War Film Miscellany Trivia Quiz

Answer: Lawrence of Arabia

Set in Egypt and Arabia, this epic describes T.E. Lawrence's exploits in uniting the Arabs to fight on the British side against the Turks. Peter O'Toole was not even the first choice for the role of Lawrence, but Marlon Brando was unavailable, fortunately, some might say. Noel Coward famously said of O'Toole that if he had been any prettier they would have had to call the film "Florence of Arabia"!

Answer: The Dambusters

The film tells the story of the daring 1943 raid by Lancaster bombers of 617 Squadron on the Mohne and Eder dams in the Ruhr. The black Labrador belonging to Wing Commander Guy Gibson, the squadron commander, was knocked down and killed by a car as the crews were preparing for the operation.

Answer: Ice Cold in Alex

Starring John Mills, Sylvia Sim and Anthony Quayle, a handful of British troops escape from besieged Tobruk and cross the desert in a military ambulance to reach Alexandria. There they celebrate with ice cold lager, which gives the film its name. Real lager was used in the filming, and John Mills later confessed that after several hours of re-takes the cast were all quite drunk!

Answer: The Battle of Britain

This is a real "spot the star" film, with Michael Caine, Christopher Plummer, Robert Shaw and Edward Fox all playing fighter pilots, when in reality they would all have been considered far too old for the job in 1940! The English composer William Walton composed a complete score for the film, but 90% of it was rejected as being "too classical".

Answer: A Bridge Too Far

The intention of Operation Market Garden, which was the largest airborne operation up to that time, was to capture several bridges over the Maas and Lower Rhine to assist allied troops in the invasion of Germany. Several bridges were captured but at the last bridge, at Arnhem, British and Polish paratroopers met fierce German resistance and the operation stalled, hence the title of the film.

Answer: The Battle of the River Plate

The German pocket battleship Graf Spee was intercepted by a Royal Navy task force in the South Atlantic. After suffering damage the Graf Spee escaped under cover of darkness and sought refuge in the Uruguayan port of Montevideo. When its time limit in the neutral port expired the captain took the still damaged Graf Spee to sea with a skeleton crew and scuttled it rather than have it impounded or captured.

Answer: The Bridge on the River Kwai

The film was adapted from a French novel by Pierre Boulle, and certain aspects of the book were changed for the film, notably the fact that in the original story the bridge was not destroyed. The character of Lt Cdr Shears USN did not appear in the novel, but was introduced to give the film wider appeal among an American audience. William Holden, who took the part, was given top billing but he was outshone by Alec Guinness, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of Colonel Nicholson, the senior British officer.

Answer: Dunkirk

Richard Attenborough stars in this film as a reluctant volunteer who takes his cabin cruiser and joins a flotilla of small craft which crosses the channel to assist in the rescue of thousands of British troops who have been driven back to the Belgian coast at Dunkirk and are in imminent danger of death or capture.

Answer: Regeneration

The poet Siegfried Sassoon, an officer in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers, had already been decorated for gallantry when he published his "Soldier's Declaration" in 1917. He was sent to Craiglockhart Hospital near Edinburgh where he was treated by the eminent psychiatrist William Rivers, and met fellow poet Wilfred Owen.

The film is based on Pat Barker's excellent trilogy which comprises "Regeneration", "The Eye in the Door" and "The Ghost Road".

Answer: Aces High

Malcolm MacDowell stars as the young squadron commander, dealing with constant losses among his pilots, and one who is cracking up due to combat stress. There are excellent flying sequences which were filmed using replica aircraft of the period owned by The Shuttleworth Trust.