Gallipoli (1981)

First saw this movie when I was 14. I remember being angry and upset at the ending. Re-discovered the movie in 2003 as a World History teacher. Starting showing my classes this movie and always interested to see the students reactions at the final scene. I have read numerous books dealing with Gallipoli as well as conversing with members of the Australian Light Horse Association regarding the film and the Gallipoli Campaign itself. Learned a great deal about the event and have a profound respect for those men and what they stood for. Its sad that the mentality and character that those men had are no longer found today...Lest We Forget

Fmovies: A stranger seeing the title Gallipoli might think one was going to view a kind of docudrama along the lines of The Longest Day. That's certainly a film waiting to be made. Instead one's going to see the friendship of two sprinters, Mark Lee and Mel Gibson, and how they join the Australian Army which sent a lot of its best and brightest to fight in a faraway war in Europe which really Australia had nothing to do with.

Australia was a nation at that point for only 14 years in 1915. The various colonies and the great unsettled middle united and achieved independence from Great Britain in 1901. It had developed no real traditions as a nation up to that point. The USA had some similar growth pangs, many historians hold that we didn't become a nation really until the end of the Civil War.

The Aussie fascination with sports is shown here. Part of the recent frontier tradition is the explanation usually given. Mark Lee is a sprinter, training to represent Australia in the Olympics to come. Mel Gibson is also a sprinter, but takes a rather more casual attitude towards it. Reference is made to Harry Lascelles who was an Australian track star of the period. In fact Lee when he enlists adopts that as a last name and lies about his age. In Australia sports stars aren't just athletes with inflated egos and paychecks like they are in America. From Harry Lascelles, to Rod Laver, to Murray Rose, right down to Ian Thorpe, these people are national icons.

Gibson and Lee's army service and the Gallipoli campaign only occupy a third of the film. In the next World War, Winston Churchill who had a big hand in conceiving this operation called the landings at Anzio a "beached whale". The difference there though was that eventually the Allied Armies did hook up with the Anzio beachhead in a few months. You had a similar beached whale at ANZAC cove on the Gallipoli peninsula with Aussie and Kiwi troops from the ANZAC countries with these troops established on a beachhead, but unable to move in any direction.

The idea behind Gallipoli was to seize it and march forward and seize control of the straights of the Dardenelles and Bosporus so supplies to Russia would get through and knock the Ottoman Empire out of the war. To rescue this operation which was in trouble, the Allied commander Sir Ian Hamilton landed another army at Suvla Bay on the other side of the peninsula. Those two armies never hooked up and now there were two beached whales on Gallipoli and no other Allied Army looking to hook up with them.

It's this particular action and what happens to Gibson and Lee as two of the thousands still stuck at ANZAC cove that is the heart of the story.

Mel Gibson of course became an international star shortly. I'm surprised Mark Lee didn't though he's had a successful career in Australia. In fact I was most impressed by the touching performance he delivers here.

All the young men who died in that operation who bonded together on those beachheads and those who survived took back a national identity with them. No one was from Victoria, New South Wales, Western Territory etc. they were all Aussies now, but it was a terrible price. And in a war that really had nothing to do with Australia. That fact entered into the thinking in Australia and New Zealand come the second war when there was very much a threat to the continent/island nation's very existence. Bitter lessons from Gallipoli impressed on that generation of Australia's best and brightest.

The Australian classic, handling a subject that is a significant part of Australian history and culture. The characters are heart-felt and sincere, without the standard mawkishness of American movies. They reflect the underdog, larrakin nature of the traditional Aussie spirit. This is the closest most Australians get to a blatant flag-waving exercise, so let us enjoy it! It certainly helps make ANZAC Day ceremonies a lot more meaningful to the younger generations, who need full-color pictures to help visualize the events. Of course it shouldn't be taken as a documentary, but I have heard that most war veterans approved of the dramatization.

Gallipoli fmovies. A lesson still sadly unlearned by today's great "Empire" - this film builds perfectly to show that war IS terror. In 1915, as today, it is not the ruling elites that ultimately face that terror, but everyday people full of precious dreams and yet-to-be-fulfilled promise. "Gallipoli" follows the adventure of two Australian mates fighting for the British Empire in a badly-managed attack in Turkey during WW1. The deckchairs have been somewhat rearranged these days, but the message is as relevant, as chilling and as powerful as ever. A true classic.

Terrific film that so succinctly sums up the passion and the innocence of the Aussie soldiers as they gave their lives up for a cause not their own, believing to the end that duty demanded that they make a good showing of themselves. This story is based in historical fact and is still discussed today as one of the most terrible follies foisted upon young men by totally incompetent military leaders. There are even worse stories that are told about the wars outcome in France and Belgium but this film captures enough of the tragedy to drive home the point of how mad all wars are.

The very young and handsome and Aussie sounding Mel Gibson is very convincing as are the entire cast. Peter Weir crafted a heart wrenching film which ends with a moment that you just can not shake from your mind. Great film and very moving.

Peter Weir has long been one of my favorite directors, and he has had a career consumed by subtle, quiet, lingering films. He can make the most banal concept seem thrilling and suspenseful; a perfect example is the Harrison Ford film "Witness." It could have easily become a stupid, insulting, exploitative "thriller." The ending is, in retrospect, quite ridiculous. But Weir has a strange ability to make anything seem realistic.

"Gallipoli" is one of his older films, from 1981, and it stars a huge cast of names - most famous today, of course, Mel Gibson...whose name is now splattered across the front of the DVD case.

The story is a true one and follows a group of young Australian men who join the ANZACs in World War I. They are sent to Gallipoli, and amidst personal and emotional turmoil they must learn to band together and fight the Turkish Army.

The movie is long, as another reviewer on the site points out. But all of Weir's films are. What I didn't like about his most recent - "Master & Commander" - is that it used special effects (exteriors of ships, etc.) and action sequences (raging storms) to compensate for the slow bits... and came across (to me anyway) as quite dull and down-trodden.

"Gallipoli" is a great film - slow, subtle, low-key. It's a bit like an Australian version of "All Quiet on the Western Front." I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys slower films and can appreciate character-driven dramas. Don't go near it if your attention span was dimming during "xXx2."