Guess what made the "Top 10 Historically Inaccurate Films" list?

[macwilkin]

I think that sometimes we have to realize that accuracy and truth are characteristics that are no good for cinema, that is however always a "fiction"...

Again, I disagree. There are a number of movies who achieved a happy medium between historical accuracy & ripping yarns. I've already mentioned several in my previous posts.

I happened to be watching "Hoosiers" last night -- I'm not much of a basketball fan, but I love the movie for its story and the fact that it reminds my mom of her childhood in Iowa. The movie is based on the 1954 Milan, Indiana High School basketball team that won the state championships. Obviously, Hollywood fictionalized much of the story to give it drama -- but there were a number of accurate details, and several of the real players endorsed the movie in giving a good glimpse of life in 1950s Indiana -- at least one even appears in the movie!

T.

[Panache]

Yeah, I can just imagine a brontosaurus in harness and being used a s a crane. The crane operator would ride on the creature's back and use ropes and pulleys to get the creature to do its job.....

Well that was how Stonehenge was built (and Rutland Weekend Fans rejoice )

Cheers

Jamie

[highlander_Daz]

"Braveheart" made huge impact in Scotland when it opened, despite its inaccuracies, it brought Wallace into people lives like never before, Scots are constantly being to we have the murder capital of Europe (Glasgow), Scots are more likely to have heart attacks and cancer because of our Diet, Scots this and Scots that, Braveheart gave us some pride, and a feelgood factor, we often come off second best in Sport etc, Wallace and Robert the Bruce were winners!!

My only dislike of the film is the way the Bruce is portrayed, as a boy I used to wonder what Kind of man Bruce was, a strong determained and ruthless man, a leader with all the military and leadership skills of Rommel and Mongomery.
I dont think the film does him Justice , Would love to see a film about the Bruce with James Mackenzie form TVs "Raven" playing him

http://www.jamesmackenzie.co.uk/index.html

check out James photo gallery he is excaly as I imagine Bruce to look

[macwilkin]

My only dislike of the film is the way the Bruce is portrayed, as a boy I used to wonder what Kind of man Bruce was, a strong determained and ruthless man, a leader with all the military and leadership skills of Rommel and Mongomery.
I dont think the film does him Justice , Would love to see a film about the Bruce with James Mackenzie form TVs "Raven" playing him

For me, this is one of the few strengths of the movie: a more accurate portrayal of the Bruce as an Anglo-Norman noble who sided with Edward when it benefited him -- and he had a great "propaganda machine" tae boot.

Besides no bridge at Stirling, one of the most glaring absences in the movie was the Battle of Roslin in 1303, where a Comyn defeated the English. :mrgreen:

Alan Young's book Robert the Bruce's Rivals really opened my eyes to the real Bruce -- that's not to say he was a villan or anything, but he was not the super-nationalist as many portray him. He was very similar to his fellow Anglo-Norman gentry.

Of course, being a Cumming descendant, I am just a wee bit biased.

T.

[beloitpiper]

I just saw that before I popped back here. I had the same reaction the first time I saw a trailer for that new caveman (yes I will use that term) movie. Some one, somewhere, please make a historical movie that is accurate....please.
Sara

Some of us archaeology students went to go see that movie. EVERYTHING in that movie was wrong. We couldn't stop laughing! The other people in the theater must have hated us... I mean, come on!
-The earliest pyramids were not built until 2,500 BCE
-In the movie, there are no stone tools whatsoever
-They use LOCKS and KEYS
-Mammoths were EXTINCT before 10,000 BCE
-The sail boats in the movie, the way their sails were arranged, would've just spun like a top
-The people in the movie use advanced iron tools, but the Iron Age begins around 1,200 BCE
-Every tribe in that movie was multi-ethnic, which would've been very wrong
-The giant birds they were attacked by were probably Phorusrhacidae, which lived in South America around Cenozoic Era
-And why does the old medicine woman sleep with her jewelery on?

As far as pyramids being around 10,000 years ago. Read some of Graham Hancock's books. He puts up a very interesting argument for the pyramids to be much older then excepted history.

That is cute, but Graham Hancock is a writer. His theories have been shot down more times than I can count, and although he is entertaining, every archaeologist I know can list the ways he alters "evidence" and invents facts.

[Coemgen]

Some of us archaeology students went to go see that movie. EVERYTHING in that movie was wrong. We couldn't stop laughing! The other people in the theater must have hated us... I mean, come on!
-The earliest pyramids were not built until 2,500 BCE
-In the movie, there are no stone tools whatsoever
-They use LOCKS and KEYS
-Mammoths were EXTINCT before 10,000 BCE
-The sail boats in the movie, the way their sails were arranged, would've just spun like a top
-The people in the movie use advanced iron tools, but the Iron Age begins around 1,200 BCE
-Every tribe in that movie was multi-ethnic, which would've been very wrong
-The giant birds they were attacked by were probably Phorusrhacidae, which lived in South America around Cenozoic Era
-And why does the old medicine woman sleep with her jewelery on?



That is cute, but Graham Hancock is a writer. His theories have been shot down more times than I can count, and although he is entertaining, every archaeologist I know can list the ways he alters "evidence" and invents facts.

But it's so obvious!

The aliens who built the pyramids sped up human technology to make them and resurrected the mammoths to help! But when the slaves revolted, the aliens destroyed everything, sending mankind back to the stone age, and killed the mammoths, and erased peoples memories!

They just came back in 2,500 B. C. to build the pyramids again, allowing the aliens to create images that would mind-control King Solomon when the Queen of Sheeba visited him, causing him start the freemasons. The masons were then used by the aliens take over the world as part of a cabal with the trans-dimensional lizard people who live beneath Los Angeles!

The crash at Roswel was obviously part of the master plan, because it allowed them to take over the American Government! It all makes sense now!

[davedove]

But it's so obvious!

The aliens who built the pyramids sped up human technology to make them and resurrected the mammoths to help! But when the slaves revolted, the aliens destroyed everything, sending mankind back to the stone age, and killed the mammoths, and erased peoples memories!

They just came back in 2,500 B. C. to build the pyramids again, allowing the aliens to create images that would mind-control King Solomon when the Queen of Sheeba visited him, causing him start the freemasons. The masons were then used by the aliens take over the world as part of a cabal with the trans-dimensional lizard people who live beneath Los Angeles!

The crash at Roswel was obviously part of the master plan, because it allowed them to take over the American Government! It all makes sense now!

I'm sorry, but you know too much. I'm afraid we have to take you to a special center. There you will have your mind altered so that everything you say, no matter how true or false it may be, will come out as insane gibberish.

Again, I apologize, but you brought this on yourself.

[Joe Gondek]

I'm sorry, but you know too much. I'm afraid we have to take you to a special center. There you will have your mind altered so that everything you say, no matter how true or false it may be, will come out as insane gibberish

.


The Men in Black???????????

[BoldHighlander]

Mel Gibson never claimed he was making documentaries.

It's not an excuse, Todd. These movies are entertainment, not documentaries.

Okay, I have to comment on "The Patriot" as a member of the Brigade of the American Revolution (BAR) -- which were heavily involved as extras in this film, (& two of my compatriots "managed" the reenactors for this film).

The studio made a big deal of its hiring of Smithsonian historians as consultants for this picture, to the point that you almost got the feel that you were seeing history played out on the screen. You weren't.
And this really is the crux of the whole issue.
I even have a copy of the Smithsonian's magazine that came out at the time w/ Mel on the cover, where they lauded the film as a very historically accurate telling of the period.

I could go on all day & cite all the inaccuracies, including that Tarleton ("Tavington" in the film) never burned down a church full of civilians, nor did the Crown forces as a whole.

I remember a story told many times on the BAR board at the time about how the afore mentioned reenactor "managers" (both historians in their own right) tried to inform the production team that the cut & color of the uniform of the British Dragoons were all wrong: Tarleton's men wore green sleeved waistcoast (or white linen frocks in the South) and natural colored buckskin breeches. The coats seen in the film are War of 1812 fashion, not Rev War (as are also the black colored riding breeches).
The response from the costume designer says it all when she replied "I just won an oscar for Titanic, you don't tell me my job!"

[Freedomlover]

So yes, we all know -- filmakers aren't necessarly making documentaries, but most people watching their films aren't necessarily aware of that.

Even films put out claiming to be 'documentaries' often are nothing more than the pursuit of personal agendas, some more or less harmless and some not. Al Gore comes to mind. His film has been exposed as an agenda driven pack of lies by British courts, and he is on the verge of being sued here in the States for fraud.

As the late Adlai Stevenson replied to the woman who said to him, that every "thinking American" was voting for him, "That's not enough, madam, we need a majority!".

T.

Ain't that the truth!