifestation. The way I've heard it described
is a sewer pipe in the bottom ofthe ocean.
(23:59):
It sounds so pleasant. Yeah.
And there's no windows. You don't have any sunlight
whatsoever. You know, you can't get any
fresh air. The capabilities back then, it
started out as you could only besubmerged for like 48 hours.
And then those S boats were whatdid that.
And then later on, like Sammy said, it could be 3 days I
(24:19):
believe. But you're just running on fumes
at that point because you're running on your batteries.
And those batteries, I forget what they're made out of, but
when they're hit with salt water, they expel chlorinated
gas. Not really the thing that you
want in the middle of salt water.
That's not Yeah. Understand the year.
(24:40):
Yeah, that was what took out most of the crew of the Tang
when they were hit by their own torpedo.
And then as they were trying to get out through the escape
hatches, the hull collapsed. And as soon as that salt water
hit the batteries, it was just poisonous, noxious gas all over
the boat and everyone was asphyxiated.
(25:01):
It's not that we needed that aside.
Sorry, guys. I put a lot of asides in here.
I'll check. Yeah, just it feels like health
and safety were perhaps not top of mind.
No, not at all. Well, decisions were made.
Yeah, Tyler dives EU 570 one. It's fucked up, but he still is
able to dive. Like it still has some capacity
to do some things. And they actually have a
(25:23):
mechanic in their crew so they can make some of the fixes that
the Germans were not able to do.They're underwater and of course
they have to face off against the real resupply submarine that
has torpedoed their submarine. And so they have a little
underwater torpedo duel in the dark.
Which is not accurate. Actually sub on sub action was
really rare, and then there's actually only one instance in
(25:46):
the war of a submerged sub successfully torpedoing another
submerged sub. I guess they're borrowing from
real life. They're the statistical anomaly
for all of the statistics. Yeah, yeah, I think I, well and
I it's hard maybe for us to imagine today, but these aren't
homing torpedoes like you have to aim this torpedo at the
(26:08):
target you would like to hit, which is difficult at night in
the ocean. I also read somewhere that
German resupply your birds did not typically have torpedoes, so
it's a stretch. That's interesting.
I do like this sequence though, when they are diving, just the
kind of the rapid fire and then everybody's running around like
crazy. Like this is in German, this is
(26:29):
in German. And so whence and Hirsch are
just running their minds off, like trying to translate all of
the different gauges for everybody.
I don't understand what Bill Paxton was talking about when it
came to Tyler and his decision making because he's making 20
decisions in probably about 5 seconds amount of time and every
single one of them gets them diving and down to safety.
(26:50):
Yeah, it's not very consistent storytelling on their part.
I was just thinking about, you know, when they're, when they
keep calling the German speakerson board over to like, find me a
thing that says hydraulic or find me whatever.
I'm like, I speak pretty good French, but I wouldn't know the
technical words on a submarine for anything.
After they kind of just about survive, they go to look for
(27:12):
survivors of their own sub, the S 33, and find the cook, Eddie
Carson and Wessner pretending tobe an electrician instead of the
commander of the German slump. So I found this really confusing
because I thought, haven't they seen this man already?
Do they not recognize this guy as being the commander?
(27:35):
But I guess maybe not. Well, they saw him as part of of
the greeting party when they were boarding EU 571.
But I don't think he necessarilywas like, hi, I'm the captain.
And maybe not. Maybe you're right.
So they take this guy in and then they head for England.
This is Tyler's plan. But to do this, though, I have
to cross through you both infested Warners of the North
(27:58):
Atlantic. So it's not easy.
And one of the crew, Missoula, is not a particularly big fan of
this friend. This is the guy who said if you
die too far, you will just die immediately anyway.
He's not a fan of the plan or time of choices in general.
And he's pretty vocal about it. And then the Chief actually
(28:18):
shuts him up. Like he shuts him up against the
wall of that. Your bird is like, shut up.
So I like the scene. I like the Chief.
I do like that character quite alot.
So they're like, this is going to be so hard for us to go
across EU boat infested waters of the North Atlantic.
I'm like, yeah, but you look like AU boat like, and you guys
killed everyone on the resupply U boat.
(28:41):
So theoretically if someone radioed you or whatever, you get
one of your German guys on the line to be like, hey, we met the
resupply, so we're all good now.Our U boat is fine.
I'm like, I don't understand whythat can't happen.
Yeah, that is really confusing. And they do bring up like, well,
if we encounter another U boat, we only have one torpedo like,
but they would be so confused while you're shooting at them
(29:02):
and it would just bring more trouble for you.
Yeah, it is a weird part. Just pretend to be the German
submarine that you look like you're even wearing the correct
uniforms for. God suck, Yeah.
Just keep your head down guys. I did struggle at this part of
the movie because I'm like this his plan is so fucking
convoluted and I'm like am I dumb or could they just pretend
(29:25):
to be a U boat? And then also as they're pulling
up to, you know, the allied dockor whatever the harbor as a U
boat, I mean, wouldn't they alsorun the risk of being torpedoed
by the allies? That I didn't get that, yeah.
I feel like at this point I had almost forgotten that they still
have to Enigma and that's why they're then that's why they
(29:47):
even have to make it back. I'm like, wait, what?
What are their stakes again? That it's the Enigma and it
can't be caught because then theGermans will know they have to
Enigma and then they will changeup the codes.
So there are stakes, but I kept forgetting what they were.
It kind of does take like a backseat, doesn't it?
The ending machine. It does.
(30:08):
Also I think in real life it didn't just happen once like it
happened a few times that Enigmamachines ended up getting
captured so. Yeah, they are in.
A couple of them are in the end notes, the nerd cards at the
end. Fun fact, the because I have to
plug the great city of Chicago, the greatest city in the world.
The only U boat that you can seein North America is in Chicago.
(30:31):
It's EU 505, and it was captured, the only one captured
by the Americans. Yeah.
It's kind of a cool thing. You can go on it.
You can see exactly how cramped this was.
There's also an American S boat,I believe, from that era in
Charleston. You can go on that as well.
And it definitely does smell like World War 2 ball sack and
(30:53):
diesel fuels. Yeah.
I love how that stent just hangsaround over the intervening
decades. I didn't understand it.
I was taking a tour on this thing and I got so lightheaded
and I felt so, yeah, so sick theentire time.
Like, you'd think by now it would have aired out, but Nope.
(31:14):
You know, they were going for authenticity, I think.
Yeah, they didn't want to get one of those, like those little
cardboard things you hang from the rearview mirror in your car
that smells like a pine tree or something.
Just like all over. Yeah, I would like to say no
thank you to all of this. Fair enough.
Fair, Yeah. They see a German destroyer on
the horizon which like sidebar that whatever boat is there is
(31:35):
not a German destroyer. But like for suspension of
disbelief, we'll pretend it is aGerman destroyer and they so
obviously they have to dive because even though they look
fully like a U boat, they just are like we can't be seen.
So they're diving down, but Vosner manages to sabotage them
and he knocks out tank who's supposed to be watching him.
(31:56):
He shoots Mozola, but then Carson the cook stops him from
escaping. And so like, I don't know why
Vosner is being like kept alive at this point because he's being
a huge pain in the ass and fucking everything up.
But anyways, so they're not ableto dive yet.
So they devise this plan where they're going to try and let the
German destroyer get close and then they're going to destroy
(32:16):
the radio communications on the destroyer, which they have to do
because they don't want the German destroyer to radio back
to land and tell everyone that there are Americans on this U
boat. Because then everyone will know
that they have an Enigma machineand then they will dive.
It's a whole thing. And.
Apparently the destroyer is alone.
Yeah. Sure.
(32:37):
I love that tone. Just apparently it's alone and
also I think they can't die. Yep, because they haven't
managed to fix their your body enough yet for them to die, so
they have to solve for time. Yes, that's what it is.
It's just really confusing. So they do manage to take out
that comes for some reason, no one knows why.
(32:58):
And then they do die and. You have to explain how they
take out the radio comms that people need to know.
Do I remember? Do they use that?
What do they do? They use the machine?
No, they don't. What do they do?
They shoot it with like this biggun and they manage to like
pigeonhole this fucking shell into like the exact place where
(33:18):
they need it to go. All right, it's the anti
aircraft condoms. And all the while, you know,
they have this crew from the German destroyer in a little
dinghy kind of trying to rope upnext to the U571, and they're,
you know, trying to speak Germanto who they think are other
fellow Germans. And the guys are like, yeah,
(33:40):
whatever. Yeah, pay no attention to us
getting this big ass gun ready to shoot.
Yeah, no, don't worry. Like it feels so cartoonish.
It feels like literal Looney Tunes, like somebody's going to
go sneaking by dressed as a Bushat some point.
It's like there wasn't even an attempt made to like, let's get
the German speaking dudes up here and like try and trick this
(34:03):
crew in the dinghy into going away.
Let's like not even make that attempt.
I think actually one of them wasWentz and he's just like, yeah,
Glash. And he just keeps moving.
Like, yeah, he doesn't even try to like start just talking to
distract them. He's no, it's let's just sneak
by with our, you know, Acme gun over here.
(34:23):
Oh yeah, and this is part of a longer con, because once they
knock out this ship's radio situation, they're going to dive
and then come back up far away from the ship and then use their
single remaining torpedo. And they're not going to fuck
this up. They're going to torpedo the
ship from far away and then everyone will die and their
secret will be safe. And it's really tense because
(34:45):
they do dive and they go right underneath that destroyer and
it's super tender. Like, are they gonna hit it?
Are they gonna hit it? But they don't, obviously.
And then the destroyer fires a whole bunch of splashers, which
is the nickname for the depth charges to try and destroy them.
And they have to come up with yet another plant to try to get
(35:06):
away and to where they like airspace to try and get safe
that way. So this whole scene takes a long
fucking time and they use so many depth charges.
I don't think they would have had that money because I read
somewhere that it's like 18 if you count them and they didn't
have it on the Destroyer. It's another one of those, how
(35:26):
can we make this even more unbelievable?
This is how. The thing is about depth charges
too. So depth charges are an anti
submarine weapon. It's basically an explosive.
It looks a little bit like a barrel.
You can roll it off a ship and if you're right over top of a
submarine and it falls through the water causes an explosion.
And they were developed originally during World War One.
They improved during World War 2.
(35:47):
They created these head throwingweapons.
If I'm in a boat, I can throw like a spray of them in front of
me instead of just like rolling them off the edge of the boat.
But they fell out of use after World War 2 because they
invented homing torpedoes, whichwere much more accurate because
depth charges had a like a 5% success rate.
So they definitely would not be scoring hit after hit on a
submarine, especially because for like a ship they would have
(36:10):
to use like sonar to find where the submarines are.
But like effectively underneath you is like a blind spot.
So you're dropping deaf charges but like you don't know if
you're hitting anything? So that's why they need AT
clearly, because they just neverget you anyway.
They also tried to do something else, which is eject debris and
(36:31):
also Mazzola's body to try and trick the destroyer into
thinking that they are in fact destroyed.
But this doesn't work yet because it takes time for the
debris and Mazzola's body to surface.
So there's this whole thing where the crews kind of like
we're we're going to eject Mazzola's body after he tried to
(36:52):
maybe save us a little bit toward the end finally after
being a Dick the whole time. But they do end up doing it.
I don't think they executed thisrole in the movie.
It just struck to learn to have effect.
Like either have it work immediately or just don't.
Yeah, I was confused that they brought it up and then a bunch
of other stuff happened and thenthey actually did it.
(37:14):
Yeah. Then it still felt like it took
a long time for the Germans to see it as well.
And I had totally forgotten thatMissoula had that whole scene
where they're basically establishing him as the boat hot
head. Like when that reconnaissance
plane finds them and he's tryingto, he's trying to go down.
I think it's Trigger. Like literally this guy's name
(37:37):
is Trigger and he's on the machine gun and he's trying to
goad him into shooting down thisreconnaissance plane.
And it's all just, I think to establish like, oh, this guy's
got a temper issue. And he doesn't trust Tyler
because he directly deserves an order right in front of him.
Yeah, and then they kill him off, so no longer a source of
(37:57):
conflict. Tied that one up, yeah.
They've dived down about as far as they would reasonably want to
dive in this submarine. And then Tyler's like we're
going to dive even lower. We're going to dive down to
they're at like 160 meters, which is like the Max.
And he's like we're going to dive to 180 meters and then a
few minutes later he's like we're going to dive down to 200
meters. And basically up until like this
(38:21):
like 2 minute span where the pressure of the water actually
starts to affect EU boat. Mostly the proof that we can see
that they're getting deeper underwater and more stressed out
is the fact that everyone is very sweaty.
So they dive down super low. The water pressure eventually
damages the ship and they start to send, but the ballast tanks
have been damaged. So they basically can't slow
(38:42):
their ascent and they are going to surface whether they like it
or not, which was not part of the plan.
And they are like, OK, well we got to have our torpedo ready
when we surface because we're going to have to shoot this
destroyers now or never. But of course their torpedo is
fucked up because it wouldn't beaction movie if that weren't the
case. And so trigger has to go into
the submerged pipe to fix. AI think it's a hydraulic leak,
(39:05):
which is also I would say like probably the most claustrophobic
scene of the movie. Yep, I looked this up.
There was considerable variability in the Max dives of
different classes of submarines.The probably the deepest diving
submarine of World War 2 is the Type 7U boat.
It had a test depth of 270 meters or 890 feet.
The test depth was not necessarily a maximum depth.
(39:26):
Dives of up to 300 meters were sometimes recorded during the
war without crushing. Usually these were not
intentional dives like it would be as a result of submarine
having to go super low to take evasive maneuvers.
Not because they wanted to go that low necessarily, but it
would have been super inadvisable because sometimes
submarines, even at less than their test depth, would have an
(39:46):
adverse reaction to pressure. You're always in a situation
where the water pressure could potentially get you.
And I think the American submarines, at least the early S
boats, only had the capability to do half of what AU vote could
do. So when the guys are freaking
out that Tyler's pushing them further and further, it's
because in their minds they think that this is a sure way to
(40:07):
die. And then?
I love how the chief kind of murmurs to himself, like those
Germans can really make a vote. That's true.
And then before you know it, youneed more conflict because they
suddenly realize they hear something out for the sonar or
on the radio. I mean, and it's not one of
their messages. So they're like, who's sending
(40:29):
this message? And it turns out that Roster has
escaped yet again and he's trying to signal the Germans.
Why the fuck is he still alive? Maybe I misunderstood this.
I thought he was like tapping a Morse code message.
They were all trying to be really quiet and then they could
hear this like Morse code message, and it was him.
Yeah, and I love this part because the two guys who pick up
(40:52):
on it are the two German speakers.
Yeah, as far as action movies. So like I do, I'll get sucked
into an action movie like a mothto a flame.
This is my favorite part of the whole movie because you can, if
you watch Hirsch, he realizes what's going on before everybody
else does and before the audience does, and he just takes
off running out of nowhere. And then the next time you see
(41:14):
him, he's got just like, rage inhis eyes and he bludgeons Vosner
in the face with a wrench, I think it is.
And and then he comes back with,like, blood streaked down his
cheek. And everybody's looking at him
like, sweetie, you got a little,you got a little something.
And he's like blood. He goes from totally freezing in
the beginning to like just this,you know, rabid killer like
(41:39):
totally over Vosner bullshit at that point.
So I think everybody else is like you said, why is he still
alive? This movie is a cautionary tale
and what to do with your Pows? Grim, sorry.
I like this part too because thethey're trying to be so fucking
quiet in this submarine because the boat on the surface can hear
(42:01):
them if you even like, speak tooloudly with the sonar, which I
think is just like that. Adds so much tension to it.
Like they're sort of like speaking very quietly to one
another and trying not to make any noise.
And I guess this was also a thing that boats would do to
each other if they're or like due to submarines is just
whenever you ping this sonar, you can hear it reverberate
(42:23):
through the submarine. So even if it was just a normal
day and a boat was trying to harass you, it would ping the
sonar and just keep you awake. It would annoy the hell out of
you to the point where you wouldjust kind of snap too.
Interesting, that's mean. It reminds me of washing machine
Charlie. The Japanese would fly a plane
(42:43):
over every night in Guadalcanal and just drop bombs in the
jungle to just harass the Marines and their foxholes.
Yeah. Well, unfortunately our young
submariner trigger drowns, but not before he saves the day.
He fixes the leak so they can fire their torpedo and they're
able to successfully blow up thedestroyer.
I guess it's kind of a happy ending.
The remaining crew abandons the ship.
(43:04):
They still have the Enigma, so they're going to be able to
bring it back and help the allies crack the Enigma code and
they are spotted by AUS Navy plane so they know that they're
hopefully going to shortly be rescued.
Hooray, but no trigger don't die.
We liked you. So sad, especially when you see
him reaching. And yeah, poor trigger.
I will be honest that I did findhim interchangeable with the
(43:27):
other young blonde guy up until this moment.
I wanted to make the joke like, oh trigger, we hardly knew you.
They're like, we need a small guy to go down and plug this
leak. And so everybody looks at the
two small guys who happen to be sitting next to each other, and
they're like, why is everyone looking at us?
Yeah, those are. Yeah.
I wonder if that's the other interchangeable blonde small
(43:50):
fellow. He also probably has an
interesting nickname. Yeah, I I just feel like I'm 511
and I feel like I would hate being on a submarine, but in
that moment I would love being 511 and too big to go in that
pipe. I didn't put this in the notes,
but it's Tyler has to make the hard decision to send him in
(44:10):
there. And then he's like, I can't do
it because he comes back out unsuccessful at some point.
And then Tyler has to speak to him and like, encourage him to
come back in there and fix it. And you're like, oh God, no,
he's going to die. Isn't it?
You just know. I like who he's like.
I know you think you can't fix it, but I need you to defy the
laws of physics. Perhaps like snap some of your
(44:32):
bones and get in there. I looked up the plane that
because it looked funny to me and apparently it's a PBY
Catalina which is a flying dog. I thought this was really neat.
I've never seen one before, but cool.
What would it have been doing there?
Do we know? Like does it lot, you know, does
(44:53):
that mean that they were close to Greenland I.
I feel like they make it a pointto like I think Matthew
Mcconaughey's character or something says something like,
oh, it's a long range something or other.
Like we're meant to understand that.
Like they know that typically you wouldn't get like a single
or double engine plane like out that far.
Thankfully, there hasn't been another submarine waiting to
(45:13):
kill them in their day. And EU boat infested waters that
we were warned about. Yes.
Exactly. So we had an opening card.
We also got an end card. It says, well, it's quite long.
There's a couple. It says this film is dedicated
to the bravery of our large sailors and officers who
westernized capturing Enigma materials from you guys during
(45:35):
the Battle of the Atlantic. And then we get a couple of
examples. The first one is May 9, 1941,
Enigma machine accounting documents captured from the U110
by HMS Bulldog and HMS of the third escort group.
So that's the first one we get, which is actually not an
(45:55):
American crew, but a British crew.
And the second one we get is October 30th, 1942, short
weather cipher captured from theU559 by The Age.
And the last one we got is June 4th, 1944, Enigma machine and
guarding documents captured fromthe U5O5 by U.S.
(46:17):
Navy Task Force 22.3. So that's it.
That's the end of the movie. It just ends like you said in
the beginning. That's it.
Just stops. I have some notes on this.
(46:37):
So the film Sam has already mentioned it, but it's very,
very, very, very loosely based on the story of the year 110,
which we just mentioned in the end cards.
But it's a British crew, not theAmericans that captured the
first Enigma cards on sea. And that's perhaps the reason
that the British didn't really like this film.
(46:59):
And this actually made it all arranged in the House of
Commons, where Labour MP Brian Jenkins stated that the film
was, quote, UN quote, an affrontto the memories of British
sailors who lost their lives on this action.
And Prime Minister Johnny Blair at the time agreed.
And when we say very loosely based, it's because the 110 crew
(47:21):
had actually left EU boat and they thought it was going to
sink, but it didn't. And that's when the crew of the
HMS Boulder was able to board itand grab the Enigma and the
goat. So it's not quite as exciting as
we job in this movie. No, that would have been like a
15 minute movie they would have done.
EU boat is empty. Let's get on there and grab the
Enigma. I do like I said, I hate to say
(47:44):
the ugly American thing but theydon't really make any claims
though to be based on anything so I don't want to make any
British friends of the pod mad but I don't get it.
Sorry I had to say it. I just don't understand the
frustration. Very little dead in the market
(48:06):
quite a bit. Oh, OK, I was because I was also
wondering too if maybe I was watching it on Netflix.
So I was wondering if it was something that Netflix removed,
you know, was like an inspired by title at the beginning.
So I tried to find like a DVD ofit and was unsuccessful but so
(48:26):
that makes sense. I think I remember reading too
that I don't remember if it was the director.
I think maybe it was, but he hadactually spoken with some of the
actual crew members. And then when the movie was
about to come out, one of the guys that he'd been talking to
was like, would it be cool if you mentioned the actual guys
who did the stuff? And he was like, OK, so the end
(48:47):
cards were actually sort of added as like an afterthought,
which I almost wonder if, like, if it would be easier to
attribute this movie entirely tofiction if they just hadn't
added those end cards. I think that would have been a
better idea for sure. In 2009, this film was first on
the list of the most historically inaccurate movies
in the Times. So it's not very accurate.
(49:10):
And David Ayer was later quoted to regret making the movie like
this and changing the British crew to an American crew.
And yet injected assault to fury.
Yeah, I thought that was funny too, that he actually said like,
I wouldn't have done it this waytoday.
And then Fury is super weird andinaccurate.
(49:32):
Yeah, it's funny because it's like, I don't know, the vibes of
this are almost like, you know how in Fury, what's historically
accurate is like the Super technical stuff.
A lot of the time it's like, oh,this specific Control Board is
100% historically accurate, or like this piece of the tank is
100% historically accurate or whatever, but then it's like the
actual everything happening around it has like nothing to do
(49:54):
with actually what happened in history.
Yeah, that's definitely U571. And I think I read somewhere too
that the people who made the film toured the U5O5 and took a
crapload of notes. And so yeah, all that technical
stuff when they call out different instrumentation and
different procedures, that's all100% correct.
(50:18):
So I feel like Ayer has a style then going from this to Fury.
Yeah, but there wasn't a like a 20 minute long super sexual
assault scene in this movie, so I did appreciate that.
I knew there's a reason I haven't seen Fury.
Yeah, you can give it a miss. I went through a really like
anti Brad Pitt stage. I don't, I can't pinpoint why,
(50:42):
like don't ask me. I just kind of was like, oh,
he's in it. I can pass right now.
And then I just never revisited it.
So I'm glad you gave me that trigger warning though.
Yeah, I made to say that one outof 10 in whatever we were
writing a lot of and it. Kind of sucks because like it
has Jon Bernthal in it. It has Shia La Boeuf who like
sucks as a human being but is like a pretty good actor.
(51:03):
It has like, you know, it has like the makings of potentially
being a good movie and then it is simply not a good movie.
Speaking of writings, we need towrite this movie, guys.
I'm going to go to our guest first.
Katie, what do you rate it? It's definitely a solid action
movie, but that's about it. It's not solid in any sort of
history whatsoever, so I'm goingto split the difference and say
(51:26):
I give it a 5. So that's five improbable as
good scenarios out of. Yes.
I mean, I'd say there were about5 in there, so.
I was going to say like, that's still probably less than what
was in the movie, but. How about you some?
Gosh. Well, it was fun to see Matt
settle, It was fun to see Bon Jovi even though I did not
recognize him, It was fun to seeMatthew McConaughey doing his
(51:50):
usual Matthew McConaughey thing.And it was fun to see Bill
Paxton RIP, but it's simply not that great of a movie.
It was nice to see a submarine movie.
Like I feel like there's not a ton of them.
So that was kind of cool and it gave me an opportunity to look
into that. But yeah, I'll give this movie.
I think I'll agree. I'll give it 5 and probable
escape scenarios out of 10. It's like if you want to like
(52:13):
throw something on and maybe notpay that much attention to it,
it's not the worst or anything, but I don't think that you need
to run out and watch it. I don't think it's a crucial
part of the World War 2 Canon. I'm going to rate it like as a
movie it's not bad. I'm going to give it maybe 4.5
improper escape scenarios out of10, only because I had a
(52:35):
terrible time being claustrophobic and in front of
the sea. It's a decent thriller.
It's pretty 10s in some places, which I enjoyed.
I don't remember any of the music.
I do remember some of the music actually, and I don't think
about it at the opening of it. I thought it was quite
triumphant, like we're we're celebrating World War 2 again.
(52:57):
It's almost like it almost gave me like Indiana Jones vibes and
places. Yeah, but yeah, I don't think I
would watch it again for all thereasons I've already named.
So not a waste of time, but alsonot a great movie.
I'll definitely put it on if I'mlike, folding laundry or
something, but there are other movies that I can watch to fill
(53:19):
a couple of hours of my life. Yeah.
Katie, are you reading anything?I am.
So I'm doing two different bookskind of in fits and starts.
I'm alternating between the two.One is called D-Day through
(53:40):
Franchise, and it's this incredibly well researched
collection of interviews and diary entries and things like
that of the French who were living in Normandy and their
experiences of the day before the landing and then after that.
And another collection of memoirs called And If I Shall
(54:02):
Perish, which is about combat nurses in World War 2,
alternating between the two because it's pretty heavy on
both sides and sometimes you need a break.
Sounds about right. Are you reading other things on?
Yeah, I am reading The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, Herman
Goering, Doctor Douglas M Kelly and A Fatal Meeting of the Minds
at the end of World War 2 by Jack L Hi.
(54:24):
And it's interesting because I am also reading a book that I
talked about last week about theBattle of Britain.
So I'm getting like Herman Goering 1940, the RAF are going
to be wiped out in a few days. We're going to have air
superiority, no problem. And then I'm also get Herman
Goering at like Nuremberg where he's just like, I'm still the
head Nazi in charge, damn it. So it's a super neat read so
(54:47):
far. I mean, just like a really
interesting topic, I guess. And they're making a movie
that's coming out in November where I think Russell is it
Russell Crowe who plays Goering anyway.
Yeah, it's got Russell Crowe, it's got our friend Rami Relek.
I say our friend, he's not our friend.
We've never met him. And it's got also he's got a
Dutch actress in it, which I think is neat.
(55:09):
So hopefully we'll get to cover it on the show and maybe get
some of the actors on. I'm just putting that out.
They are into the universe rightnow.
Manifest it. Are you reading anything?
I am not to no one surprise are you could probably watching
anything. I have watched a lot of things
recently. I what am I?
The last thing I watched was Foundation, which is a sci-fi
(55:34):
show but can't even tell you what it's about.
It's too confusing. But it's good and it's one of
those that you can kind of get lost in, and the world building
is really neat, so I enjoyed that.
Nice. Yeah, I feel like you watch a
lot of sci-fi stuff or like I feel like you've mentioned some
sci-fi stuff before. I love sci-fi if it's good and
(55:55):
if I don't have to look at spacetoo much because I'm also afraid
of space. Have you seen Altered Carbon?
Yes, I loved Altered Carbon. This again.
I liked that one too. Yeah, anyway.
I think we're kind of to the point where we can round up this
episode. Katie, thank you so much for
being on with us today and beingunder the bed submarines.
(56:16):
Thanks for having me, it was a pleasure.
And everybody else, thank you somuch for listening.
You can find us wherever you getyour podcast.
You can rate us on a bunch of platforms.
You can send this episode to a friend who likes submarines.
You can follow us on Instagram at Rosie the Reviewer Podcast.
You can visit our website rosietheviewer.com For more
(56:38):
information and we'll see you next week.
Bye.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist
It’s 1996 in rural North Carolina, and an oddball crew makes history when they pull off America’s third largest cash heist. But it’s all downhill from there. Join host Johnny Knoxville as he unspools a wild and woolly tale about a group of regular ‘ol folks who risked it all for a chance at a better life. CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist answers the question: what would you do with 17.3 million dollars? The answer includes diamond rings, mansions, velvet Elvis paintings, plus a run for the border, murder-for-hire-plots, and FBI busts.