My Boy Jack

[LeeEnfield]

Just watched this drama, based on Jack Kipling, and his loss of life at the battle of Loos.

 

Very moving, I thought.

[Bodge Deep]

Yep I enjoyed it... didn't really take much notice of the uniforms eqpt etc to be honest but thought it was very well done.

I thought the casting of Daniel Radcliffe was excellent as he sticks in everyones mind as a very young man which emphasised the inexperience and youth of so many of those poor souls

[Mark]

Missed it at work tonight :-(

[hardyferret]

I watched it too, very well done and moving The sum ?? what a bloody waste

 

The poem said a lot at the end

 

 

HF

[ford 369]

very thought provoking tv ,for a change,especially on november 11

Nigel

[N.O.S.]

I thought the casting of Daniel Radcliffe was excellent as he sticks in everyones mind as a very young man which emphasised the inexperience and youth of so many of those poor souls

 

Yes, very good point. I caught the tail end of it after a very long drive to Preston for work last night - well worth catching a repeat I would think. Really makes you think.....

[ArtistsRifles]

Saw it and thought it was good, very good. Not only was Daniel Radcliffe good but so was the actor who played his father - the change from the jingoistic pro war character to what he became in the end was well portrayed.

[woa2]

If you missed this excellent programme, you can watch it on-line from the ITV website.

 

http://www.itv.com/Drama/default.html

 

Alternatively, they are going to bring it out on DVD.

[Snapper]

I've been to Dud Corner where Jack Kipling's name is listed on the monument to the Missing. There is also his alleged grave in nearby St Mary's ADS cemetery which is an extremely contentious spot. The decision to identify the grave as his has never had universal agreement amongst the genuine experts and many feel it was a 'political' decision, made for some bizarre reason long after the Kiplings had died. For me they represent an enormous tragedy, given the later death of their daughter in the USA which Mrs Kipling really blamed on her husband. Poor Kipling, one of the greatest writers in the English language ruined by his own ambition for his children. There is a lesson in it for us all. I'm planning to visit the Kipling grave in January. Loads have been already, but it will be nice to do it. The battles of Loos and Festubert claimed tens of thousands of men and are very much ignored in favour of looking at the Somme and 3rd Ypres in the mainstream. I missed the programme, but will catch up.

Cheers

 

MB

[LeeEnfield]

Yep I enjoyed it... didn't really take much notice of the uniforms eqpt etc to be honest but thought it was very well done.

I thought the casting of Daniel Radcliffe was excellent as he sticks in everyones mind as a very young man which emphasised the inexperience and youth of so many of those poor souls

 

 

 

Well equipment looked to be right; SMLE enfields, long bayonetts, webbing, etc all looked true, also B'dress ;..............All looked as though someone had done their homework in researching the details.

Certainly loads better that another semi recent doc/drama on the somme, where no4 enfields were being shown, with a Very strange lash up to affix the long blade. (No4's only ever had fittings for the 'pigsticker')

[Snapper]

Good, during the particular period there was a real hotchpotch of kit before officers learned to make themselves less conspicuous. Not sure about the Guards anyway, where spit and polish were always paramount. The rifles thing is interesting. The Somme thing meant well, but they will always cut corners at the Beeb. I dream of the day we have a really decent film made on the war with the production standards of a Spielberg movie. But the cost alone would be huge and we all know the audience would be lacking unless we could get Matt Damon to say cor blimey guv'nor or I say old chap (quite apart from anything from t'other latitudes north of Pinewood. I wouldn't care as long as the film was true to the men and the times. Read McCrae's Battalion by Jack Alexander. It is Band of Brothers in every sense and the multi layered stories are wonderful. Jambos forever. It's a pipe dream.

[LeeEnfield]

Good, during the particular period there was a real hotchpotch of kit before officers learned to make themselves less conspicuous. Not sure about the Guards anyway, where spit and polish were always paramount. The rifles thing is interesting. The Somme thing meant well, but they will always cut corners at the Beeb. I dream of the day we have a really decent film made on the war with the production standards of a Spielberg movie. But the cost alone would be huge and we all know the audience would be lacking unless we could get Matt Damon to say cor blimey guv'nor or I say old chap (quite apart from anything from t'other latitudes north of Pinewood. I wouldn't care as long as the film was true to the men and the times. Read McCrae's Battalion by Jack Alexander. It is Band of Brothers in every sense and the multi layered stories are wonderful. Jambos forever. It's a pipe dream.

 

 

Personnaly, while I watch BoB, on tv and then was given the dvd's,..............I didn't really 'get into', it, that much.

 

Book I'd like to to see made into film,...as long as it stayed true to written word, is

Covenant With Death, by John Harris.

 

(* I've an idea it was made,.......but wasn't as per book;...........although I may be wrong)

 

The book is a good read,....well worth looking out for, the descriptions of battle seem verry realistic. (book was first published in 1961)

 

'Two years in the making

Ten minutes in the destroying

That was our history'.

[Degsy]

Y,es, certainly agree with you about the book Andy, really takes you into the trenches.