Review Bernard Law Montgomery from Life Miniatures

[Nap]

Hi everyone .

Life Miniatures have established themselves as a a quality company producing releases of a extremely high quality the one I shall be sharing is one that we have seen painted up by PF members recently ...it is of course one of the most famous military leaders of WW2 namely :

BERNARD LAW MONTGOMERY

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We all of course know him of course from his experiences and leadership in WW2 but he also served with distinction in WW1 including winning the DSO ​

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Lets have a little bit of background on this instantly known man :​

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Bernard Law Montgomery was born on 17 November 1887 in London. He was educated at St Paul's School and the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, and commissioned into the Royal Warwickshire Regiment in 1908. He was severely wounded in the chest early in World War One and spent the rest of war as a staff officer.(on the right)

Between the wars he served in India, Egypt and Palestine. In April 1939, he was given command of the Third Division, part of the British Expeditionary Force which took part in the fighting preceding the Fall of France in June 1940.
He was rapidly promoted. In August 1942, he was appointed commander of the Eighth Army, the British and Commonwealth forces fighting in the Western Desert. He inspired a dispirited and defeated force to victory over the Germans and Italians at the Battle of El Alamein. Prime Minister Winston Churchill was convinced this battle marked the turning point of the war.
Montgomery commanded the Eighth Army in the subsequent Allied campaigns in Sicily and then on the Italian mainland. He was then recalled to the UK to take part in the planning of Operation Overlord, the invasion of Normandy.
During the Normandy landings and for several months afterwards, Montgomery commanded all Allied troops in France. In September 1944, this command was taken over by US general Dwight Eisenhower, with Montgomery reverting to command of 21st Army Group.

Montgomery bitterly resented this, although he was promoted to field marshal by way of compensation. His arrogance and reluctance to cooperate with others made him increasingly unpopular, particularly with the Americans.
Montgomery led his army group in the battle for Germany and, on 4 May 1945, he received the surrender of the German northern armies at Lüneburg Heath.
After the war, Montgomery was created a knight of the Garter and Viscount Montgomery of Alamein. He commanded the British Army of the Rhine and served as chief of the Imperial General Staff from 1946 to 1948. From 1948 to 1951, he was chairman of the permanent defence organisation of the Western European Union. In 1951, he became deputy commander of the Supreme Headquarters of NATO, serving for seven years. He died on 24 March 1976.
Montgomery was the most well-known British general of World War Two, famous for his victory at the Battle of El Alamein in November 1942. He was nicknamed 'Monty'.
This man was a soldier's soldier IMO looked up by all that served with him , always willing to be around his troops and as a leader caring about his decisions and the effect they could have .
Monty is of course known for his famous beret one which included the Tank Regt alonoside the General Officers cap badge

but he has also been seen with the Parachute Regt as well

.....whatever he wore he was a respected and professional soldier .



Books abound on this man , his life , his military career and indeed books that he has written so there is no end of great material to look at , Osprey did a book on WW2 leaders and ofcourse he is featured in that (Elite 98 Plate F3 - wearing the para badge and denison smock)
A book which fellow PF member Chris Edwards(cheers mate) put me on to was "Monty a Life in Photographs" ...a great book full of pictures ad so much information about him and indeed his family going right back (I got my copy from Amazon for a total of 0.01p plus £2.81 shipping...bargain!!!)

Continued in next post:
Nap

 

[Nap]

Let's see what we are looking at :


Title: Bernard Law Montgomery

Scale:1/9th

Reference: LM - B010

Material: Lt Gray Resin

No of Parts: 4

Sculptor: Sang-eon Lee

Box Art: Myeong-Ha Hwang

As usual with Life miniatures we are treated to a very high standard of packaging , a strong box with the parts well protected sandwiched between foam layers , on the box we have a colour depiction of the completed bust together with a closeup of the medals ribbons that are showing .

The model consists of just 4 parts the main torso , the head, the beret, and a pillar style base .

Prep is no more than removing carefully positioned casting plugs ..all very easy and quick to deal with , the neck fits into the collar area well with no filler the beret needed a tiny swipe of filler where it met the head but nothing to be concerned about , the pillar base fits snugly into the recess provided (I like most will consign this to the spares box and use a brass tube) .

Once this is done you have perfectly smooth casting , superbly sculpted , you could also of course make this into a bronze statue ..it would be just as effective I am sure.

Looking at the main piece of resin the torso now :

Monty is depicted wearing the flying jacket lined as in the picture in the previous post , this is without doubt a really well known uniform as a result and a well chosen one by Life Miniatures , lots of details , lots of different textures (leather,cloth, lining of the coat etc)

Monty wears battle dress under his leather jacket , the battle dress has the distinctive chain hanging across , the material is a dream to look at and as we have seen in Mark Dollery's post a dream to paint as well..nice one Mark

Here is the link to Marks post:

(http://www.planetfigure.com/threads/life-miniatures-monty.64826) .

Sculpting of the folds and pockets are great (nice undercuts on these), the actual chain is a nice detail , e have the collar and tie really well done , on his battle dress we have the red tab showing with of course some of his medals (a reference on the box for these)

The coat is so well done its crying out for the worn leather effects often seen (I would recommend you refer to Marks post on the forum) and of course we have the sheepskin lining and collar this is a fabulous bit of sculpting and will benefit even more careful painting..it looks almost real ..great stuff Life Miniatures .

On now to the head ..is this Monty ..you bet it is the distinctive features abound from the sculpt , lots of reference material used throughout the WIP and what a stunning result it is an amazing likeness .

Now onto the famous doubled badged beret he wears , as said he has the General Officers (Field Marshalls) badge alongside the Tank Regt badge ..in one word these are SUPERB , fine details you can almost read the writing ...needles to say this great sculpting will aid painting making the end result so impressive , the beret itself is in keeping with the period and the pictures we see , floppy and larger than todays modern ones , it sits very naturally onto the head looking spot on , with it painted it comes to life ...... perhaps a bit of texture to the surface if you wish

Finally we have the base ...as normal this is the pillar type perfectly usable if you choose to do so , fit is tight into the recess provided on the underside of the bust.

Final Thoughts:

This is without doubt a cracking piece from Life Miniatures as expected well presented with minimal presentation, fabulous casting ...and it truley looks like the subject ...a credit to the sculptor and when painted comes to life ..all credit to the painter of the box art ..indeed anyone who paints this will achieve a great result.

I have no hesitation in saying ...add this to your collection , great piece and the product will give you hours of pleasure , during and when displaying it .

For more information on this including suppliers worldwide and indeed on other Life Miniature products go to the website:

www.lifeminiatures.kr

Thanks for looking in

Nap

 

[swralph]

Another great review Nap.
So far I have bought 3 models because of your reviews

 

[flart1943]

Looks like a great bust. Thanks for the detailed review.
Pete

 

[Mark Dollery]

hi Kev, yep, agree with every word...a great piece to paint
Mark D

 

[lopee]

Another high quality review. Thank you for sharing!

Martin

 

[Rich Sculpts]

A truly excellent sculpt. For me the one part of the work that stands out the most is the lambs wool collar, he has done one hell of a job on that. If you have ever had to sculpt something that that its a real swine to make it look convincing!

My hat off to Sang-eon - a masterful work...

-Rich

 

[taff edwards]

Hi Kevin cracking review looking forward to getting into mine ,it is quite a twist of fate that Montys ancestors hailed from the area of Normandy and has very strong links with William the Conqueror , and History would have him involved in the Invasion of Normandy hundreds of years later and Rommel would end up getting wounded in either in or very close called Montgomery ,..History a funny old thing eh
Keep the reviews coming Kevin
Cheers Chris

 

[bane3D]

Thak you for this superb review of great bust!