Eagles Over London
Eagles Over London Italian La battaglia dInghilterra , is a 1969 macaroni combat war film directed by Enzo G. Castellari.
When Enzo G. Castellari finished the film Kill Them All and Come Back Alone, he asked the producers what their next film would be. They replied a war epic about the Battle of Britain with the Harry Saltzman version yet to be released. Enzo thought that was a great idea but the producers had their sights on Alberto De Martino directing. The producers stipulated that stock footage of the actual Battle of Britain needed to be used in the film and that it should be used in a splitscreen method. They asked Enzo if he would direct the special effects sequences and cut it with the stock footage using a splitscreen method. Enzo had never heard of split screen so he was shown the American films The Thomas Crown Affair and the The Boston Strangler. He shot the effects sequences and mixed it using a triple split screen method. An example is having a British plane shoot on the left side, having a German plane getting hit on the right side, and having stock footage in the middle. When shown this splitscreen footage, the producers were so impressed they decided to have Enzo direct the entire picture. After this, Enzo sat down with a writing partner for a week to rewrite the overlong script to make it more actionoriented and less of a soap opera.It should be notedaccording to whom? that the film is entirely fictional and historically inaccurate. For instance, the RAF never shot down 94 German planes in one day London was never blitzed in one sortie by 1,000 planes and the RAF Control Centre was never attacked in any way. It is also interesting to noteaccording to whom? that the director uses Messerschmitt Bf 109s or nearreplicas of them as RAF Hawker Hurricanes, and Supermarine Spitfires as Luftwaffe Bf109s. There are also interestingaccording to whom? fictional bombers that are supposed to be Heinkel He 111s. ........
Source: Wikipedia
