Breaker, Breaker
Starring:Chuck Norris, George Murdock, Terry O'Connor, Don Gentry, John Di Fusco, Ron Cedillos, Michael Augenstein, Dan Vandegrift, Douglas Stevenson (II), Paul Kawecki, Larry Feder, Jack Nance, David Bezar, Miranda Garrison, Amelia Laurenson, Ray Saniger, Dee Cooper (II), Deborah Shore, The Great John L., David Stephen Essex
Director: Don Hulette
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Product Type: DVD
Editorial Review:
Amazon.com
Made in the heady days of movies like Convoy and Smokey and the Bandit, when CB radios were expected to create the kind of communication network the Internet has provided, Breaker! Breaker! tells the tale of J.D. Dawes (Chuck Norris of Good Guys Wear Black and TV's Walker, Texas Ranger), a trucker in tight jeans and a blonde shag. While J.D. is defending his arm-wrestling reputation in a truck stop poolroom, his younger brother Billy is being taken advantage of by the crooked cops of Texas City, California, a former ghost town turned would-be tourist trap, run by a corrupt judge named Joshua Trimmings. When the scam gets out of hand, Billy disappears--and J.D. comes to town to find him. There are many campy things to appreciate about Breaker! Breaker! (the sequined collar of the shirt Norris wears during a meditation teaching, or the glorious air-brushed eagle on Norris's van), and by contemporary Jackie Chan/The Matrix standards the fighting is slow and unspectacular--but ironically, this actually gives the action some grit and makes the blows feel more visceral than the wild flips and kicks of more recent movies. The chase scenes have surprising momentum, and there's some fine scenery-chewing by George Murdock as the wicked judge. And for a curious bit of trivia, Jack Nance--who must have been playing the lead in David Lynch's Eraserhead concurrent with Breaker! Breaker!--plays a trucker friend of Norris's. --Bret Fetzer
Average customer rating:
- Look no further for the finest war movie ever made
- A Story And A Metaphor
- Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building
- Underappreciated Gem
- The first taste of the 20th century...
|
Breaker Morant
Starring: Edward Woodward , Jack Thompson , John Waters (III) , Bryan Brown , and Charles 'Bud' Tingwell
Director: Bruce Beresford
Manufacturer: Fox Lorber
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Similar Items:
- Gallipoli (Special Edition)
- Zulu
- The Man Who Would Be King
- Khartoum
- The Charge of the Light Brigade
ASIN: 1572521775
Release Date: 1997-11-12 |
Amazon.com
Before coming to America to make such acclaimed films as Tender Mercies and Driving Miss Daisy, Australian director Bruce Beresford made a lasting impression with this compelling courtroom drama, considered one the finest films of the Australian new wave of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Based on a true story about three soldiers in the Boer War who are served up as political scapegoats of the British Empire, the film uses a flashback structure to dramatize the courtroom testimony. It begins when the three Australian soldiers are railroaded for the justified killing of a German missionary and placed on trial for court-martial not as a matter of justice, but to mollify the German government for the sake of political expediency. Burdened with a competent but inexperienced and hopelessly disadvantaged lawyer, the soldiers realize that their fate has been sealed and the outcome of their trial is a fait accompli. Unfolding with urgent precision and a riveting focus on its well-drawn characters, Breaker Morant was the all-time box-office hit in Australia at the time of its release in 1980, and it remains one of the very best historical dramas ever made. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews:
Look no further for the finest war movie ever made.......2007-03-03
Brilliantly adapted from a true story, poignantly filmed and outstandingly produced and acted, "Breaker Morant" stands alone at the big heap of great war movies. It's all here, of course: battle scenes, commando ambushes, honor, valor, betrayal, executions and a real 'kangaroo court martial'. The accused's fates are sealed from the opening salvo, as we bear witness to another example of the vast British empire taking no prisoners of its own, leaving innocent soldiers of the Commonwealth hung out to dry to protect its own repugnant brand of morality. The viewer senses this early on, but is compelled to watch every frame of this magnificent film. It will move you as few other films will, on almost every level of human compassion, duty and truth. In a film in which every line counts, the best line, quite possibly, is spoken by Lieutenant Morant, "These days its quite easy to be on the wrong side". A masterpiece.
A Story And A Metaphor.......2007-02-16
Breaker Morant, a fine Australian film made a generation ago, can be viewed in one of two ways, either being equally valid. It tells a straightforward story of true events that came to pass after the Boer War ended in 1900, in which a pair of valiant Colonial soldiers, one of whom a former horse "breaker" named Morant, are executed by firing squad in a probable and in some quarters still infamous miscarriage of justice. Victory having been achieved in this unpopular South African war, the British begin to mend fences with the uneasy Boer population and to that end seek out scapegoats whose punishment might appease Boer resentment over the savagery with which the British waged their anti-guerilla fight in the closing days of the hostilities. Selecting veterans responsible for the "execution" of members of a Boer partisan group, the British hierarchy gives world-wide center stage to this trial, and later to the punishment of two men (a third member of the accused trio is later spared death) most directly at the heart of the incident in which armed Boers masquerading as civilians died. This judicial action divided segments of the British population and engendered considerable resentment in Australia, as the soldiers put to death were brave and loyal military members, much needed by the Empire in a time of war and suddenly dispensable in a time of uneasy peace. It should also be noted that the Boers the condemned men shot that day were almost certainly guilty of being clandestine insurrectionists responsible for direct attacks on British forces in a conflict in which the distinctions between friend and foe had long since blurred and in which the rules of "civilized" Victorian-era combat had broken down in a very modern way.
And of course as I mentioned Breaker Morant is also unavoidably metaphorical, as it was somewhat intended to be. The men killed by firing squad were a sort of "anymen" fighting in "anywar" be they British in Africa a century since, Americans in Vietnam forty years ago, or service personnel in Iraq today. In war there will always be cruelties, human beings under great pressure will on occasion snap, and when faced with an enemy who clothes himself in the guise of civilians, an individual's judgment of right and wrong will always fade from sharp focus.
Breaker Morant is a good film, and its story is universal.
And sad.
Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building.......2007-01-20
I can't say enough about this film. The plot, the characters and the actors who play them are excellent. It is the kind of film that one can watch time and again, and each time, catch another detail that makes the film more meaningful.
Underappreciated Gem.......2007-01-12
This movie is very well done, with crisp performances by all participants. Based on actual events, it tells the story from a very pro-Aussie anti-British point of view. Regardless of this bias, the story is well told , believable and moving. Quite a thought provoking, yet enjoyable drama. (BTW, I have heard that this was Ronald Regan's favorite film, not sure if that was true or not.)
The first taste of the 20th century..........2006-10-28
I saw this movie as a pre-teen with my father and it made quite an impression on me. Even then I had read many books about the British empire, even one history on the Zulu wars, so I had something of a context for the movie. I was thinking about Breaker Morant again the other day and decided to order it from Amazon and watch it once more. I am glad I did. The movie is as excellent as I remember it. This is a courtroom drama of three Australian soldiers brought up on charges of shooting enemy prisoners, despite the fact they were acting under orders when doing so. Between the courtroom scenes one is treated to vignettes of the soldiers in the field where the events happened. The movie, based on actual events, is stirring, poignant and obviously memorable. Well worth watching.
It does an excellent job of portraying the differences betwixt the British and Australian national characters and the underlying tensions between these groups. It also shows how geopolitical events can conspire to make scapegoats of good, decent, and loyal soldiers. In this case the British are forced to prosecute these soldiers in order to appease the Germans, who at the time of these events had the most powerful army in the world. If the Germans had weighed in on the side of the Boers it would have been disastrous for the British. In order to avoid this the Australians are tried as war criminals. Thus WWI was avoided for another 15 years.
The movie is eerily prescient of so many problems which plague the world today. The problems of fighting an enemy who is not in uniform, who employs hit and run guerilla tactics, and who is not a soldier of sovereign nation. How do you fight them? What rules do you adhere to if they do not adhere to your rules? If you capture them, how do you treat them? These are issues we have been dealing with since the events of this movie and are caught up with yet today with the war on terrorism. It is all to easy to imagine the military today offering up it's own soldiers as scapegoats in order to bring the conflict in Iraq to an end. Beneath the stirring courtroom drama, the movie also shows how so many other elements of our current military and world situtation have roots in this conflict. The special forces units we employ, even the word Commando, trace their roots to the Boer conflict. Concentration camps trace their roots to the Boer war as well, an invention of the British, not the Germans. Even the shooting of prisoners, despite being under orders, and the treatment of insurgents, harkens to scenes of Nuremberg and Guatanamo Bay.
The movie is well worth watching for it's historicity, showing early developments in guerilla war, concentration camps, terrorism, counter-insurgency tactics, and special forces, as well as the slow slide of the British empire and how geopolitical forces can grind indivudal soldiers to dust as easily as enemy actions. It is also a splendid courtroom drama on top of all that. I highly recommend it.
Average customer rating:
- Look no further for the finest war movie ever made
- A Story And A Metaphor
- Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building
- Underappreciated Gem
- The first taste of the 20th century...
|
Breaker Morant (Masterworks Edition)
Starring: Edward Woodward , Jack Thompson , John Waters (III) , Bryan Brown , and Charles 'Bud' Tingwell
Director: Bruce Beresford
Manufacturer: Fox Lorber
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
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Similar Items:
- Gallipoli (Special Edition)
- Zulu
- The Man Who Would Be King
- Khartoum
- The Charge of the Light Brigade
ASIN: B0002V7OCY
Release Date: 2004-12-14 |
Amazon.com
Before coming to America to make such acclaimed films as Tender Mercies and Driving Miss Daisy, Australian director Bruce Beresford made a lasting impression with this compelling courtroom drama, considered one the finest films of the Australian new wave of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Based on a true story about three soldiers in the Boer War who are served up as political scapegoats of the British Empire, the film uses a flashback structure to dramatize the courtroom testimony. It begins when the three Australian soldiers are railroaded for the justified killing of a German missionary and placed on trial for court-martial not as a matter of justice, but to mollify the German government for the sake of political expediency. Burdened with a competent but inexperienced and hopelessly disadvantaged lawyer, the soldiers realize that their fate has been sealed and the outcome of their trial is a fait accompli. Unfolding with urgent precision and a riveting focus on its well-drawn characters, Breaker Morant was the all-time box-office hit in Australia at the time of its release in 1980, and it remains one of the very best historical dramas ever made. --Jeff Shannon
Description
New hi def color transfer made from 35 mm interpositive - picture: 16x9 Anamorphic 1.85:1 presentation, 5.1 surround sound, subtitled in English, French and Spanish, commentary with director Bruce Beresford, 20 minute interview with actor Edward Woodward, in-depth character breakdown, photo gallery and original theatrical trailer. Synopsis: Based on a true story, Breaker Morant is the tale of three soldiers who are court-martialed at the end of the Boer War. When one of their comrades is ambushed and killed, three soldiers (Edward Woodward, Brian Brown and Lewis Fitz-Gerald) seek revenge and kill a Boer Solider. The act of murder and the mysterious disappearance of a German missionary leads to the arrest of the three men. In one of the most controversial court-martials in military history, they are defended by Major Thomas (Jack Thompson), small town Australian solicitor who has only been given one day to prepare the case.
Customer Reviews:
Look no further for the finest war movie ever made.......2007-03-03
Brilliantly adapted from a true story, poignantly filmed and outstandingly produced and acted, "Breaker Morant" stands alone at the big heap of great war movies. It's all here, of course: battle scenes, commando ambushes, honor, valor, betrayal, executions and a real 'kangaroo court martial'. The accused's fates are sealed from the opening salvo, as we bear witness to another example of the vast British empire taking no prisoners of its own, leaving innocent soldiers of the Commonwealth hung out to dry to protect its own repugnant brand of morality. The viewer senses this early on, but is compelled to watch every frame of this magnificent film. It will move you as few other films will, on almost every level of human compassion, duty and truth. In a film in which every line counts, the best line, quite possibly, is spoken by Lieutenant Morant, "These days its quite easy to be on the wrong side". A masterpiece.
A Story And A Metaphor.......2007-02-16
Breaker Morant, a fine Australian film made a generation ago, can be viewed in one of two ways, either being equally valid. It tells a straightforward story of true events that came to pass after the Boer War ended in 1900, in which a pair of valiant Colonial soldiers, one of whom a former horse "breaker" named Morant, are executed by firing squad in a probable and in some quarters still infamous miscarriage of justice. Victory having been achieved in this unpopular South African war, the British begin to mend fences with the uneasy Boer population and to that end seek out scapegoats whose punishment might appease Boer resentment over the savagery with which the British waged their anti-guerilla fight in the closing days of the hostilities. Selecting veterans responsible for the "execution" of members of a Boer partisan group, the British hierarchy gives world-wide center stage to this trial, and later to the punishment of two men (a third member of the accused trio is later spared death) most directly at the heart of the incident in which armed Boers masquerading as civilians died. This judicial action divided segments of the British population and engendered considerable resentment in Australia, as the soldiers put to death were brave and loyal military members, much needed by the Empire in a time of war and suddenly dispensable in a time of uneasy peace. It should also be noted that the Boers the condemned men shot that day were almost certainly guilty of being clandestine insurrectionists responsible for direct attacks on British forces in a conflict in which the distinctions between friend and foe had long since blurred and in which the rules of "civilized" Victorian-era combat had broken down in a very modern way.
And of course as I mentioned Breaker Morant is also unavoidably metaphorical, as it was somewhat intended to be. The men killed by firing squad were a sort of "anymen" fighting in "anywar" be they British in Africa a century since, Americans in Vietnam forty years ago, or service personnel in Iraq today. In war there will always be cruelties, human beings under great pressure will on occasion snap, and when faced with an enemy who clothes himself in the guise of civilians, an individual's judgment of right and wrong will always fade from sharp focus.
Breaker Morant is a good film, and its story is universal.
And sad.
Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building.......2007-01-20
I can't say enough about this film. The plot, the characters and the actors who play them are excellent. It is the kind of film that one can watch time and again, and each time, catch another detail that makes the film more meaningful.
Underappreciated Gem.......2007-01-12
This movie is very well done, with crisp performances by all participants. Based on actual events, it tells the story from a very pro-Aussie anti-British point of view. Regardless of this bias, the story is well told , believable and moving. Quite a thought provoking, yet enjoyable drama. (BTW, I have heard that this was Ronald Regan's favorite film, not sure if that was true or not.)
The first taste of the 20th century..........2006-10-28
I saw this movie as a pre-teen with my father and it made quite an impression on me. Even then I had read many books about the British empire, even one history on the Zulu wars, so I had something of a context for the movie. I was thinking about Breaker Morant again the other day and decided to order it from Amazon and watch it once more. I am glad I did. The movie is as excellent as I remember it. This is a courtroom drama of three Australian soldiers brought up on charges of shooting enemy prisoners, despite the fact they were acting under orders when doing so. Between the courtroom scenes one is treated to vignettes of the soldiers in the field where the events happened. The movie, based on actual events, is stirring, poignant and obviously memorable. Well worth watching.
It does an excellent job of portraying the differences betwixt the British and Australian national characters and the underlying tensions between these groups. It also shows how geopolitical events can conspire to make scapegoats of good, decent, and loyal soldiers. In this case the British are forced to prosecute these soldiers in order to appease the Germans, who at the time of these events had the most powerful army in the world. If the Germans had weighed in on the side of the Boers it would have been disastrous for the British. In order to avoid this the Australians are tried as war criminals. Thus WWI was avoided for another 15 years.
The movie is eerily prescient of so many problems which plague the world today. The problems of fighting an enemy who is not in uniform, who employs hit and run guerilla tactics, and who is not a soldier of sovereign nation. How do you fight them? What rules do you adhere to if they do not adhere to your rules? If you capture them, how do you treat them? These are issues we have been dealing with since the events of this movie and are caught up with yet today with the war on terrorism. It is all to easy to imagine the military today offering up it's own soldiers as scapegoats in order to bring the conflict in Iraq to an end. Beneath the stirring courtroom drama, the movie also shows how so many other elements of our current military and world situtation have roots in this conflict. The special forces units we employ, even the word Commando, trace their roots to the Boer conflict. Concentration camps trace their roots to the Boer war as well, an invention of the British, not the Germans. Even the shooting of prisoners, despite being under orders, and the treatment of insurgents, harkens to scenes of Nuremberg and Guatanamo Bay.
The movie is well worth watching for it's historicity, showing early developments in guerilla war, concentration camps, terrorism, counter-insurgency tactics, and special forces, as well as the slow slide of the British empire and how geopolitical forces can grind indivudal soldiers to dust as easily as enemy actions. It is also a splendid courtroom drama on top of all that. I highly recommend it.
Average customer rating:
- Not Bad, But Not Good Either
- A Dated, But Okay Effort For Norris' First Starring Role
- Good for a Laugh
- they don't make B-movie action films like this any more
- Semi-Trucks, CB Radios, Frozen TV Dinners and Chuck Norris!!
|
Breaker, Breaker
Starring: Chuck Norris , George Murdock , Terry O'Connor , Don Gentry , and John Di Fusco
Director: Don Hulette
Manufacturer: MGM (Video & DVD)
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
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Similar Items:
- Good Guys Wear Black
- Convoy
- A Force of One
- Lone Wolf McQuade
- The Great Smokey Roadblock
ASIN: B00004ZBVH
Release Date: 2000-12-19 |
Amazon.com
Made in the heady days of movies like Convoy and Smokey and the Bandit, when CB radios were expected to create the kind of communication network the Internet has provided, Breaker! Breaker! tells the tale of J.D. Dawes (Chuck Norris of Good Guys Wear Black and TV's Walker, Texas Ranger), a trucker in tight jeans and a blonde shag. While J.D. is defending his arm-wrestling reputation in a truck stop poolroom, his younger brother Billy is being taken advantage of by the crooked cops of Texas City, California, a former ghost town turned would-be tourist trap, run by a corrupt judge named Joshua Trimmings. When the scam gets out of hand, Billy disappears--and J.D. comes to town to find him. There are many campy things to appreciate about Breaker! Breaker! (the sequined collar of the shirt Norris wears during a meditation teaching, or the glorious air-brushed eagle on Norris's van), and by contemporary Jackie Chan/The Matrix standards the fighting is slow and unspectacular--but ironically, this actually gives the action some grit and makes the blows feel more visceral than the wild flips and kicks of more recent movies. The chase scenes have surprising momentum, and there's some fine scenery-chewing by George Murdock as the wicked judge. And for a curious bit of trivia, Jack Nance--who must have been playing the lead in David Lynch's Eraserhead concurrent with Breaker! Breaker!--plays a trucker friend of Norris's. --Bret Fetzer
Description
Chuck Norris ("Walker, Texas Ranger") puts the pedal to the metal in this hard-driving action/adventure exploding with heart-pounding chases and slam-bang martial arts battles. As powerful as an 18-wheeler and as fast-moving as a lethal karate chop, Breaker! Breaker! pushes the throttle wideopen for nonstop excitement. When trucker Billy Dawes (Michael Augenstein) vanishes duringhis first solo run, his older brother, J.D. (Norris), sets out in search of answers. What J.D. finds, however, is a deadly conspiracy involving a corrupt small-town judge (George Murdock) and a ring of thieves who prey upon unsuspecting motorists. With help from a beautiful local woman (Terry O'Connor), J.D. searches for his brother and battles the criminals with his amazing karate skills, fighting all the way to an explosive final showdown that may just destroy the entire town!
Customer Reviews:
Not Bad, But Not Good Either.......2007-02-24
This picture was made back in 1977 and I don't remember where I saw it at. This was a very young and very blonde Chuck Norris who played the role of John David Dawes. Also George Murdock plays the role of Judge Trimmings and terry O'Conner plays the role of Arlene. When John returns home he goes to see his brother who's riding a dirt bike. John brother Billy wants to drive a big rig and take a load of something somewhere. So John agrees to let Billy take a load gets to a small town in Texas. Billy gets into trouble with a Joshua Trimmings who's a crooked Judge that runs the small town. When John fines out that Billy never made it, he heads towards Texas to fine him. Breaker, Breaker, wasn't the best movie but it wasn't that bad. I give this movie 7 weasel stars basically for its action.
A Dated, But Okay Effort For Norris' First Starring Role.......2007-01-11
During the CB (Citizen Band) radio craze of the 70's, Chuck Norris began his very successful leading man career by appearing in this film.
Norris plays a trucker whose brother gets caught up in a speed-trap town whose leaders don't mind killing to maintain control. Of course, truckers unite by using the CB radios, Norris kicks lots of butt, and a good reckneck time is had by all.
The CB focus, fashions and trends are very dated, and the movie isn't good enough to overcome these limitations. But it works as a cheap action flick and curio timepiece. Breaker, Breaker is far from Norris' best, but he has also done much, much worse.
Good for a Laugh.......2006-02-13
Chuck Norris's brother is hauling freight through a small Texas Town when the local sherif arrests him on a trumped up charge. The town confiscates the load, kidnaps his brother, and puts him in jail.
This causes chuck to go into the town and start opening a king sized can of whoop but. Bad acting, good fight seens, and a poor story line all combine for a pretty good movie. I'd buy this movie just to laugh at the out of date 1960-1970 fasions.
Rich
they don't make B-movie action films like this any more.......2005-03-07
and it's a shame, these days most direct to video b-movies are not all that great, but back then, they were fun, sure the acting and story are not the best, but it's fun, and really that's what you come for right? fun, good action with some funny scenes in there.
the action may not seem like much next to the jackie chan movies or the post-matrix world and that's a shame, Chucks action always seemed more real, down and dirty, his hits meant something, when he does his big kicks, you know that hurt.
the movie held up better than i thought it would, i saw it again for the first time in years just minutes ago, it has some 70's styles and look, but really it's more of a timeless western feel they have going on, chuck is the stanger coem to clean up "texas city" and save his brother, he faces down the locals, has a great fight or 20, gets the girl and walks off into the sunset.
Semi-Trucks, CB Radios, Frozen TV Dinners and Chuck Norris!!.......2005-02-02
This short (65 minutes) movie features Chuck Norris as a truck drivin' guy who just happens to be an expert in karate. Chuck is J.D. Dawes, a good name for a trucker if there ever was one, and he comes home to find his kid brother riding dirt bikes in the obligatory two-brothers-bonding scene. Well, before you know it, little brother is off on a haul, alone of course, gonna pick up some frozen TV dinners for delivery. Gee, I hope something doesn't happen to him along the way.
Meanwhile a group of ne'er-do-wells, led by corrupt judge Trimmings (George Murdock, actually pretty good to watch) have founded Texas City, California. Among Texas City's many fine civic industries are crooked cops, a corrupt judicial system, kidnapping, moonshine and selling pilfered automobiles for scrap metal. At the town meetings, they give reports on all the fine progress their new little town is making. All is well until they kidnap Chuck Norris' little brother using false charges. I reckon they're gonna get their tails whipped.
(Apparently the residents of Texas City had never seen a Chuck Norris film - too bad for them, eh? They messed with the wrong guy's little brother driving a semi-truck of frozen TV dinners).
The acting runs from decent to horrible, depending upon where you are in the film. The cinematography is OK, especially for a low-budget film like this one. In one scene, Chuck pulls up in the semi-truck with the set lights brightly reflecting off the grill/front of the truck. As he moves out of frame, you can actually see them dim the set lights, fading on the truck. Then, there's a bit of high school acting from a "concerned" lady who speaks with Chuck. Aye carumba.
John Di Fusco as Arney does a decent job as the slow-witted, Gomer-Pyle-lookin' brother of the owner of the auto repair station in Texas City. He becomes a pivotal character because of his good heart. Miranda Garrison is pretty good as the barmaid-floozy, whom the judge hangs out with when he's not busy stealing other people's money. She's kinda got a weirdo-nutty thing going on with her doll collection though. Unfortunately, some of the other extras must have taken some acting lessons from the dolls. Oh and there's a couple of guys who shoot at approaching cars just to keep 'em out. Real nice town, that Texas City, eh?. I'm surprised there wasn't a banjo and a guitar faintly dueling somewhere in the distance.
Like all good stories, what goes around comes around. The calvary is a little bit different this time, but effective nonetheless. And there's a little slow-mo fighting with martial arts (bet that caught ya by surprise) where the director uses a bit of artistic license. If you're a Chuck Norris fan, you'll probably find enough about this film to like and it's PG-13 for language. Other decent Chuck Norris films are "Good Guys Wear Black" and "The Hero and the Terror" and "Code of Silence" is pretty good, though being about Chicago mobsters makes it pretty rough in some spots.
And it must be said, the CB radio craze was in full swing when this movie was produced. Surprisingly, it's not overdone in this film. Bit of trivia: The art direction for "Breaker, Breaker" was done by Thomas Thomas (who also designed the van Chuck drives with a huge eagle on it). I just wondered if he was the guy who came up with the name for the movie.
Well, y'all have yourself an outstanding day, keep the greasy side down, watch out for them four-wheelers and Smokey Bear. We gone, bye-bye!
![Breaker Morant [Region 2]](http://www.germanelectronics88.com/noimage.gif)
Average customer rating:
- Look no further for the finest war movie ever made
- A Story And A Metaphor
- Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building
- Underappreciated Gem
- The first taste of the 20th century...
|
Breaker Morant [Region 2]
Starring: Edward Woodward , Jack Thompson , John Waters (III) , Bryan Brown , and Charles 'Bud' Tingwell
Director: Bruce Beresford
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
Ball, Vincent
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Thompson, Jack
| ( T )
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Woodward, Edward
| ( W )
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Beresford, Bruce
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Similar Items:
- Gallipoli (Special Edition)
- Zulu
- The Man Who Would Be King
- Khartoum
- The Charge of the Light Brigade
ASIN: B00004TIT4 |
Amazon.com
Before coming to America to make such acclaimed films as Tender Mercies and Driving Miss Daisy, Australian director Bruce Beresford made a lasting impression with this compelling courtroom drama, considered one the finest films of the Australian new wave of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Based on a true story about three soldiers in the Boer War who are served up as political scapegoats of the British Empire, the film uses a flashback structure to dramatize the courtroom testimony. It begins when the three Australian soldiers are railroaded for the justified killing of a German missionary and placed on trial for court-martial not as a matter of justice, but to mollify the German government for the sake of political expediency. Burdened with a competent but inexperienced and hopelessly disadvantaged lawyer, the soldiers realize that their fate has been sealed and the outcome of their trial is a fait accompli. Unfolding with urgent precision and a riveting focus on its well-drawn characters, Breaker Morant was the all-time box-office hit in Australia at the time of its release in 1980, and it remains one of the very best historical dramas ever made. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews:
Look no further for the finest war movie ever made.......2007-03-03
Brilliantly adapted from a true story, poignantly filmed and outstandingly produced and acted, "Breaker Morant" stands alone at the big heap of great war movies. It's all here, of course: battle scenes, commando ambushes, honor, valor, betrayal, executions and a real 'kangaroo court martial'. The accused's fates are sealed from the opening salvo, as we bear witness to another example of the vast British empire taking no prisoners of its own, leaving innocent soldiers of the Commonwealth hung out to dry to protect its own repugnant brand of morality. The viewer senses this early on, but is compelled to watch every frame of this magnificent film. It will move you as few other films will, on almost every level of human compassion, duty and truth. In a film in which every line counts, the best line, quite possibly, is spoken by Lieutenant Morant, "These days its quite easy to be on the wrong side". A masterpiece.
A Story And A Metaphor.......2007-02-16
Breaker Morant, a fine Australian film made a generation ago, can be viewed in one of two ways, either being equally valid. It tells a straightforward story of true events that came to pass after the Boer War ended in 1900, in which a pair of valiant Colonial soldiers, one of whom a former horse "breaker" named Morant, are executed by firing squad in a probable and in some quarters still infamous miscarriage of justice. Victory having been achieved in this unpopular South African war, the British begin to mend fences with the uneasy Boer population and to that end seek out scapegoats whose punishment might appease Boer resentment over the savagery with which the British waged their anti-guerilla fight in the closing days of the hostilities. Selecting veterans responsible for the "execution" of members of a Boer partisan group, the British hierarchy gives world-wide center stage to this trial, and later to the punishment of two men (a third member of the accused trio is later spared death) most directly at the heart of the incident in which armed Boers masquerading as civilians died. This judicial action divided segments of the British population and engendered considerable resentment in Australia, as the soldiers put to death were brave and loyal military members, much needed by the Empire in a time of war and suddenly dispensable in a time of uneasy peace. It should also be noted that the Boers the condemned men shot that day were almost certainly guilty of being clandestine insurrectionists responsible for direct attacks on British forces in a conflict in which the distinctions between friend and foe had long since blurred and in which the rules of "civilized" Victorian-era combat had broken down in a very modern way.
And of course as I mentioned Breaker Morant is also unavoidably metaphorical, as it was somewhat intended to be. The men killed by firing squad were a sort of "anymen" fighting in "anywar" be they British in Africa a century since, Americans in Vietnam forty years ago, or service personnel in Iraq today. In war there will always be cruelties, human beings under great pressure will on occasion snap, and when faced with an enemy who clothes himself in the guise of civilians, an individual's judgment of right and wrong will always fade from sharp focus.
Breaker Morant is a good film, and its story is universal.
And sad.
Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building.......2007-01-20
I can't say enough about this film. The plot, the characters and the actors who play them are excellent. It is the kind of film that one can watch time and again, and each time, catch another detail that makes the film more meaningful.
Underappreciated Gem.......2007-01-12
This movie is very well done, with crisp performances by all participants. Based on actual events, it tells the story from a very pro-Aussie anti-British point of view. Regardless of this bias, the story is well told , believable and moving. Quite a thought provoking, yet enjoyable drama. (BTW, I have heard that this was Ronald Regan's favorite film, not sure if that was true or not.)
The first taste of the 20th century..........2006-10-28
I saw this movie as a pre-teen with my father and it made quite an impression on me. Even then I had read many books about the British empire, even one history on the Zulu wars, so I had something of a context for the movie. I was thinking about Breaker Morant again the other day and decided to order it from Amazon and watch it once more. I am glad I did. The movie is as excellent as I remember it. This is a courtroom drama of three Australian soldiers brought up on charges of shooting enemy prisoners, despite the fact they were acting under orders when doing so. Between the courtroom scenes one is treated to vignettes of the soldiers in the field where the events happened. The movie, based on actual events, is stirring, poignant and obviously memorable. Well worth watching.
It does an excellent job of portraying the differences betwixt the British and Australian national characters and the underlying tensions between these groups. It also shows how geopolitical events can conspire to make scapegoats of good, decent, and loyal soldiers. In this case the British are forced to prosecute these soldiers in order to appease the Germans, who at the time of these events had the most powerful army in the world. If the Germans had weighed in on the side of the Boers it would have been disastrous for the British. In order to avoid this the Australians are tried as war criminals. Thus WWI was avoided for another 15 years.
The movie is eerily prescient of so many problems which plague the world today. The problems of fighting an enemy who is not in uniform, who employs hit and run guerilla tactics, and who is not a soldier of sovereign nation. How do you fight them? What rules do you adhere to if they do not adhere to your rules? If you capture them, how do you treat them? These are issues we have been dealing with since the events of this movie and are caught up with yet today with the war on terrorism. It is all to easy to imagine the military today offering up it's own soldiers as scapegoats in order to bring the conflict in Iraq to an end. Beneath the stirring courtroom drama, the movie also shows how so many other elements of our current military and world situtation have roots in this conflict. The special forces units we employ, even the word Commando, trace their roots to the Boer conflict. Concentration camps trace their roots to the Boer war as well, an invention of the British, not the Germans. Even the shooting of prisoners, despite being under orders, and the treatment of insurgents, harkens to scenes of Nuremberg and Guatanamo Bay.
The movie is well worth watching for it's historicity, showing early developments in guerilla war, concentration camps, terrorism, counter-insurgency tactics, and special forces, as well as the slow slide of the British empire and how geopolitical forces can grind indivudal soldiers to dust as easily as enemy actions. It is also a splendid courtroom drama on top of all that. I highly recommend it.
Average customer rating:
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Image Breaker
Manufacturer: Kingdom Connection
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
ASIN: B000I6K8NK |
Product Description
professional wrestler Shawn Michaels, Atlanta Falcons' Justin griffith, and others join jentezen franklin in this illustrated message to over 24,000 students in knoxville, TN. Through powerful testimonies, anointed scripture, and hilarious sketches, this generation is challenged to recognize the great purpose that God has placed upon our lives. We were made to be an image breaker.
Average customer rating:
- Not Bad, But Not Good Either
- A Dated, But Okay Effort For Norris' First Starring Role
- Good for a Laugh
- they don't make B-movie action films like this any more
- Semi-Trucks, CB Radios, Frozen TV Dinners and Chuck Norris!!
|
Breaker! Breaker! [Region 2]
Starring: Chuck Norris , George Murdock , Terry O'Connor , Don Gentry , and John Di Fusco
Director: Don Hulette
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
General
| Action & Adventure
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Garrison, Miranda
| ( G )
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Murdock, George
| ( M )
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Nance, Jack
| ( N )
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Norris, Chuck
| ( N )
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( B )
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Similar Items:
- Good Guys Wear Black
- Convoy
- A Force of One
- Lone Wolf McQuade
- The Great Smokey Roadblock
ASIN: B00004U0JN |
Amazon.com
Made in the heady days of movies like Convoy and Smokey and the Bandit, when CB radios were expected to create the kind of communication network the Internet has provided, Breaker! Breaker! tells the tale of J.D. Dawes (Chuck Norris of Good Guys Wear Black and TV's Walker, Texas Ranger), a trucker in tight jeans and a blonde shag. While J.D. is defending his arm-wrestling reputation in a truck stop poolroom, his younger brother Billy is being taken advantage of by the crooked cops of Texas City, California, a former ghost town turned would-be tourist trap, run by a corrupt judge named Joshua Trimmings. When the scam gets out of hand, Billy disappears--and J.D. comes to town to find him. There are many campy things to appreciate about Breaker! Breaker! (the sequined collar of the shirt Norris wears during a meditation teaching, or the glorious air-brushed eagle on Norris's van), and by contemporary Jackie Chan/The Matrix standards the fighting is slow and unspectacular--but ironically, this actually gives the action some grit and makes the blows feel more visceral than the wild flips and kicks of more recent movies. The chase scenes have surprising momentum, and there's some fine scenery-chewing by George Murdock as the wicked judge. And for a curious bit of trivia, Jack Nance--who must have been playing the lead in David Lynch's Eraserhead concurrent with Breaker! Breaker!--plays a trucker friend of Norris's. --Bret Fetzer
Customer Reviews:
Not Bad, But Not Good Either.......2007-02-24
This picture was made back in 1977 and I don't remember where I saw it at. This was a very young and very blonde Chuck Norris who played the role of John David Dawes. Also George Murdock plays the role of Judge Trimmings and terry O'Conner plays the role of Arlene. When John returns home he goes to see his brother who's riding a dirt bike. John brother Billy wants to drive a big rig and take a load of something somewhere. So John agrees to let Billy take a load gets to a small town in Texas. Billy gets into trouble with a Joshua Trimmings who's a crooked Judge that runs the small town. When John fines out that Billy never made it, he heads towards Texas to fine him. Breaker, Breaker, wasn't the best movie but it wasn't that bad. I give this movie 7 weasel stars basically for its action.
A Dated, But Okay Effort For Norris' First Starring Role.......2007-01-11
During the CB (Citizen Band) radio craze of the 70's, Chuck Norris began his very successful leading man career by appearing in this film.
Norris plays a trucker whose brother gets caught up in a speed-trap town whose leaders don't mind killing to maintain control. Of course, truckers unite by using the CB radios, Norris kicks lots of butt, and a good reckneck time is had by all.
The CB focus, fashions and trends are very dated, and the movie isn't good enough to overcome these limitations. But it works as a cheap action flick and curio timepiece. Breaker, Breaker is far from Norris' best, but he has also done much, much worse.
Good for a Laugh.......2006-02-13
Chuck Norris's brother is hauling freight through a small Texas Town when the local sherif arrests him on a trumped up charge. The town confiscates the load, kidnaps his brother, and puts him in jail.
This causes chuck to go into the town and start opening a king sized can of whoop but. Bad acting, good fight seens, and a poor story line all combine for a pretty good movie. I'd buy this movie just to laugh at the out of date 1960-1970 fasions.
Rich
they don't make B-movie action films like this any more.......2005-03-07
and it's a shame, these days most direct to video b-movies are not all that great, but back then, they were fun, sure the acting and story are not the best, but it's fun, and really that's what you come for right? fun, good action with some funny scenes in there.
the action may not seem like much next to the jackie chan movies or the post-matrix world and that's a shame, Chucks action always seemed more real, down and dirty, his hits meant something, when he does his big kicks, you know that hurt.
the movie held up better than i thought it would, i saw it again for the first time in years just minutes ago, it has some 70's styles and look, but really it's more of a timeless western feel they have going on, chuck is the stanger coem to clean up "texas city" and save his brother, he faces down the locals, has a great fight or 20, gets the girl and walks off into the sunset.
Semi-Trucks, CB Radios, Frozen TV Dinners and Chuck Norris!!.......2005-02-02
This short (65 minutes) movie features Chuck Norris as a truck drivin' guy who just happens to be an expert in karate. Chuck is J.D. Dawes, a good name for a trucker if there ever was one, and he comes home to find his kid brother riding dirt bikes in the obligatory two-brothers-bonding scene. Well, before you know it, little brother is off on a haul, alone of course, gonna pick up some frozen TV dinners for delivery. Gee, I hope something doesn't happen to him along the way.
Meanwhile a group of ne'er-do-wells, led by corrupt judge Trimmings (George Murdock, actually pretty good to watch) have founded Texas City, California. Among Texas City's many fine civic industries are crooked cops, a corrupt judicial system, kidnapping, moonshine and selling pilfered automobiles for scrap metal. At the town meetings, they give reports on all the fine progress their new little town is making. All is well until they kidnap Chuck Norris' little brother using false charges. I reckon they're gonna get their tails whipped.
(Apparently the residents of Texas City had never seen a Chuck Norris film - too bad for them, eh? They messed with the wrong guy's little brother driving a semi-truck of frozen TV dinners).
The acting runs from decent to horrible, depending upon where you are in the film. The cinematography is OK, especially for a low-budget film like this one. In one scene, Chuck pulls up in the semi-truck with the set lights brightly reflecting off the grill/front of the truck. As he moves out of frame, you can actually see them dim the set lights, fading on the truck. Then, there's a bit of high school acting from a "concerned" lady who speaks with Chuck. Aye carumba.
John Di Fusco as Arney does a decent job as the slow-witted, Gomer-Pyle-lookin' brother of the owner of the auto repair station in Texas City. He becomes a pivotal character because of his good heart. Miranda Garrison is pretty good as the barmaid-floozy, whom the judge hangs out with when he's not busy stealing other people's money. She's kinda got a weirdo-nutty thing going on with her doll collection though. Unfortunately, some of the other extras must have taken some acting lessons from the dolls. Oh and there's a couple of guys who shoot at approaching cars just to keep 'em out. Real nice town, that Texas City, eh?. I'm surprised there wasn't a banjo and a guitar faintly dueling somewhere in the distance.
Like all good stories, what goes around comes around. The calvary is a little bit different this time, but effective nonetheless. And there's a little slow-mo fighting with martial arts (bet that caught ya by surprise) where the director uses a bit of artistic license. If you're a Chuck Norris fan, you'll probably find enough about this film to like and it's PG-13 for language. Other decent Chuck Norris films are "Good Guys Wear Black" and "The Hero and the Terror" and "Code of Silence" is pretty good, though being about Chicago mobsters makes it pretty rough in some spots.
And it must be said, the CB radio craze was in full swing when this movie was produced. Surprisingly, it's not overdone in this film. Bit of trivia: The art direction for "Breaker, Breaker" was done by Thomas Thomas (who also designed the van Chuck drives with a huge eagle on it). I just wondered if he was the guy who came up with the name for the movie.
Well, y'all have yourself an outstanding day, keep the greasy side down, watch out for them four-wheelers and Smokey Bear. We gone, bye-bye!
Average customer rating:
- Look no further for the finest war movie ever made
- A Story And A Metaphor
- Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building
- Underappreciated Gem
- The first taste of the 20th century...
|
Breaker Morant
Starring: Edward Woodward , Jack Thompson , John Waters (III) , Bryan Brown , and Charles 'Bud' Tingwell
Director: Bruce Beresford
Manufacturer: Fox Lorber
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD
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Brown, Bryan
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Haywood, Chris
| ( H )
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Thompson, Jack
| ( T )
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Similar Items:
- Gallipoli (Special Edition)
- Zulu
- The Man Who Would Be King
- Khartoum
- The Charge of the Light Brigade
ASIN: 157252507X
Release Date: 1999-06-29 |
Amazon.com
Before coming to America to make such acclaimed films as Tender Mercies and Driving Miss Daisy, Australian director Bruce Beresford made a lasting impression with this compelling courtroom drama, considered one the finest films of the Australian new wave of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Based on a true story about three soldiers in the Boer War who are served up as political scapegoats of the British Empire, the film uses a flashback structure to dramatize the courtroom testimony. It begins when the three Australian soldiers are railroaded for the justified killing of a German missionary and placed on trial for court-martial not as a matter of justice, but to mollify the German government for the sake of political expediency. Burdened with a competent but inexperienced and hopelessly disadvantaged lawyer, the soldiers realize that their fate has been sealed and the outcome of their trial is a fait accompli. Unfolding with urgent precision and a riveting focus on its well-drawn characters, Breaker Morant was the all-time box-office hit in Australia at the time of its release in 1980, and it remains one of the very best historical dramas ever made. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews:
Look no further for the finest war movie ever made.......2007-03-03
Brilliantly adapted from a true story, poignantly filmed and outstandingly produced and acted, "Breaker Morant" stands alone at the big heap of great war movies. It's all here, of course: battle scenes, commando ambushes, honor, valor, betrayal, executions and a real 'kangaroo court martial'. The accused's fates are sealed from the opening salvo, as we bear witness to another example of the vast British empire taking no prisoners of its own, leaving innocent soldiers of the Commonwealth hung out to dry to protect its own repugnant brand of morality. The viewer senses this early on, but is compelled to watch every frame of this magnificent film. It will move you as few other films will, on almost every level of human compassion, duty and truth. In a film in which every line counts, the best line, quite possibly, is spoken by Lieutenant Morant, "These days its quite easy to be on the wrong side". A masterpiece.
A Story And A Metaphor.......2007-02-16
Breaker Morant, a fine Australian film made a generation ago, can be viewed in one of two ways, either being equally valid. It tells a straightforward story of true events that came to pass after the Boer War ended in 1900, in which a pair of valiant Colonial soldiers, one of whom a former horse "breaker" named Morant, are executed by firing squad in a probable and in some quarters still infamous miscarriage of justice. Victory having been achieved in this unpopular South African war, the British begin to mend fences with the uneasy Boer population and to that end seek out scapegoats whose punishment might appease Boer resentment over the savagery with which the British waged their anti-guerilla fight in the closing days of the hostilities. Selecting veterans responsible for the "execution" of members of a Boer partisan group, the British hierarchy gives world-wide center stage to this trial, and later to the punishment of two men (a third member of the accused trio is later spared death) most directly at the heart of the incident in which armed Boers masquerading as civilians died. This judicial action divided segments of the British population and engendered considerable resentment in Australia, as the soldiers put to death were brave and loyal military members, much needed by the Empire in a time of war and suddenly dispensable in a time of uneasy peace. It should also be noted that the Boers the condemned men shot that day were almost certainly guilty of being clandestine insurrectionists responsible for direct attacks on British forces in a conflict in which the distinctions between friend and foe had long since blurred and in which the rules of "civilized" Victorian-era combat had broken down in a very modern way.
And of course as I mentioned Breaker Morant is also unavoidably metaphorical, as it was somewhat intended to be. The men killed by firing squad were a sort of "anymen" fighting in "anywar" be they British in Africa a century since, Americans in Vietnam forty years ago, or service personnel in Iraq today. In war there will always be cruelties, human beings under great pressure will on occasion snap, and when faced with an enemy who clothes himself in the guise of civilians, an individual's judgment of right and wrong will always fade from sharp focus.
Breaker Morant is a good film, and its story is universal.
And sad.
Timeless view of the politics of war and empire building.......2007-01-20
I can't say enough about this film. The plot, the characters and the actors who play them are excellent. It is the kind of film that one can watch time and again, and each time, catch another detail that makes the film more meaningful.
Underappreciated Gem.......2007-01-12
This movie is very well done, with crisp performances by all participants. Based on actual events, it tells the story from a very pro-Aussie anti-British point of view. Regardless of this bias, the story is well told , believable and moving. Quite a thought provoking, yet enjoyable drama. (BTW, I have heard that this was Ronald Regan's favorite film, not sure if that was true or not.)
The first taste of the 20th century..........2006-10-28
I saw this movie as a pre-teen with my father and it made quite an impression on me. Even then I had read many books about the British empire, even one history on the Zulu wars, so I had something of a context for the movie. I was thinking about Breaker Morant again the other day and decided to order it from Amazon and watch it once more. I am glad I did. The movie is as excellent as I remember it. This is a courtroom drama of three Australian soldiers brought up on charges of shooting enemy prisoners, despite the fact they were acting under orders when doing so. Between the courtroom scenes one is treated to vignettes of the soldiers in the field where the events happened. The movie, based on actual events, is stirring, poignant and obviously memorable. Well worth watching.
It does an excellent job of portraying the differences betwixt the British and Australian national characters and the underlying tensions between these groups. It also shows how geopolitical events can conspire to make scapegoats of good, decent, and loyal soldiers. In this case the British are forced to prosecute these soldiers in order to appease the Germans, who at the time of these events had the most powerful army in the world. If the Germans had weighed in on the side of the Boers it would have been disastrous for the British. In order to avoid this the Australians are tried as war criminals. Thus WWI was avoided for another 15 years.
The movie is eerily prescient of so many problems which plague the world today. The problems of fighting an enemy who is not in uniform, who employs hit and run guerilla tactics, and who is not a soldier of sovereign nation. How do you fight them? What rules do you adhere to if they do not adhere to your rules? If you capture them, how do you treat them? These are issues we have been dealing with since the events of this movie and are caught up with yet today with the war on terrorism. It is all to easy to imagine the military today offering up it's own soldiers as scapegoats in order to bring the conflict in Iraq to an end. Beneath the stirring courtroom drama, the movie also shows how so many other elements of our current military and world situtation have roots in this conflict. The special forces units we employ, even the word Commando, trace their roots to the Boer conflict. Concentration camps trace their roots to the Boer war as well, an invention of the British, not the Germans. Even the shooting of prisoners, despite being under orders, and the treatment of insurgents, harkens to scenes of Nuremberg and Guatanamo Bay.
The movie is well worth watching for it's historicity, showing early developments in guerilla war, concentration camps, terrorism, counter-insurgency tactics, and special forces, as well as the slow slide of the British empire and how geopolitical forces can grind indivudal soldiers to dust as easily as enemy actions. It is also a splendid courtroom drama on top of all that. I highly recommend it.
DVD:
- China Dolls
- Aikido Saito's Jo
- Waltz across Texas
- Great Locomotive Chase (Rpkg)
- Johnny Yuma & Between God, The Devil & A Winchester
- The Conqueror
- The Dirty Dozen
- Once Upon a Time in Mexico (Superbit Collection)
- Never Cry Wolf (Full Screen Edition)
- Hustle and Heat
DVD List
DVD
DVD
Bobby Gosh Live in Concert
Shattered
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