Best Supporting Bunker?

[Rich Goodale (Guest)]

I just caught the end of "From Here to Eternity" on the telly and it sure looks like Montgomery Clift bit the big one in the middle of a Seth Raynor bunker at Waialae, perhaps even the Redan (8th).  Two questions:

1.  Am I right?
2.  If so (or even if not) are there any other classic instances of a bunker having a key supporting role in a major non-golf related motion picture?  Perhaps "Paths of Glory was really filmed at Painswick, as I previously adumbrated?  (OK, that's 3 questions, but whose counting--except Naccarato, Huckaby and Kilfara.....?).

[THuckaby2]

Hey, I resemble that remark!  OK, so I do scrupulously read ever word you write... It's all part of the learning... any crap given back is only with the humblest of intentions.

Now as for your questions, however many they may be...

1. Hell if I know.  I trust you're correct.  
2. Patton's in a hell of a bunker when he faces off against Rommel in that epic cinematic battle... you can faintly make out the bunker short of #17 at Edgewood in some of the Tahoe scenes in Godfather II.... William Wallace battles the vile English near what must later become some wonderful bunkers, right?  So this has to be all over Braveheart... OK, I'm struggling here.  

TH

[Rich Goodale (Guest)]

Tom

Thanks for responding to a very silly thread--even for me!  I think I was just trying to express how I viewed that scene so much differently than I would have 2-3 years ago.  Then, I would have focused on Clift's death rictus. Today I was just looking at the flashed up edges of the bunkers.......

PS--Braveheart was filmed in Ireland, where I understand they also play golf........

[THuckaby2]

Rich:  I knew there was a reason I love Braveheart, beyond the fact my mother in law's maiden name is Wallace and she is a direct blood relative of Sir William... they picked the right place to film it!

I have watched that movie at least 20 times.

FREEDOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BTW, you're not alone in this "affliction."  I'm not kidding that I saw Patton recently in the same light you saw FHTE.... the big battle scene against Rommel had me thinking bunkers and firm and fast conditions....  

TH

[Paul_Turner]

To counter those who subscribe to the Mel Gibson school of history.

If they ever find the site of Brunanburh, I'm sure they'll find a rugged bunker built for our Angle hero King Athelstan.  

[THuckaby2]

Well jousted Mr. Turner!

It was fun to watch how the English were portrayed in that movie.  Well, fun for me anyway, as a Celt.    As for it being history, well... there was a great television show here on the History Channel on exactly that and they concluded that Mel took a few liberties.  Just a few.  SInce when should the real facts get in the way of story-telling?  

In any case even in the movie version you gotta admire Longshanks to a certain extent.

TH

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Rich, Not entirely.

According to the Internet Movie Database:

Filming Locations for
Braveheart (1995)    
 
Ballymore Eustace, Kildare, Ireland
Fort William, Glencoe, Scotland, UK
Glen Nevis, Fort William, Scotland, UK
Glencoe, Scotland, UK
Loch Leven, Onich, Highland, Scotland, UK
Sally's Gap, County Wicklow, Ireland
St Margarets, Dublin, County Dublin, Ireland
The Curragh, County Kildare, Ireland
Trim Castle, Trim, County Meath, Ireland
Trim, Ireland  

Also, I have to reiterate to all the movie "Local Hero" starring Burt Lancaster which of course as you know was filmed in Pennen and Lochailort Inn, Lochailort, White Sands, Morar, and Mallaig and featured some pretty outstanding natural links and blowouts on Ben's Beach. (the mythical home of one Ben Knox--the town's savior)



Sorry for the quality of the photo

One of my all time favorites.

[Rich Goodale (Guest)]

Thanks, Tommy.

My understanding is that all of the battle scenes were done in Ireland, but like Dr. Mucci, I could be wrong.....

Vis a vis "Local Hero," it (not unsurprisingly) strikes many deep and important chords with me and should be viewed by anybody thinking about coming to Scotland to play golf, even though there is no golf in the movie whatsoever!  As for the blow out bunkers on Ben's Beach (was that maybe where the concept of "Ben's Porch" came from?), only somebody completely besotted with GCA could even think of desecrating that site with a golf course, which on the ecological food chain is only a few steps up (down?) from an oil terminal!

Do your sources say anything about the bunker in the death scene in FHTE?  Just wondering......

[JakaB]

Jackass the Movie has risen to the greatest golf movie of all time...the golf cart scenes may do more for walking than the last scene will do for matchbox collecting...When the golfer turned on the horn blowers and drilled a golf ball at them it was classic cinema.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Rich,
It  has been so long since I have seen From Here To Eternity, I'm sort of fuzzy remembering that paticular scene on the Waialae.

Your right, Local Hero should be required watching for anyone going to Scotland for the first time. I own the movie on DVD. Consider it one of my favorites and have seen. The director, Bill Forsyth is one of my personal favorites also. Another movie of his called Comfort and Joy is also a great movie. (Filmed in Glasgow) As is the movie that sort of made him famous with a lot of studio heads--Gregory's Girl.

Sadly, when David Puttnam's reign ended at Columbia, so did a lot of great movies like Local Hero.

[Brad Tufts]

Not so much a best supporting bunker, but a best supporting green.  

At the beginning of Chariots of Fire, the boys run across the 18th green of TOC I believe, and if you notice, the main character guy brings his clubs on the train to St. Andrews.