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Recently having read into the American Civil war and the great battle of Gettysburg, I wonder if fellow dakka users could point me to any media they consider to be entertaining.

Sadly, I have not been able to find any action game about Gettysburg itself (the heck?). There are a few strategy games and we recently bought the Ultimate General Steam EA RTS-ish game. We have found a few videos but most are documentaries and those tend to be rather....boring. Unless you disagree?

Anything you guys would want to have anyone interested in it to look into?

Also: screw the South!

There is the film Gettysburg (from 1993, not the crappy History Channel made one that probably involves aliens or something). This movie is LONG. Bring snacks.

The movie is based on the novel The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara.

 LordofHats wrote:
There is the film Gettysburg (from 1993, not the crappy History Channel made one that probably involves aliens or something). This movie is LONG. Bring snacks.

The movie is based on the novel The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara.

What makes that movie great and realistic is that 95% of the Soldiers were local Reinactors. They were telling the costume designers what they were doing wrong.

You cant go wrong with the DVD, you will get a lot of info from the Special Features.
Other Good Movies
>The General [Based on a real Story]
>The Horse Soldiers [A good movie showing some of the raids that happened]
>The Undefeated [This gives you good look at the mindset after the war]
>Gone with the Wind [The Post Battle Scenes gives you good insight]
>Glory [This Movie got me thinking about a Guard Regiment, that I still have not gotten much work on]

Darn, someone suggested Gettysburg (the movie) already. As mentioned, it is quite long, but it does have some brilliant depictions of the generals.

Also, if you're able to find it, Civil War Generals 2 is a great game for the period. It's one of the old Sierra hex games, but I had quite a bit of fun playing it.

I think there's a Civil War mod for Empire: Total War as well.

 IAmTheWalrus wrote:
Darn, someone suggested Gettysburg (the movie) already. As mentioned, it is quite long, but it does have some brilliant depictions of the generals.

Also, if you're able to find it, Civil War Generals 2 is a great game for the period. It's one of the old Sierra hex games, but I had quite a bit of fun playing it.

There's also Gods and Generals

Thanks for the suggestions so far, we'll look into it...I assume that Gettysburg is on Netflix too.

I forgot to mention that music is appreciated as well. Iced Earth released a 32 minutes, 3-part-song about Gettysburg and it still gives me shivers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M155Er6PFz0

Best part at 28:00:

We're almost there my boys!
I've never served with finer!
We must push foward boys!
AND BAYONET THE YANKEE TYRANT!
to the copse of trees we charge,
to crush the union center!
And when they turn and run,
an open road leads us to freedom!!! (fa-reedom)

Amazing!

Gods and Generals doesn't include the battle of Gettysburg

Though Civil War wide we also have Glory, Gangs of New York, and Gone with the Wind (the film and book are classics)

 LordofHats wrote:
Gangs of New York

I honestly wouldn't consider that much of an ACW film... It's definitely a fantastic piece of work, and it doesn't take long to figure out that people like the Dead Rabbits were ACTUAL GANGS!!! Take that you silly Bloods

Ah but the film takes place during the Civil War on the eve of the New York draft riots

I cannot recommend Gettysburg (the 1993 film) highly enough. It is a modern epic. Every part of that movie is perfect in every way. If you can track down a copy of the soundtrack, buy it. You will not be disappointed.

But if you plan to watch the film, clear up your schedule for an entire afternoon. That monster is 4 hours long (four and a half if you get the director's cut).

Also, on a broader Civil War note, why not look into... The Civil War (by Ken Burns). It is the definitive documentary about the war, as it details events leading up to and after the war, with a plethora of celebrity voice actors reading letters from the participants and interviews and commentary by some of the premier historians of the era (that era being the 1980s). Every time I wacth it, I learn something new.

By the way, it's like 10 episodes long, and each episode is around 90 minutes long. Might want to take a few days off of work before you tackle that one.

There is a fair few civil war mods for Mount and Blade Warband which are quite good to play.
This also looks promising but I imagine is a fair bit off yet:
http://www.flyingsquirrelent.eu/index.html

Edited: Misread.

Gettysburg
God and Generals
Red Badge of Courage
Blue and the Gray
Glory
Ride with the Devil
Cold Mountain

Some mention the old school movies

The Horse Soldiers
Shenandoah
The Undefeated


Suprise people forgot "Glory"

 Frazzled wrote:


There's also Gods and Generals

If you want to see a movie with bad acting, bad writing, and a movie that celebrates slavery, and shows happy slaves...by all means watch Gods and Generals.


GG

 generalgrog wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


There's also Gods and Generals

If you want to see a movie with bad acting, bad writing, and a movie that celebrates slavery, and shows happy slaves...by all means watch Gods and Generals.


GG

Then you totally did not understand then what the movie was trying to portray about the events and battles leading up to Gettysburg concerning two main figures of the Confederate State Army. Lee and Jackson

Yeah. I can get behind the bad acting and bad writing. Gods and Generals was rather lack luster as a film, but celebrating slavery? The movie is based on the book Gods and Generals, by Jeff Shaara (son of Michael Shaara who wrote The Killer Angels) and is a prequel to his fathers book.

I don't remember any celebrating of slavery in any of those films or books.

 LordofHats wrote:
Yeah. I can get behind the bad acting and bad writing. Gods and Generals was rather lack luster as a film, but celebrating slavery? The movie is based on the book Gods and Generals, by Jeff Shaara (son of Michael Shaara who wrote The Killer Angels) and is a prequel to his fathers book.

I don't remember any celebrating of slavery in any of those films or books.

I to do not remember a scene of slaves cheering on Confederate Forces. I highly doubt it since it would not actually portray the reality of that time. I can see it for Union Forces as shown in "Glory" but I think GG might be thinking of the slaves assisting in the post battle. I think a scene involving a slave looking for his master to give a proper burial and taking home his personnel belonging might be what GG referring to.



Been a long time since I've seen the movie. Though a while back we had a thread on the civil war where I mention the Irish Brigade on both sides meeting each other in battle

I highly recommend reading The Killer Angels. The author did a great job, but his son never reached the same level in writing. IMO, he was trying to emulate his father too much and came off as a bad copy.

Like people have said, Ken Burns "The Civil War" is pretty definitive. It is very well done about an important part of American history.

 Jihadin wrote:
I think GG might be thinking of the slaves assisting in the post battle. I think a scene involving a slave looking for his master to give a proper burial and taking home his personnel belonging might be what GG referring to

I think there might be a scene like that, but I wouldn't call that a celebration of slavery. Many African Americans had lived their entire lives as slaves, and contrary to w/e silliness some films might suggest, a great many never questioned their lot in life. A slave showing great deference and loyalty to his owner isn't far fetched nor a celebration, especially since such events probably did actually happen.

Many southerners went to battle with slaves in tow. That one might seek out his master after a battle seems probable.