ROAD to MESSINA

[Cadman]

Disclaimer
The following cinema classic screenplay and series of movie still’s is not for the faint-hearted. Any resemblance to actual people, living or otherwise, is entirely intentional and historical inaccuracies like skirts too short are cos Weinstein insisted on them. Dubious shoulder patches and the wrong 1943 US flag are the result of poor research by the wardrobe dept. Unfortunately, there were no M48 Patton tanks available to use as German Panzers and American Ronson’s during the filming of this epic.
Special guest appearance of Marilyn Monroe is by kind permission of JFK.
The overture theme is “Copperhead Road” composed and performed by Steve Earle, and the full music score from the movie is available on CD;
https://www.amazon.com/Definitive-Collection-Steve-Earle/dp/B001O3MLU4

ROAD to MESSINA
Nope – it’s not an old B&W Bing & Bob comedy/adventure “Road Movie”.
It’s borderline lunatic, Lieutenant-General George Smith Patton Jnr and his 7th US Army’s race with the similarly flawed General Bernard Law Montgomery and his battle-worn Desert Veterans, to deliver Sicily from Benito’s evil Fascist régime, July - August 1943.

 

However, with Patton’s forces still 3 miles short of closing off the German escape route at the port of Messina, today’s busy PR schedule, (which includes a morale-boosting visit to wounded GI’s at a nearby field hospital), has been screwed because “Old Blood & Guts” and his MP escort have stumbled over a member of his command engaged in a spot of private enterprise.

 

Hapless Pte Oswald Harvey Oldman latterly of Dallas, Texas, who’s been caught with his pants around his ankles while moving samples of the goods, initially tries a hastily cooked-up story that the crates are filled with Molotov Cocktails. This isn’t necessarily an outright lie, seeing as that moonshine is probably as flammable as gasoline. It’s too bad for Oswald that he’s not fooling George S, or anyone else for that matter.

Tough MP, Sgt R. Lee Hartman barks, “Are you eye-balling me son?”
“Sir, no Sir,” screams Oswald.
“Don’t try an’ lie to me boy. Git down there an’ gimme twenty.”

 

Hartman then spots two light-fingered characters from the Big Red One encroaching on the crime scene hoping for the chance to grab a few free bottles of hooch, and he warns them off in no uncertain terms.
Very no-uncertain-terms.

 

His even tougher partner, ex-San Francisco PD officer, Sgt Larry “Grubby” Callaghan, snarls at the now-breathless Oswald,
“I know what you're thinking maggot. You're thinking, that’s an M1 semi-automatic Garand rifle Sgt Callaghan’s waving around, an’ the clip holds eight rounds -- but has he fired eight warning shots, or only seven?”
“Now to tell the truth, I've forgotten myself in all this excitement. But seeing as the 0.30-06 caliber Garand is the best squad weapon in the world and will blow your head clean off, you got to ask yourself a question.”
“Do I feel lucky?"
“Well? Do ya feel lucky, punk?”

 

The unhappy Oswald, with the muzzle of Grubby Larry’s M1 almost inside his left nostril, decides that his day has been all out of luck so far and avoids that Italian Carcano carbine fixed to the jeep windshield like it’s got the bubonic plague.
Patton’s driver, Tech 3rd Grade, Patrick “Red” O’Halloran from the Lower East Side, Chicago, and his sidekick, Pte Jethro “Jed” Clampett of Birmingham, Alabama, are fixin’ to have a good snigger while they enjoy the MP’s ripping Oswald a new one from that truly awesome can of whoop-bottom they've opened up on him.
There's also two obviously rear-echelon officers trying to brainstorm their way through electro-mechanical mysteries. It's all just too funny.

The onlookers include two strays from 82nd Airborne. A couple of identical cousins, Marion “Gritty” Chisum and John “Gabby” Dutton, residents of the bunkhouse on a run-down ranch in Sidewinder County, around fifty miles from the nearest one-horse town of Fractured Jaw, New Mexico.
This pair of saddle tramps disembarked from the troopship at some miserable place in England called Greenock; where the saloons didn’t provide spittoons or proper ice-cold beer, and the cantankerous clientele insisted on growling at them in some guttural dialect of what might have been Swedish, or maybe it was Dutch; but them folks shore wuzzn’t speakin’ American.
Our two heroes were then shipped off to some searing wasteland called Tunisia to prepare for the invasion of Southern Europe -- and the jump into Sicily that didn’t quite go to plan due to high winds and pilot error.

 

Having never previously been across the county line and with all that unaccustomed travel having resulted in complete disorientation by this time, they think they might have been dropped into Denver.

They’ve stopped off at “The Pizzeria Napoletana” to sink a few cold ones of Coors Lite, along with Lt Simon Lacroix Legree, lately a cotton industry entrepreneur in Louisiana, who’s been admiring French waitress Yvette Carte-Blanche’s incredible legs…and she’s still waiting for them to settle up for all that flat beer left on their table.
Now desperate for the company of their own kind, they ask Legree,
“Say Lootenant, see if’n y’all can spot Colonel Jim a-comin’ on down the pike with his woopin’ an’ a-hollorin’ good ol’ boys from the 82nd.”
Perhaps they’re hoping Colonel Jim will pick up the tab.

 

The young officer has a quick scan through his bino’s and says nope, no sign of the soon-to-be-promoted to Brigadier-General, James Gavin and his good ol' boys, but he can see that shady Pte Clint Kelly guy hightailing out of town on the back of what must be a new type of Sherman, cos it’s real fast, sports a huge turret gun and what looks like a pretty cool music system.

Pseudo-Scot, Major Sir Alasdair Lancelot Wigan-Pier, of that ilk, from a crumbling sandstone castle near Wick that was built by the estate factor around the turn of the century; and who’s Monty’s spy…err…the British Liaison Officer, gleefully updates his prickly Boss, who still reckons his Desert Rats will beat “THAT PRIMA DONNA” into Messina.

 

And with typical Limey duplicity, this guy has the blatant cheek to file his scandalous report using the latest US Army wireless gear being tirelessly lugged around by Patton’s baby-faced radio operator; the Hershey-bar munching Hank “Kid” Williams Jr of Boot-Heel City, Missouri.

Meanwhile, Cpl Mickey Cornetto from Manhattan, Noo Yoik, has run into some dame trying to claim her,
“Knees have gone all wobbly at the sudden influx of so many quiet-spoken and clean-cut American boys who all look like film stars.”

 

While Signorina Carla Ponti can certainly be economical with the truth, especially when sizing up Neanderthal’s with poor personal hygiene who might as well have $-signs tattooed on the ridge of bone across their foreheads; she’s also pretty quick off the mark to recognize lucrative black-market opportunities for all those Nylons and Cartons of Lucky’s the bellowing and disheveled GI’s are handing out with generous abandon.
Observing the festivities with eyes colder than glacial ice, Patton resolves to set these goofballs straight once he’s finished dealing with Oswald.

 

Naturally, Mickey and the entire 2nd platoon get invited to a private celebration party round at Carla’s BFF Sofie Scicolone’s place at the back of the pizza restaurant she runs on Syracuse Boulevard. That’s Sofie and her poisonous little sister Lucrezia along with Yvette, in front of their establishment next to The Statue of The Fallen Madonna, discussing the wonders of ancient Sicilian culture with The Forces of Democracy.
Winning hearts and minds are…(photo is from the auditions)...

 

…Pte Kirby “Swamp Thing” Boudreaux from the bayou’s around Baton Rouge; PFC Elijah “Rooster” McAllister out of Mountainburg, Arkansas; Pte Nathan “Reb” Forrest from Bedford, Georgia; Pte John Lee Pettimore of Copperhead County, Kentucky and Top-Sgt Benjamin “Benny the Ball” Lebowski of New Jersey.
The boys are all eager to attend the liberation bash, but the only stuff likely to be liberated round at Sofie’s place is the contents of GI’s wallets.

It’s strongly suspected that “The Pizzeria Napoletana” is where the bootleg white lightening is being manufactured, no doubt utilizing a rusty cast-iron cauldron and an innovative selection of unspeakable ingredients.
US Army Intelligence have been casing the joint for days and checking out the ID’s of all four young ladies.
Carla is definitely mainland Italian and may be a double-agent on the payroll of Admiral Wilhelm’s Abwehr. Yvette is a French Resistance leader from Marseille who’s hiding out from the Boche, but the Scicolone sisters are a complete mystery.
In an amazing plot twist, despite the fact they look nothing like each other, stunning blonde Lt Mary Ure and the equally attractive Lt Ingrid Pitt are deadly British SOE agents, who’ve been secretly inserted into the local crime organization…as sisters..!!??

 

Moving on…
…Captain Harold Norbert Huckabee III of Santa Rosa, California, had demonstrated a level of hitherto unsuspected initiative and purloined a beat-up dispatches motorcycle; then hit the road to Messina hoping to sniff out delivery of his promised merchandise. Having never previously been further from HQ than a trip to the latrines, he inevitably got lost within the first couple of miles and now, even worse, his 2-wheeled transport has seized up, leaving him stranded in what is essentially a combat zone. With mounting apprehension, he kicks the tires a few times, only to discover that doesn’t make the piece of junk work.
Fellow West Point Graduate, Major Troy Whitmore Drake, a scion of old money from Providence, Rhode Island, now decides to offer his two cents, although what he understands about motorcycles is pretty much what a donkey understands about Boolean Algebra.
Consulting the smudged Harley Operators Manual, he hopefully suggests the problem might be fouled spark plugs, the battery could be flat, the condenser across the points is maybe blown, or something?

 

Perhaps getting that bit closer to the prize cigar, he finally reckons the breakdown can actually be attributed to the locally-sourced oil that dumbass HQ mechanic, Jake “Torquey” Cutter, used at the last service interval way back in Vichy French-Morocco.
“Torquey” would’ve done better to go see Rick at the Café Americaine for the oil. Rick can get his hands on anything and get anything, or anyone, fixed up as well, if he’s a mind to.

 

So, will Oswald Harvey Oldman end up being the patsy for the samples of “1943 Vintage Chateau Rotgut” he’s been caught trying to deliver to various end-users, while Pte Kelly the real villain of the piece flees the scene with the main consignment of illicit goods?
Will George S have to apologize to Oswald for being nasty to him?
Will those two bozo’s ever realize they’re reading the diagrams in that smudged Harley Operators Manual…upside down?
Will Lt’s Ure and Pitt be betrayed into foul Tedeschi hands by Carla the suspected Abwehr double-agent? Probably not, as they’re both signed up for the follow-up movie – as is Pte Kelly funnily enough.
Will Yvette fall for Major Wigan-Pier? Stranger things have happened in this movie.
Or is this entire farce yet another Slimy Limey sting operation set up by shadowy SOE Colonel Colin Firth back in London to get Monty into Messina first?

Next movie in the franchise is being filmed even as this one goes on general release.
Working title will be either; “Patton Charms the Ladies of Piccadilly”, or “Piccadilly: Where Only Eagles Dare”.

 

1:35 Scale Models & Figures
The Dodge Staff Car is from Italeri.
The Harley is from Miniart.
The Jeep is from Tamiya.
Figures are both plastic and resin from various manufacturers including Tamiya, Dragon, Verlinden, MJ Miniatures, etcetera, etcetera.
Models & figures are painted with acrylics from Lifecolor, Vallejo and Scale75.
The street section, palm tree kit, Madonna statue and scatter material are all from Reality in Scale. The restaurant façade is scratch-built. Movie poster and pin-up fliers are by Verlinden.

Edited March 4, 2023 by Cadman

[Pete in Lincs]

Brilliant. love it.

[dnl42]

That's outstanding! And a hoot!

[Pete Robin]

That's mad, but it works brilliantly. Cool storytelling as well.

Regards

Pete

[Dr. Quack]

Every diorama should tell a story - congrats on providing us with such brilliant entertainment.

Q

 

 

 

 

Still laughing!

[Cadman]

2 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

Brilliant. love it.

 

2 hours ago, dnl42 said:

That's outstanding! And a hoot!

 

1 hour ago, Pete Robin said:

That's mad, but it works brilliantly. Cool storytelling as well.

Regards

Pete

 

46 minutes ago, Dr. Quack said:

Every diorama should tell a story - congrats on providing us with such brilliant entertainment.

Q

 

Still laughing!

 

Thanks for the positive responses guys.

I originally had no intention of posting this as it was really done for my own amusement, but I decided to do so after cutting out the more, (potentially), controversial jokes.
Satire is one of the most difficult tasks to pull off, especially when limited to only photos and text. After all, no-one hears the voice inflections or see's the body language of the narrator.
Then again, the first draft I wrote is something to behold...😂...and would've got me crucified had I posted that particular version...🤫
It's always a balancing act, especially with an international member base, but I think with this drastically edited revision the post manages to avoid coming across as just too stoopid, or indeed offensive toward either Patton, or Monty; or the troops they commanded.
Both characters had their faults, but that just proves they were human, and their mutual achievements far outweighed those faults in any case.
Good luck catching the many pop culture references to various films/TV series/books that I included. Even I'm not certain how many are still lurking in the text...😇
Cheers

Edited January 6, 2023 by Cadman
removed a comment

[Cadman]

If you squint your eyes up and check the second last photo again, the Captain Huckabee character looks a bit like Jimmy Stewart.

But my favourite photo is the one where SOE agent Lt Pitt is inviting 2nd platoon to, "Come up and see me sometime".

That's one of Mae West's catchphrases, but in this context it's straight out of a Tom & Jerry cartoon.

😆

[Muchmirth]

Wow you’ve been very busy. This one looks great too. Top job and again top story telling!

Paul

[Cadman]

1 hour ago, Muchmirth said:

Wow you’ve been very busy. This one looks great too. Top job and again top story telling!

Paul

 

This one took around six weeks to put together. The updated Frozen Chosin only took a week or so, as all I did was paint some figures and find space for them on the diorama base.

Being retired does have its compensations...😃 

[Cadman]

The eagle-eyed may have spotted that Miss Monroe flounced off the set of this movie because she received a better financial offer to appear in a similar epic set in Korea and being filmed by Dining Table Film Productions Inc.

No worries, her replacement has already been found and passed her audition. She'll make her debut on the outskirts of Messina in around a week from now -- once the wardrobe department finish applying her makeup.

Cheers

Edited March 5, 2023 by Cadman

[Cadman]

Here's the additional figure that's going into this one.

Now, be gentle with me. I'm not that great at doing 1:35 figures, and the photos of Carlo, the Brave Sicilian Resistance Leader/Mafia Thug are far larger than the actual figure.

 

 

 

 

 

Carlo and Ms Monroe's replacement ought to be located in the diorama over the next couple of days and then I'll post a few updated photos of the diorama.

Cheers

[RichieW]

That was a heck of a lot of fun to read through. Great diorama, great storytelling and a great laugh too. Thanks for the entertainment! 😂

 

Richie

[Cadman]

18 hours ago, RichieW said:

That was a heck of a lot of fun to read through. Great diorama, great storytelling and a great laugh too. Thanks for the entertainment! 😂

 

Richie

 

You're welcome - glad you enjoyed the show.

All three of my recent comedy dioramas have undergone very slight changes these past couple of days, but I've had problems getting decent photos due to poor light, or more likely, the fact that I don't know what I'm doing with the camera-- so I gave up and reverted to sorting out the folders in my music library which I've allowed to turn into a real mess. 

I'll get back to unravelling the mysteries of photography tomorrow. Might end up having to use the camera flash even though that usually results in unavoidable shadows on the images.

Cheers

[Homer]

Congratulations on a fine piece of work well done 👏 

[Muchmirth]

On 06/03/2023 at 11:12, Cadman said:

Here's the additional figure that's going into this one.

Now, be gentle with me. I'm not that great at doing 1:35 figures, and the photos of Carlo, the Brave Sicilian Resistance Leader/Mafia Thug are far larger than the actual figure.

 

 

 

 

 

Carlo and Ms Monroe's replacement ought to be located in the diorama over the next couple of days and then I'll post a few updated photos of the diorama.

Cheers

No need to be gentle as he’s brilliant, great painting and what a pose/expression!

[Cadman]

On 3/10/2023 at 6:03 PM, Muchmirth said:

No need to be gentle as he’s brilliant, great painting and what a pose/expression!

 

He started life as a resin figure from Evolution Miniatures depicting a Red Officer from the Russian Civil War. He'd been sitting assembled but unpainted on a shelf for years -- and then I realized he was perfect for inclusion as 'Carlo' in this diorama. I also have the companion piece, a White Officer, but haven't a clue how I can use that one. Perhaps he'd work as an opponent for the British secret agent Sidney Riley, in a "Great Game" vignette. I'll have a think about that one.