Civil War movies – Lee Duigon

The Great Locomotive Chase (1956) - IMDb

The abominable dreck that comes oozing out of Disney Studios today bears no resemblance to the great family entertainment they used to provide when Walt Disney himself was still alive and running the store.

Like, for instance, this:

When Disney Was Disney (Movie Review)

The Great Locomotive Chase was a thrill a minute, but it was far from simple-minded. Nowadays it’s become fashionable and all PC to view the Civil War in terms of black and white instead of blue and grey. If they were making it today (God forbid), it’d be nothing but shrill screed about evil white people.

Maybe someday we’ll make movies like this again. For now, let’s just hope they don’t g et purged from YouTube in a frenzy of self-righteous bullschiff.

Image result for images of german sniper in bell tower, ww2 movie

Growing up in the 1950s, I saw an awful lot of World War II movies on TV. And in a lot of those movies, there were snipers. The German sniper was always up in a bell tower; the Japanese sniper, up a palm tree. And I don’t remember ever seeing an American or British sniper.

Snipers were bad guys, almost the same as assassins. Only the enemy had snipers. Yes, I know that isn’t true. Of course our side had snipers, too. But in the movies the sniper was always some Axis villain picking off our boys from high up in the bell tower.

Now snipers are good guys and America is proud of them. That’s how it is today.

In Civil War movies, both Blue and Grey had snipers but they were called “sharpshooters,” never snipers, and theirs was presented as a brave and honorable calling that helped their side win battles. I do not understand the difference between a sniper and a sharpshooter.

Anyhow, the question is, how did snipers go from being bad guys, only employed by the enemy, to good guys fighting for America? How did that happen?

Or am I just remembering it all wrong?