battle of Britain movie

[Pat Carry]

Just watched this movie again the other day. I know it been discussed here before but refresh my memory please, how many of each kind of aircraft were used in the making of this fine movie?

[airnutz]

Pat, Wiki says 100 aircraft comprised the 35th largest air force in the world at the time. They say, 27 Spitfires, 6 Hurricanes, 32 CASA 2.111, 27 CASA HA-1112 Buchon, 2 CASA 352 Tante Ju, and 1 B-25 photo ship "the Psychedelic Monster". This total, if my fat fingers are correct comes to 95...tho I expect an Uberfan will be along to sort us all out...

[Jerry O'Neill]

And they weren't all in the air or at the same location together at one time.
One Spit went to Spain, and I believe two CASA 2111's went to the UK for the filming.
A bunch of Buchon's came to the UK too.
Jerry

[JohnB]

Just to clearify...not all the Spitfires or Hurricanes flew.
Some, recently on gate guard duty at various RAF bases, were used as set dressing.


BTW:
-The country pub seen in the film is the Jacksaw in Kent, not far from the historic Hawkinge airfield (now closed but home of a fine museum) and the Battle of Britain memorial at Capel-le-Ferne.
It hasn't changed much since the filming aside from enclosing the front door. They have stills from the film so you can see how it looked back in the old days. Good food and a bit of history, not only from the film but no doubt a popular place with the battle's "original cast".

-And I'm sure many of you have been to Duxford, for those of you who haven't, you can see the foundation of the WWII hangar they destroyed during the filming of the Luftwaffe attack. After that the hangers were out in a protection register.

[Kyleb]

Weren't there a couple of Me-108's in at the airport in "Berlin"?

<Edit - I skimmed those scenes the other day. I didn't see the -108's. Probably a bad recollection on my part.>

Last edited by Kyleb on Mon Jan 07, 2019 10:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Warbird Kid]

And they weren't all in the air or at the same location together at one time.
One Spit went to Spain, and I believe two CASA 2111's went to the UK for the filming.
A bunch of Buchon's came to the UK too.
Jerry

That is correct! Any shots with more than two CASA 2111's were filmed in Spain. IIRC after filming wrapped in Spain, the great majority of the HA-1112's went to England for the mass dogfight scenes. A couple of amazing shots in particular that deserve attention are the ones when Göring visits the coastline:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nZCiwtRK0I
SKIP TO 4:00 mins

Here you can see large (real) shots of at least 18 CASA 2111's along with 16 HA-1112's. These shots must have also been apart of the Spain filming detachment.

[airnutz]

Mmmm...yes, not all in the air at the same time or same location. Some were flight readied, some taxi only, and some static set dressing. That's why I referenced the Wiki source for further perusal. There was or perhaps still is a website with alot of detail about the film, but it escapes me.

Back to the original question...with Kylebs input, we're up to 2 108's or Nord's for a total of 97? Flight Global pdf archive article from 1969 says over 100 aircraft..I reckon we're forgetting the Proctor Stuka, Proctuka, or Stuktor...tho it didn't make the final cut. I'm assuming RC models don't count.
http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/1909.html

EDIT
Correction made to archive address

Last edited by airnutz on Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:02 pm, edited 4 times in total.

[Lynn Allen]

I read the other day that a Spanish pilot was killed in the making of the movie. Anybody else know about this?

Lynn

[airnutz]

Lynn, in reading the BoB movie article in the Flight International article from September 1969 archived, they noted a Spanish pilot was killed prior to production while practicing aerobatics in one of the Messers. The production company, Spitfire Productions, apparently gained high regard from the Spanish crews, "when they made a large 'ex gratia' payment to the widow".

There was an error with Flight address link above which is now corrected. My apologies folks!

[Dan K]

Weren't there a couple of Me-108's in at the airport in "Berlin"?

<Edit - I skimmed those scenes the other day. I didn't see the -108's. Probably a bad recollection on my part.>

Any chance you might be thinking of the Berlin scene from The Hindenburg?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZk02ar1sZ8

[mike furline]

If you didn't already know it there is a book about the movie. Not cheap, but you can find them from time to time.
https://www.abebooks.com/signed-first-e ... 4210816/bd

[JohnB]

In case you aren't familiar with the fun Internet Movie Car Database, here is it's page of the vehicles...some correct, some not...used in the film.

https://www.imcdb.org/movie.php?id=64072

Some nice shots of the aircraft are included.

[JohnB]

And in case you missed it when originally published, here is an article from the March 1970 issue of FLYING magazine on the making of the film, written by a member of the "original cast" of the battle who flew for the film.

https://books.google.com/books?id=0lxBb ... lm&f=false

Remember, flying Spitfires were very rare then, Hurricanes even moreso, so the film was a very big deal in the history of the warbird preservation movement.

Last edited by JohnB on Tue Jan 08, 2019 11:39 am, edited 2 times in total.

[Randy Wilson]

To follow up on Mike's post above, there were two books published about the making of the Battle of Britain movie. The first was "The Battle of Britain the making of the movie", by Leonard Mosley, 1969, which is mostly a narrative of the making of the film with lots of stories about the director, producer and cast members. A quick check on abebooks.com shows this edition is available quite reasonably.

The second is the one Mike posted a link to, "Battle of Britain The Movie by Robert J. Rudhall, 2000. Chapters are called Reels, with Reel 10 being "Identifying the Royal Air Force", with info on how to identify the various airworthy Spitfire (12) and Hurricane (3) marks, followed by a list of those just taxiing or static.

Reel 14 is titled "The Aircraft Fleet, Then and Now" on pages 161-168. There are 79 aircraft listed, with notes as to which flew, only taxied or were static. A last section "They Also Served" mentions "several other aircraft in minor roles, in front of and behind the cameras". These include the two Ju 52 (CASA 352) in the opening scene and the Proctor Stuka "lookalikes".

As Mike has pointed out, this second book seems to be less common in the used book market and thus somewhat pricey. I have both books in my library and if someone has a specific question about one or some of the aircraft mentioned in the book, I would try and help. I would not be comfortable republishing a whole chapter of the book. I also don't claim to be an expert on the movie, just a fan.

Randy

[ffuries]

Cool site with BOB movie pictures, information etc.

http://www.daveswarbirds.com/bob/frames.htm