A Hill in Korea, or also titled Hell in Korea in the U.S., is a 1956 British war film by director Julian Amyes, based on the 1953 literary novel of the same name by Max Catto. During their retreat in the Korean War in 1951, a small group of British soldiers finds themselves in danger as the men are cut off from the rest of the British army and their allies. Left to their own devices, they are chased by a large group of Chinese soldiers and are surrounded in a temple on a hill.
The following weapons were used in the film A Hill in Korea:
Lieutenant Butler and Sgt. Payne (Harry Andrews) have Sten Mk Vs without the foregrip as their primary weapons. Butler attaches his one with No. 7 Mk. 1/4 bayonets. Pte. Docker (Michael Medwin) gets Butler's Sten during the final stand.
The main battle rifle of Chinese soldiers in the movie is the German Gewehr 1871/84 which is equipped with Seitengewehr 71 bayonets. Private Wyatt (Ronald Lewis) grabs a dropped Gewehr from the battlefield to use it against a machine gun position. The use of this Mauser in Chinese service is not entirely historically incorrect since the Qing dynasty purchased a large stock of the single-shot predecessor in the 1870s. But at this time, Chinese forces were mostly equipped with Soviet Mosin Nagants or their Type 24 rifles.
Bren Mark II light machine guns are widely used by British soldiers. Notably, users are Private Rabin (Harry Landis), Lance Corporal Hodge (Robert Shaw), Pte. Neill (Barry Lowe), Pte O'Brien (Robert Brown), Pte. Kim of the South Korean Army (Charles Laurence) and Pte. Henson (David Morrell). Sgt. Payne and Private Wyatt can be seen firing them at the final battle.
In the shots in which the Brens are being fired, they have Blank Firing Adaptors (BFA) fitted, which visibly extend the length of the barrels beyond the front sight block. These were standard British army issue, designed to be used with the Mark 10z .303 wood bulleted blank rounds, which were introduced in 1954.[1] As well as allowing the weapon to cycle, the BFA partially broke up the wood bullet for safety reasons, earning the attachment the nickname of "masher barrels."
Two Chinese soldiers can be seen with unknown stick grenades.
Error creating thumbnail: File missingThe soldiers crawling toward the Bren guns. Note the string coming out of the grenade in the foreground instead of a screw cap.
Other
M20A1/A1B1 "Super Bazooka"
The Anti-Tank team consisting of Pte. Docker and Pte. Lindop (Victor Maddern) is equipped with an M20A1/A1B1 "Super Bazooka".
Towards the end of the film the attacking Chinese deploy a British Centaur tank. The film was shot in Portugal, and the Portuguese army obtained around 24 Centaurs in 1945, replacing them with the M-47 Paton in 1955, around the time of production. The North Koreans did capture a small number of the visually near-identical Cromwell tanks northwest of Seoul in January 1951, so one ending up in Chinese hands - and thus represented in the film with a Centaur - is not a total anomaly.
