- Adaptation Displacement: The book never really was popular in the first place, but now it's almost completely forgotten. The massive displacement is somewhat justified, since the only time when the book is mentioned at all, it's the opening titles and in the original, black and white version, it was a white lettering over a very bright background.
- Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: When in the Arab village, Franek starts to panic, since he can't get any supplies. So he starts talking to himself about being turned into soup himself. Suddenly the Arab managing the nearby shish kebab stand turns to Dolas and starts praising Polish military pea soup, in perfect Polish.
- Cult Classic: Goes without saying. In fact, due to such status, the movie was even digitally restored and colorised by a private TV station to further bolster viewing rates and sell it on DVD.
- Memetic Mutation:
- Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz, born in Chrząszczyrzewoszyce, Łękołody county. Just check the page about Poland alone. It's one of the most infamous tongue twisters of Polish language, at least for foreigners. If you are one, expect from Poles to dare you to say it.
- Curiously, this gag comes originally from the novel C.K. dezerterzy, where it's met with a similar reaction. In that novel, the protagonist introduced himself as Szczepan Brzęczyszczewski, born in the village of Mszczonowieścice, Grzmiszczosławice borough, Trzcinogrzechotnikowo county. Those origins are hard to pronounce fast even for native Poles.
- The three card scene was used even as a commercial in late 90s.
- Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz, born in Chrząszczyrzewoszyce, Łękołody county. Just check the page about Poland alone. It's one of the most infamous tongue twisters of Polish language, at least for foreigners. If you are one, expect from Poles to dare you to say it.
- Special Effect Failure: Completely unintentionally, when the movie was digitally restored and colorised, the Italian submarine become painfully obvious as a miniature model. The original, black-and-white version didn't suffer from this issue.
- Surprisingly Good Foreign Language: There is not a single non-Polish actor in the movie. Yet there are dialogues in nine foreign languages and they are all perfectly performed. The only exception might be the Austrian farmer, who speaks fluent German, but doesn't have a highly distinctive Tyrolian accent, but that's just nit-picking.
- Watch It for the Meme: Thanks a lot, Franek, a.k.a. Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/YMMV/HowIUnleashedWorldWarII
FollowingYMMV / How I Unleashed World War II
Go To