General Patton

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If anyone has seen the 1970 film Patton (which won Best Film), you'll learn that the colorful, controversial, heroic American general believed in past lives.

This was depicted a few times in the film, such as here:



See these articles:

General George Patton And Reincarnation

These are the 8 reincarnations of General George S. Patton


Patton, The Second Coming of Hannibal


Patton's poem:

Through the travail of the ages
Midst the pomp and toil of war
Have I fought and strove and perished
Countless times upon this star.

I have sinned and I have suffered
Played the hero and the knave
Fought for belly, shame or country
And for each have found a grave.

So as through a glass and darkly
The age long strife I see
Where I fought in many guises,
Many names - but always me.

So forever in the future
Shall I battle as of yore,
Dying to be born a fighter
But to die again once more.

One of my most watched movies. Probably because I'm a fan of George C. Scott, not George Patton. I'm also fascinated by WW2 and watch lots of documentaries about it. I have no idea why - probably because my childhood was dominated by it whether in our personal lives (the experiences of our parents' generation) or in films and TV. 

I did read more about Patton though and discovered he believed that he would reincarnate into a soldiers life time after time. Somehow I doubt that's how it works although I was told by a regression therapist that many of my past lives have been as a soldier. In this life I'm mostly a pacifist and my interest in WW2 is historical rather than military. Maybe I was Patton which would be some kind of divine joke because my former self would hate who I am this time around - a coward pinko commie hippie.

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I saw the movie a few months ago for the first time. Quite a terrific movie. Great fan of Scott, too - especially his performance in Dr. Stangelove.

Another great WWII movie, one of my favorites,  that basically follows the same trajectory - North Africa, Sicily, France-Germany - is Samuel Fuller's The Big Red One (1980), with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) as one of the platoon grunts. Fuller was a soldier during the war before he became a screenwriter and film director, and it's basically his autobiography during the war. Catch it if you haven't seen it! (Make sure to see the 2004 Reconstruction as the original was severely shortened and butchered by the studio.)

I saw the movie a few months ago for the first time. Quite a terrific movie. Great fan of Scott, too - especially his performance in Dr. Stangelove.

Another great WWII movie, one of my favorites,  that basically follows the same trajectory - North Africa, Sicily, France-Germany - is Samuel Fuller's The Big Red One (1980), with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) as one of the platoon grunts. Fuller was a soldier during the war before he became a screenwriter and film director, and it's basically his autobiography during the war. Catch it if you haven't seen it! (Make sure to see the 2004 Reconstruction as the original was severely shortened and butchered by the studio.)

Yes indeed, I watched that for the first time only a few months ago. Lee Marvin as the sergeant - another of the film greats, in my opinion.

Going back to the reincarnation theme, and perhaps linked to my fascination with WW2. At some point I became convinced that I was a soldier who was killed in action in that conflict. Nothing surprising there - I was born into this life six years after the end of the war. But I was also convinced that I was a US soldier which might be unusual for a born-and-bred Brit. However, as I said, the post-war years were packed with war movies, most of them American so perhaps, again, no surprise.

But when I think back, the feeling was triggered not by familiarity with American soldiering but with images of 1920's and 30's America. The word familiarity is the right word - that's how it felt. To be more precise, something to do with manual labour on sites like docklands and warehouses. Fleeting images and feelings. It wasn't until I watched the brilliant TV series, Band of Brothers, that the real associations with the life of a soldier came to the fore. That's something else I have watched at regular intervals since its release.

This is great! Thanks for posting this.

I remember watching this film way back in the seventies, but.... this entire reincarnation section was cut out.
Nebertheless, I was aware of him being sure about his lives in former incarnations...

Smithy