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Title:AUSTRO-HUNGARIANS ON THE ITALIAN FRONT 1 [Allocated Title]
Film Number:IWM 1034-4
Other titles:
Summary: Disjointed Hungarian film of Austro-Hungarian troops in action or training, mostly on the Italian Front, probably 1917.
Description: A training exercise on gently rolling slopes begins with 77mm field guns and trench mortars opening the bombardment, joined by light howitzers. An intercut scene of Austro-Hungarian troops walking down a damaged street. Back with the exercise, the bombardment of the slopes continues, and the Infantry start to move forward in waves, getting up to the first enemy wire. An intercut shot of an assault battalion on the march through some woods, then back to the staff officers directing the exercise, cutting between the two. Assault troops collect their equipment and move up through a communications trench. Austro-Hungarian Infantry advance through a wood and form a firing line, moving up by sections. Italian prisoners are led back through a town in the wet; the town shows battle damage and has temporary defences.
Technical Details: Format: 35mm
Number of items/reels/tapes: 1
Footage: 650 ft; Running time: 11 mins
Notes: Soundtrack: the soundtrack to this film consists of military music, and was presumably added by the BBC for its own purposes
Technical: note that the three reels of IWM 1034 are numbered as reels 1, 3 and 4. There is no reel 2
Remarks: the training exercises, if this is what they are, look very impressive indeed, although the tactics are rather primitive for the probable date of the film