After Action Report: Das Boot

Greetings WingNuts,

We are back from our long sea tour! After two weeks, the Wing Commander movie club has watched the director's cut of Das Boot. Most in attendance had seen at least the theatrical version before so we had a good idea what we were getting into… but it was certainly a tough watch! Unlike some of the war films we've watched in this series, Das Boot's impact has not diminished over the years. It's a hard edged story that portrays the reality of warfare: that most of the people fighting aren't there supporting an ideology but because society offers them no other choice. It's not an easy watch but it's a valuable one.

Of course there were a lot of Wing Commander connections to discuss given the film's importance in inspiring the Wing Commander film's look, feel, specific scenes and even… well, its captain. AD provided this excerpt from Chris Roberts' original Wing Commander film pitch where he talks all about how it will be inspired more by war films than science fiction. As he concludes: "almost a Das Boot in space!" Truer words were never spoken!

Like Star Wars, which was a heroic myth with a futuristic spin, this fundamental approach to the basic story touches on familiar chords in the audience's experience. After all, who didn't grow up with at least some exposure to the classic war movies? Wing Commander: The Movie will provide a similar experience, yet in a new and unique setting. In other words, it's something quite familiar and something quite different at the same time.

Although the heroes become trapped deep behind enemy lines and ultimately must battle their way back out again, the combat will be infrequent... yet always lurking in the background. There will probably be no more than four set combat pieces, but they'll be spectacular ones, with incredible effects done exclusively with high-end computer graphics-think Return of the Jedi on steroids!

Through it all, through the combat and the drama and the heroics, the largely unseen enemy is out there, watching constantly for the opportunity to crush our heroes and their dreams. Space combat in this universe follows the tradition of naval warfare in the Pacific during WW II. The two opposing sides maneuver around strategic planets and jump points, playing a deadly game of Silent Running-esque cat and mouse, with certain doom to whoever's located first. In the end, much of the drama turns on the tense interactions between the isolated main characters, as they search desperately for a way out of their increasingly dire predicament... almost a Das Boot in space."

And here's producer Todd Moyer saying much the same thing in the film's production notes. I guess he read the pitch!

Lamont had a number of problems to deal with on this production that his experience on TITANIC could not solve. "We had to create everything - the aircraft interiors, the decks, the equipment," he explains. "It's a very different task than doing a historical reality. I like detail; we try to create a high-tech atmosphere as efficiently as possible. These days, with better camera systems, the audience can see a lot more; when you look at the sets of a movie you'll agree that there's a lot of attention to detail. But sometimes the design comes from what you can find and how much of it you can find." Moyer continues: "Peter has created a sense of both vastness and confinement - very much like a DAS BOOT in space.

The most obvious connection is of course that German actor Jürgen Prochnow plays both U-96's nameless captain and the Tiger's Claw's XO (and later captain) Commander Geralld. He also appears in another part of the Wing Commander universe: as Xavier Shondi in Privateer 2: The Darkening. Despite his similar status in all three roles, our viewing of Das Boot confirms they couldn't be more dissimilar. As a submarine captain, he is expressly apolitical; he is not a goose-stepping Nazi but a man doing his job and navigating life as best he can. In Wing Commander, he does begin the story as a boot licking fascist, threatening Blair over his heritage and spitting venom over the Pilgrims. And then in Privateer 2, he's a third extreme: the leader of a group fighting for Mutant rights. Here he is a zealot of the opposite stripe, a heroic fighter in a good cause (and a man who loves an extremely weird bar.)

Chris Roberts described the connection to Das Boot by saying "there were some scenes I wanted in the movie that were the equivalent of Das Boot's depth-charging scene." And that's certainly true, Das Boot's central depth charge scene is absolutely the inspiration for Wing Commander's crater bombing (Das Boot even refers to U-96 hiding in a crater at one point!). But the building tension with the characters believing they'd escaped only to find the threat closer is identical in both movies. Note the obvious similarities in lighting the battle sequences, too – that's something we'll learn more about with the next film! The torpedo sequence which precedes the depth charge attack is also extremely similar to the Tiger Claw torpedoing the Kilrathi fleet during the ambush.

Wing Commander's storyboards indicate that the 'blue light' shot was originally intended to be a CG insert that would show the Kilrathi destroyer crossing the Tiger Claw. But it seems like they'd decided just to show the Das Boot-inspired blue light by the time the movie was being shot!

Incidentally, both Das Boot and Wing Commander understand what Roger Ebert does not: the threat of detection is not caused by people talking on a submarine… they're quiet because it's a tense professional environment. In real life, the danger is dropping something metal that would hit the hull (like a hammer) and not the crew talking too loudly. Wing Commander assumed viewers understood this and… they did not.

Beyond this specific scene, though, Chris Roberts borrowed a LOT of other ideas from Das Boot. And we should pause to say that isn't a criticism in any way… it's fascinating to see the inspiration, but it's also a totally valid way to create something new. The Tiger's Claw's modern-warship-like sets were heavily inspired by Das Boot's cramped submarine sets:

Even Maniac and Blair's initial visit to the ship with the camera pushing down the corridor and into the rec room seems extremely similar to Das Boot's initial tour of U-96 for the war correspondent.

Many of the movie's shots are similar to those in Das Boot. Compare the crew eating, the sonar officer at work and this remarkably referential shot of Blair resting in his bunk!

The two even share similar establishing shots. Both obfuscate the whole of the submarine/carrier and show it in a variety of different colored backgrounds to get across the mood of a sequence. And check out how much the plane that attacks the sub at one point comes in just like Angel's Rapier squadron!

Another element of Wing Commander that remains in the film but was somewhat cut down in the final edit is that the three major action sequences on the Tiger's Claw, the jump, the ambush and the final broadside battle, all had a series of 'lower decks' scenes filmed where you would see the engineer, flight boss, torpedo crews and so on at work. These were originally longer and better established the characters… in the final film they simply flash by in montages.