Movies in Vietnam

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: AFRTS HISTORY early times ww2 Korea etc...

My first experience with COMBAT was in 63 the Philippines en route from Korea to Ft McPherson. Wife’s young brothers wanted 5 pesos to see “bik moro” on neighbor’s TV. I didn’t understand it was Vic Morrow.
FrankR

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

At Da Nang in late 71, we got cinemascope movies but we had NO cinemascope lenses for the projector. They tried to get some sight view by showing at a sharp angle. Very unsatisfactory. Anyway, most movies end of 60s - early 70s were not worth the waste of film. One movie I saw at Da Nang, made in Japan in 1968 with American actors, was THE GREEN SLIME, where several FEN persons were extras. (Can Wikipedia)
FrankR

From: Ann Kelsey

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: AFRTS History - Early Times, WW2, Korea, etc

At Cam Ranh Army in 69-70 Special Services hauled 16 mm projectors around to various unit areas showing movies on an irregular basis depending on when a film canister showed up. I can’t remember a single one of the films, so they must have been undistinguished.
I do remember a clandestine showing of MASH in 1970 with a few of us hiding out in the Special Services office to see it. I have no idea how we managed to snag a copy. It definitely was not on the approved viewing list.
I remember seeing Combat on AFVN TV but not Batman.
Ann

From: Steve Sevits

Dated: June 2, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

Bela Lugosi was supposed to have been a classical stage actor of great repute in his home country somewhere in Eastern Europe. So it must be presumed he knew what he was doing.

From: Jim White

Dated: June 3, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

Not Long Binh, but the Iowa BEQ also had movies on the rooftop. I remember watching Easy Rider there.
Jim W

From: Steve Pennington

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

Plan 9 From Outerspace is, indeed, a terrible movie, but the backstory behind it is interesting. Ed Wood was a unique individual (read that weird), who did some creative financing to get the money for the film.

SLP

From: Tim Lennox

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

I only remember seeing one movie during my tour in Quang Tri, and it may have been before I transferred from a 5th Division PIO office to AFVN Detachment 5...but it was M*A*S*H! We watched it on a primitive screen set up---in the NCO "lounge" as recall... but what a perfect movie to see under those circumstances!

Movies for the GI's in Vietnam

May and June 2020

From: Ken Gilder

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Re: [AFVN] AFRTS HISTORY early times ww2 Korea etc...

I remember being told once, that, on a 16mm film frame, just 75-80% of it made it to the screen. I can verify this, as there were many times we would break out one of the "restricted" programs, and have our own private showing in the film library. Never saw it on TV, but we did snicker and chuckle when watching the program at 100% of the frame, and seeing the boom mike drop in to the top of the frame. It happened in "Bonanza" a lot.
Ken G.

Group Conversations
A & B

From: Ann Kelsey

Dated: June 3, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

The Meyerkord BOQ also had movies on the roof.
Ann

Group Conversations
N to T

From: Rick Fredericksen

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: AFRTS History - Early Times, WW2, Korea, etc

Funny story Bob. I don't think I'd arrived at Hon Tre yet. I guess you earned the "expert" medal for pistol marksmanship. This story should be on our website, unless it already is, as there are few things that get past Jim W.
Rick Fredericksen

From: Michael Scott

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

I’ve heard it said that Plan Nine From Outer Space may be the worst movie ever made.
But for my money, and I suspect there’d be some supporting testimony from members of the USARV-IO stationed at Long Binh during parts or all of 1968/69 that THE worst movie ever shown to them was: Carry On Cowboy — https://tinyurl.com/y84umk66
I know it’s not true, but I’m convinced this perversion of “cinema” was shown on a sheet, prone to blowing in the wind, more times than anything else I saw. For a few decades after coming home I could quote long passages of dialog much like a different generation can quote Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles.
Enjoy the trailer; rent or buy the movie if you have absolutely positively nothing else to do with your life at the moment. Again: https://tinyurl.com/y84umk66
Michael P Scott

USARV-IO Broadcast Section

From: Robert Wilford

Dated: June 2, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

Lugosi was a strange dude anyway. He refused to attend rehearsals for “Dracula”, but never missed a cue. At the appropriate time during the show he’d slip into the theater and appear on stage and disappear again after the show. No one from the cast ever met him. There's much more, but I don’t remember it all. Worth googling, though. We, too, love trashy cinema. So,
I call your Plan 9…plan to watch tonight. And I raise you “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes” and the original “Deathrace 2000” with Stallone and Carradine

AFVN Home

Group Conversations
C to G

From: Forrest Brandt

Dated: June 6, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

I was posted to the 1st Signal when I arrived in VN in 68. Second night there I went to the Long Binh out door theater, a Huey flew over and bright flashes went off just below it. Naive me. I thought it was flak and wondered how the NVA managed to have a flak gun so close to USARV. That raised my pucker factor significantly.
Later, at the theater at Lai Khe and word got out that A Man for All Seasons would be the movie of the week. Lt. Beauchamp Carr and I put it on our calendar. Got there with snacks and a bottle of Chateau Neuf Des Papes. Just before the movie began, two duce and halfs pulled up and dumped a bunch of grunts from the 28th Infantry. Movie begins, Thomas More is being rowed along the Thames to his house, a long, quiet scene. From one of the grunts, ”A Man for All Seasons, sheet, I thought it was goin’ to be a movie about hunting and fishing.” The troops "di di mau" the area as fast as they arrived and Carr and I enjoyed the movie by ourselves.
Forrest

Group Conversations
H to M

From: Ken Gilder

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

You might be right, but "Plan 9 from Outer Space" did win the Golden Turkey Award.
Ken G

From: Steve Sevits

Dated: May 31, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

As a fan of trashy cinema, Plan Nine is a classic which shouldn’t be missed. Bela Lugosi, of Dracula fame, died part way through the film so they completed filming with a stand-in who went around holding a cloak in front of his face. The iconic fist fight inside the flying saucer showed the space invaders electronic equipment set up on oak wooden tables, just as one might imagine the interior of a flying saucer. Plan Nine is not to be missed.
Steve

AFVN Group Conversations

Group Conversations
U to Z

From: Chuck Adams

Dated: June 3, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

The BOQ, I guess it was in Cholon/Saigon, also had rooftop movies. Can't really remember anything in particular other than a John Wayne/Dean Martin (or was it Robert Mitchum?) western with quite a bit of humor. But I do remember it was an easy walk over to AFVN HQ. Hey, that was some 50 years ago...
Chuck Adams

Note; It would be a rather long walk from Cholon to AFVN. The AFVN officers, as far as I know, used the Splendid BOQ. It was located near the Saigon Cathedral and a reasonable walk to AFVN. Jim W

From: Robert Wilford

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: AFRTS History - Early Times, WW2, Korea, etc

1969 Hon Tre. Movie night! Once a year each detachment received a Hollyiwood produced, play in the theater,actual movie! This was a big deal. The movie and 16 mm projection would arrive by helicopter and picked up the next day. The guys were delirious with joy and anticipation. Mick Mankey scrounged a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood and some white paint, and erected a “big” screen outside his hootch. Much inventorying of snacks and beverages occurred that afternoon: Jiffy pop? Check. Hormel chili check. Beer on ice? Working on it.Anything baked back home, check. Seats were “saved” by lunchtime, mostly sandbags with a pillow on top. Getting late in the day, we get word the chopper will drop the package near 7 p.m. A sergeant volunteers to take custody. Anybody qualified to thread and operate a 16 mm projector? Everybody! Sgt. Mankey will do the honors (shortest guy -time left on DEROS-in the unit. And, Mankey promises to wait until I am off guard duty and at my seat before he rolls the film. Once a year! Title? No one knows, no one cares. True to his word, Mankey starts the film at the sight of Sgt. Wilford (me) arriving from guard duty. The orchestra starts the overture to: “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”
Shocked faces exchanged looks of disbelief. Back at the image on the screen, back to each other. No one notices Wilford draw his .45 and aim it, but all were sure what would happen next: 2 shots, center mass. Back to kindergarten, Dick Van Dyke. And back to the nightly card game for the audience. Or to watch "Combat” somewhere.

From: Steve Pennington

Dated: May 30, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

At the outdoor "Mosquito Theater" at Phu Cat I watched an Italian movie about WWII, with English subtitles. Why would a movie like that even be distributed?

SLP

From: Ken Kalish

Dated: June 2, 2020

Subject: Movie Night at Long Binh (USARV-IO)

Oh yeah? Well How about Earth Girls Are Easy and Caveman?
Ken