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John Wayne M-16 "The Green Berets"


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O.K, I've seen this film quite a few times over the past 50 years. The scene that always bothers me the most is the one where John Wayne picks up the M-16 off the ground and violently smashes it against a tree into pieces, but I never really looked at the gun closely. First I'm thinking, good lord do you know what that gun would cost today on the open market, what a waste. I then also think of how fairly easily the gun came apart in pieces when he banged it against the tree. While the Duke was a pretty big guy, it just always looked like he couldn't have generated that much force to break it apart that easily.

 

It was not until I saw this still frame from the film that I realized that the producers of this film were so cheap that they used a toy Mattel Marauder M-16 to shoot this scene. Now I know why the gun broke into pieces so easily. Ah, the magic of Hollywood, they don't make em like that anymore. Perhaps today they would just CGI the gun.

 

Mike Hammer

John Wayne Mattel M-16.jpg

Mattel 1966 M16 MARAUDER.jpg

Edited by Mike Hammer
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About a year after I got to my first assignment as an Army LT, assigned to a Field Artillery battalion in Germany, we changed battalion commanders. The incoming LTC was James H. Chapman. In the Green Berets, he is the captain in charge of the SF A Team at the Fort Bragg demonstration at the beginning of the film. He had a picture on his office wall of he and his team with John Wayne. As a FA battalion commander, I wasn't impressed with his skills.

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Mike I knew that the day I saw the movie in 1968, Since I was using those and M-14's I guess they figured it was a quick scene and nobody would notice. Like the 1917a1 in 1969 "Wild Bunch" that was in 1913.When it was only a prototype, And not released to any Army at that time, I guess they never thought of using a MAXIM 08 that the German arms guy should have had in Mexico. And the Lewis gun with 47 round pan drum Would not have that Belt feed "Crazy"scene. I could see Warren Oates screaming as he is changing the drum, Not the same.....

 

Well back to the Bunker.

 

Colt21A Ron

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I've got the Blue Ray version of the movie, as well as having read the book. I lived in Ft. Rucker, Alabama when the movie came out in 1968. My Dad was a career Army Aviator--flew fixed wing (Caribou's among others) and rotary (Huey's among others). He was in Vietnam in 1963 and 1967. That's how I got my interest in "Small Arms of the World" which led to my interest in Thompson's and MP40's, etc. My Dad had a bunch of sub-machine guns in Vietnam including a Thompson.

 

One of the best movies of all time.

 

Robert

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Ron, all kinds of mistakes with guns in movies. probably the most glaring errors are found in "Raiders of the Lost Ark". The film is set in 1936 and yet the Germans are blasting away with MP 40 Sub machine guns and P-38 pistols. While it's a fantastic film and I wouldn't change it, those that know their guns recognize the inaccuracies.

 

Another film gun faux pas, (at least I think so) is "Titanic" which takes place in April 1912 has the bad guy David Warner blasting away with a nickel engraved 1911 Colt. I'm no expert on mfg. dates of civilian 1911's but I find this extremely unlikely it would have been possible to have one in private hands at that time. The 1st military guns were just put together in the last couple days of Dec.1911.

 

Mike Hammer

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  • 1 month later...

Speaking of guns in movies, if you have seen the western crime series Longmire, there were statements made about guns from minute 10 to 25 in the pilot episode I saw on dvd and virtually all of them were wrong. Also, in the first season of Elementary there were ridiculous statements made about HK MP5s that suggested that they were semiauto and smoothbore. Like most movies they are cringeworthy.

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