Should Hollywood teach history?

[Flying Pig]

This is something of a spin-off from this thread, which started off on the depiction of the Gallipoli campaign in a recent film. I was particularly interested by how the film was the OP's (and, I suspect, many people's) first encounter with the historical subject matter. In this case, it was a spring to find out more, but it brought home how much of what we 'know' about the past is actually taught to us, at least at first, by what we see on screen.

This might not be a good thing. A quick Google search brought me to this article in the Telegraph (I know, and I apologise) titled 'Russell Crowe in The Water Diviner: Rewriting History'. I must admit that most of it is rubbish, revolving around indignation that Russell Crowe might think that our picture of Gallipoli is one-sided, treating the Australians as heroes and remembering their sacrifices while forgetting that the Turkish soldiers there were in exactly the same position. However, one line from itis worth bringing out:

Because Crowe is a Great Actor, his words are taken as being authoritative. His film will be watched, and treated, as if it were actual history.

The problem is that this 'actual history' is rarely, in films, entirely accurate. Another article lists the factual inaccuracies, most of which are fairly minor - a figure for the total casualties of a battle mistakenly given as the number of Australian dead, the presence of beards on British soldiers, a day's error in the date of an engagement. Beyond the 'simple facts', though, there are bigger problems. Again, I'll quote:

The Water Diviner, filmed partly in Turkey and produced with the co-operation of the Turkish government, paints the Greeks as barbaric invaders. That, of course, plays to Turkish nationalist mythology. But it is certainly true that the Greeks invaded Anatolia in the wake of the Great War and that atrocities were committed (on both sides, though the film portrays them as being one-sided). The Greek troops are dressed and act as murderous banditti, not as Evzones, who wore a khaki military uniform and who operated as formed military units. Some Greek troops did operate as banditti, as depicted in the film, but the film-makers have basically reflected a Turkish view of the Greek invasion.

A more often-raised criticism of the film is that it does not mention anything of the Armenian Genocide, despite being released on the 100th anniversary of the Turkish government's order to commit it. You might fairly say that the plot doesn't demand it, but somebody wrote that plot. We usually rightly complain when writers create stories making heroes of Nazi soldiers without mentioning the Holocaust, or of Confederates without mentioning slavery. We've seen right here on CFC that many people have no context for this film, and can hardly expect most of them to go and look up the details of Ottoman history after seeing it.

Nor is The Water Diviner the only film that could be mentioned here. 300 is held up fairly regularly on the opposite charge, that it presents a view of history that sits neatly with Greek national mythology (and some slightly nastier racial mythologising to boot), but has little in common with how the Battle of Thermopylae or Classical Greece actually looked. Even more recently, The Imitation Game was criticised for suggesting, falsely, that Alan Turing covered for a Soviet spy. Reaching back only a little, we can find Breaker Morant, a film which has inspired people (against the director's intent, it must be said) to make heroes out of Australian officers who murdered several PoWs and an unarmed civilian churchman during the Boer War.

This brings up several points to discuss:

• Do film-makers have a duty to consider how their work affects the popular understanding of history, and should they be held accountable for how it does?
• Is there a conflict between good cinema and good history?
• Can Hollywood ever be expected to get its history right? If not, should it stop trying to make 'historical' films?

 

[Lexicus]

Well, it's not like there is an "objective" history that movie narratives can be closer or further from.

That said,

Do film-makers have a duty to consider how their work affects the popular understanding of history, and should they be held accountable for how it does?

Resounding "yes"

Is there a conflict between good cinema and good history?

Not necessarily.

Can Hollywood ever be expected to get its history right? If not, should it stop trying to make 'historical' films?

As hinted above, getting its history "right" is an unattainable goal. But I think that, yes, it is certainly possible for Hollywood (and filmmakers more generally; expecting anything of real value from Hollywood might be expecting too much) to make films that present valuable historical perspectives and are also good films.
Every narrative is chosen and every narrative has implications. I don't think it's too much to ask of filmmakers that they consider this when making historical films.
I mean, for example a film making heroes of Nazi soldiers without mentioning the atrocities is not problematic because its history is "wrong" but because its narrative portrays the Nazis in a sympathetic light without any balancing.

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Do film-makers have a duty to consider how their work affects the popular understanding of history, and should they be held accountable for how it does?

Film is an artistic medium, and film-makers have no more duty to accurately portray any event than Picasso does to paint a photo-realistic portrayal of people being bombed. The film creator has the freedom to create anything he or she desires, and the work is subject to scrutiny, analysis, derision or dismissal just as any other art form.

I would think that the film-maker certainly has responsibility to understand as much as possible about the period and subject matter before approaching it. As you pointed out, plenty of people who don't give two drops in a bucket about history may be getting their summer school lesson from the theater. But creating a historically accurate film is not the creator's primary goal. There are plenty of minor historical inaccuracies in Das Boot or Glory, but not nearly to the extent of something like Kingdom of Heaven or even Troy. The film-maker's primary duty is to effectively convey a story or experience. Apocalypse Now is not intended to be a literal representation of fighting in Viet Nam, and thus can't be approached the way you might consider The Longest Day.

When Hollywood historical blockbusters come out, inevitably there are newspaper and online articles dealing with the subject, 'History' Channel and public television specials and so on that deal with the period. They are of course piggybacking the hype of the movie to make money, but they are also stimulating the discussion and challenging the film's point of view. Thinking back to school I can remember how the release of Braveheart led my Medieval professor on a long tirade about its inaccuracies. Your example from the original thread highlights this: that the movie or series prompted individuals to seek out a better understanding of the events and catalyzed conversation. This is the real value of the historical film in relation to public education.

As to the second part of the question, who is holding the film-maker accountable? The public? The League of Decency? The Ministry of Culture? Films like Birth of a Nation or Triumph of the Will have advanced the medium tremendously, even if their points of view are atrocious. Indeed, they can ultimately work against their original intent by serving of examples of what not to support, while at the same time being appreciated for their technical and structural innovations. The true accountability is done by the viewing public.

I would add that documentary makers should be held to an entirely different standard. Not by law, but by public accountability. By creating a documentary, the creator has a moral responsibility to be as objective and informed on the subject as possible.

Is there a conflict between good cinema and good history?

Absolutely. They have two widely different objectives, which easily come at odds. The movie, even one based on true events, has the primary mission of storytelling. Which is something we have to keep in mind when the main characters all bunch together and make a perfect grenade target, or all the principals take off their helmets to chat every few moments. Not that I won't curse at the screen regardless.

Can Hollywood ever be expected to get its history right? If not, should it stop trying to make 'historical' films?

Good film-makers should strive to make their film as historically accurate as it needs to be to effectively tell the story. I have much different expectations for A Bridge Too Far than I have for Kelly's Heroes. Any historical interpretation is going to be open to radically different criticism anyway, and public response may be at odds with the creator's intent. Consider Peckinpah's intention in the Wild Bunch, with its variable speed action, telephoto lens shots and slo-mo blood splatters that were intended to repulse the audience and sicken them to the violence. Instead, of course, they loved it and action movies imitated and expanded the style.

tl;dr Film-makers' only duty is to make a movie that doesn't suck.

 

[Phrossack]

While it's not the filmmakers' duty to ensure that, say, all the uniforms have just the right amount of buttons, it's very important that they get the basic facts right and don't portray a twisted version of history that leads people into getting twisted views.

For example, if you were to make a movie about the Wounded Knee Massacre, it's a minor quibble to point out that the soldiers are using the wrong kind of carbine, but it's very important if your movie emphasizes the refusal of Lakota leaders to stop performing the Ghost Dance and ends with a note of "Welp, that was sad, but they should have just obeyed the law." People who grow up seeing that movie will likely start thinking the massacre was justified, and by extension, US presence on Lakota lands and the removal of Native Americans elsewhere was also justified. Over time, this can lead to a rather sick sense of right and wrong.

Or if you were to, say, make a fiction movie whose plot revolves around how the Holocaust never happened, it's a dangerous movie to make, even if the acting and the plot are gripping.

 

[Flying Pig]

tl;dr Film-makers' only duty is to make a movie that doesn't suck.

This I'm not convinced by. I notice that all of your points are about historical details, which I would agree ought to be given a little slack: if (for example) the stripes on a sergeant's jacket point the wrong way (which they notably don't in Glory, but often do in films depicting the period), it's not a particular problem, except that it will irritate and distract viewers who know the 'right' thing to do. So too with the war-paint in Braveheart or anything else of that sort. However, it's not just a matter of getting the facts right, but about presenting a view of what the past was like. You said that film is about trying to convey an experience: it matters, I think, what that experience is. After all, how we see the past has a big effect on how we think about things in the present - otherwise we wouldn't get so excited about it.

While it's not the filmmakers' duty to ensure that, say, all the uniforms have just the right amount of buttons, it's very important that they get the basic facts right and don't portray a twisted version of history that leads people into getting twisted views.

For example, if you were to make a movie about the Wounded Knee Massacre, it's a minor quibble to point out that the soldiers are using the wrong kind of carbine, but it's very important if your movie emphasizes the refusal of Lakota leaders to stop performing the Ghost Dance and ends with a note of "Welp, that was sad, but they should have just obeyed the law." People who grow up seeing that movie will likely start thinking the massacre was justified, and by extension, US presence on Lakota lands and the removal of Native Americans elsewhere was also justified. Over time, this can lead to a rather sick sense of right and wrong.

Or if you were to, say, make a fiction movie whose plot revolves around how the Holocaust never happened, it's a dangerous movie to make, even if the acting and the plot are gripping.

This essentially explains what I'm trying to get at, particularly as most people won't have any more exposure to the Wounded Knee Massacre beyond the film in question.

'Dangerous' is a pivotal word. As Anthony pointed out, there's room for people to interpret the film in a different way, though I do think the artist 'has the floor', as it were, and has a much easier time shaping how his viewers feel than anyone else does. There's also a degree to which, despite the film-makers' best efforts, people can go away with completely the wrong message from their work.

 

[Lexicus]

You guys put what I was arguing better than I did.

 

[Camikaze]

If 'history' is taken to be the way in which facts are related, rather than those facts themselves, I suspect movies involving much history wouldn't be all that interesting. If the question is about fidelity to the facts, I would think any responsibility only extends to the extent to which a particular presentation may have perverse results, as Phrossack describes. That isn't to say that the manner of presentation doesn't matter; it's just a question of whether the director/film-maker carries that particular responsibility.

 

[Ajidica]

The level of historical accuracy I expect in films consists of the "wiki-check" and avoiding particularly egregious interpretive errors. "Wiki-check" consists of making sure things like the script, place names, and other things the writers have complete control over is correct to the level of skimming a Wikipedia article. For example, if one is making a movie about the Cuban Missile Crisis and depicts the Soviet Premier as Stalin, I would consider that having failed the wiki-check. I'm really not a stickler for things like locations, props, and so on as the producers are limited by what they have available. Sure, the costumes and props might be more fitting for Plantagenet England than Alfred the Great era Wessex, but as long as they put a modicum of effort of appearing period accurate (no plate armor!) I don't care.
The particularly egregious interpretation errors people have mentioned above. However, I wouldn't hold it against the movie if it isn't about that subject. For example, I don't believe Downfall included mentions of the Holocaust but that wasn't the focus of the film. If, however, somehow a movie about the Holocaust got made that made it seem like the death camps didn't really exist or consisted of a few nasty camp admins, that would be a problem.

I, for one, found The Water Diviner completely acceptable as a movie, helped by the fact I still see Russell Crowe as Gladiator. It touched on an overlooked part of an overlooked part of WWI (post-war occupation of Turkey) and did so without setting off any historical alarm bells for me.

 

[Cutlass]

Filmmakers (unless documentary) are entertainers. And they are working in a commercial enterprise. As such, their real responsibility is to their investors. They're in it to make money.

That said, there's generally no reason that they couldn't be more historically accurate. There just isn't any requirement that they do so. Much of the historical inaccuracy is primarily about a lazy and slapdash approach to their subjects, rather than any intent to deceive. Or some director or writer who thinks 'the story would be cooler if we did it this way!'. They're probably wrong about that most of the time. I recall in watching the movie Pearl Harbor that, while the movie wasn't really about the Pearl Harbor attack, and it was just a setting for telling a different story, the historical inaccuracies in it ruined the movie for me, because I knew enough to see them. Most people did not, and never saw them. So as a historical piece it was worthless.

So I don't think that it's a question that can have a satisfactory answer. There's no real way of forcing historical accuracy on the entertainment industry. It's not what it's there for. So while the complaint is legitimate, I don't think it has anywhere to go.

 

[Flying Pig]

Well, the way you would encourage (I dislike saying 'force', because that opens up a whole set of implications that nobody's keen to start on) the film industry towards a particular way of doing things is the same way that you encourage any industry - by making it clear, as a set of consumers, that you want a particular sort of product and will not pay (or not pay as much) for anything else. I mean, that's the reason we have real ale in pubs, and arguably the reason why films in general have changed over time. If they made one of the not-that-early Bond films today, for example, they'd have a serious commercial problem when people took to the internet to complain about its sexism.

 

[Camikaze]

The other way to encourage the film industry to use the 'correct' version of history is for the State to enter the field, either by providing subsidies, or directly making movies, or censoring movies. I heard something recently about this becoming an increasing thing in Poland, for example, as part of the Law & Justice Party's attempts to present what they view as a 'correct' version of Polish history.

 

[Cutlass]

I don't think that would work. Might with the BBC. Not with Hollywood. See, the thing is, Hollywood doesn't care. Occasionally you get a filmmaker who wants to make a realistic historical film. And you get something like Argo, which was a critical and commercial success. There is a market for such things. It's just not most of the market. And it's not necessarily the part of the market with the biggest budgets or revenue. The typical film consumer is not sophisticated about such things. And probably has next to nothing in terms of historical literacy. The filmmakers aren't better.

So while I can sympathize with your point, I see no way to get there. The market for the historically accurate will get you good films from time to time. But not enough of the market cares. And I don't see how to get regulation to make it. Because then you'll get the version the politics wants you to get. Not what was true.

 

[Flying Pig]

The other way to encourage the film industry to use the 'correct' version of history is for the State to enter the field, either by providing subsidies, or directly making movies, or censoring movies. I heard something recently about this becoming an increasing thing in Poland, for example, as part of the Law & Justice Party's attempts to present what they view as a 'correct' version of Polish history.

I think there's something dangerous about having the state encouraging the 'right' version of history. I like the basic idea of censoring a film if it were made today in the vein of Triumph of the Will, but laws which are made for extreme cases inevitably end up being used in borderline cases, or outright abused. See: just about any law giving the government the power to restrict the rights of 'terrorists'. After all, I don't think you can present certain historical events - an example that immediately comes to mind is the Irish rebellions of the early 20th century - without putting some sort of historical spin on it, and one which will have some importance in the present.

Admittedly, we do it all the time with the National Curriculum, so there's precedent. As Cutlass touched on, I expect the BBC (or CBC, ABC as appropriate) have a 'soft' policy against showing something likely to cause a lot of controversy for its historical views, as I expect most private television companies have simply out of desire not to have angry customers. That sort of thing is very different from official laws with criminal sanctions, though.

 

[Camikaze]

My subtext was that the methods of enforcing a responsibility are fairly perverse and highly political (as is inevitably the case when speaking of a 'correct' view of history). That calls into question the desirability of thrusting any sort of responsibility onto filmmakers. The Hungarian government is probably the best example of this, although I haven't heard of them specifically entering the field of films. Orban has made a concerted effort to whitewash the post-Trianon past and demonise the Communist past, and this has played into the revanchism and xenophobia sweeping that country. The government has funded propaganda museums with borderline Holocaust-denying messages, because this is what it views as the 'correct' take on Hungarian history (whether it actually believes that, or is merely using the narrative for political gain against the ex-Communist opposition, is another question).

I know less about the Polish Law & Justice Party's more recent efforts, but I did hear that they are explicitly censoring films/TV shows which suggest any Polish involvement in the Holocaust (and this is a similar theme to Hungary's revisionism). This may be taking the lead less from Orban than from Putin, who is also obviously really into this sort of historical interference. A further example is Turkey with the Armenian Genocide; I believe it's a criminal offence to engage in what Turkey regards as 'misrepresentation' of those events.

The upshot is that in the absence of identifying any objective content which we are saying it's the filmmaker's responsibility to present, then any such responsibility is instead reliant upon an inherently political viewpoint. Of course this makes the question of legal responsibility obviously fraught. But even if we are talking about moral responsibility, it becomes difficult unless we happen to agree with the moral environment in which the filmmaker is operating. Sure, we would think there would be a justified moral constraint on a filmmaker making a film which suggested that the Holocaust didn't happen. But what if we were talking about a society in which it was taboo to point out national collaboration in the Holocaust? Then we'd be much more wary of imposing or promoting a moral responsibility which might get in the way of artistic freedom.

 

[warpus]

I don't think that people should expect Hollywood to be historically accurate. Their main concern is profits, they are going to do whatever it takes to maximize that.

Camikaze, I really do not think the Polish government had anything to do with the Holocaust. Where are you getting that from? Random Polish individuals, sure, I don't doubt that one bit.

 

[Kyriakos]

This is something of a spin-off from this thread, which started off on the depiction of the Gallipoli campaign in a recent film. I was particularly interested by how the film was the OP's (and, I suspect, many people's) first encounter with the historical subject matter. In this case, it was a spring to find out more, but it brought home how much of what we 'know' about the past is actually taught to us, at least at first, by what we see on screen.

This might not be a good thing. A quick Google search brought me to this article in the Telegraph (I know, and I apologise) titled 'Russell Crowe in The Water Diviner: Rewriting History'. I must admit that most of it is rubbish, revolving around indignation that Russell Crowe might think that our picture of Gallipoli is one-sided, treating the Australians as heroes and remembering their sacrifices while forgetting that the Turkish soldiers there were in exactly the same position. However, one line from itis worth bringing out:



The problem is that this 'actual history' is rarely, in films, entirely accurate. Another article lists the factual inaccuracies, most of which are fairly minor - a figure for the total casualties of a battle mistakenly given as the number of Australian dead, the presence of beards on British soldiers, a day's error in the date of an engagement. Beyond the 'simple facts', though, there are bigger problems. Again, I'll quote:



A more often-raised criticism of the film is that it does not mention anything of the Armenian Genocide, despite being released on the 100th anniversary of the Turkish government's order to commit it. You might fairly say that the plot doesn't demand it, but somebody wrote that plot. We usually rightly complain when writers create stories making heroes of Nazi soldiers without mentioning the Holocaust, or of Confederates without mentioning slavery. We've seen right here on CFC that many people have no context for this film, and can hardly expect most of them to go and look up the details of Ottoman history after seeing it.

Nor is The Water Diviner the only film that could be mentioned here. 300 is held up fairly regularly on the opposite charge, that it presents a view of history that sits neatly with Greek national mythology (and some slightly nastier racial mythologising to boot), but has little in common with how the Battle of Thermopylae or Classical Greece actually looked. Even more recently, The Imitation Game was criticised for suggesting, falsely, that Alan Turing covered for a Soviet spy. Reaching back only a little, we can find Breaker Morant, a film which has inspired people (against the director's intent, it must be said) to make heroes out of Australian officers who murdered several PoWs and an unarmed civilian churchman during the Boer War.

This brings up several points to discuss:

• Do film-makers have a duty to consider how their work affects the popular understanding of history, and should they be held accountable for how it does?
• Is there a conflict between good cinema and good history?
• Can Hollywood ever be expected to get its history right? If not, should it stop trying to make 'historical' films?

Ah, so this is what the OT thread was about?

Sounds like an Osam film

Maybe Crowe is trying to shed the image he got as a drunk and violent thug alongside a main actor who won two oscars and would get a third if he did not mess it all up. So instead of his new film where no genocide was commited by ottomans/turks ( ) i'd rather watch


Link to video.


Link to video.

Hey Russel, you suck

 

[Camikaze]

Camikaze, I really do not think the Polish government had anything to do with the Holocaust. Where are you getting that from? Random Polish individuals, sure, I don't doubt that one bit.

It's the involvement or collaboration of random Polish individuals that I'm referring to - the Law & Justice Party apparently is not keen on that sort of involvement being highlighted. This is indeed different to the Hungarian efforts to deny involvement, because both Horthy and the Arrow Cross Party were directly involved in deportations. So the Hungarian attempts to whitewash the past are much more egregious. But they are in the same vein.

Here is an article by Jan Gross on the issue. Here's an article with a more independent perspective.

 

[Kyriakos]

Hm, just watched this clip on YT...:


Link to video.

What the hell? Do you think that people dressed with cretan bandit clothes were marching inland in Asia Minor? This looks beyond just imbecilic... Also they apparently fight with bandit knives from 1821

Shamefru dispray.

 

[warpus]

Camikaze, I can't read that first article, but yeah, that party is doing some highly questionable things, so that doesn't surprise me.

If all they were saying is: "Stop making it sound like the Polish state was involved" then I'd be fine with those sorts of objections. Too many times has the western media referred to "Polish concentration camps", for example.

I don't think anyone can really dispute that random Polish citizens ended up on the wrong side of history. The current Polish government are a bunch of idiots.

 

[Agent327]

Camikaze, I can't read that first article, but yeah, that party is doing some highly questionable things, so that doesn't surprise me.

If all they were saying is: "Stop making it sound like the Polish state was involved" then I'd be fine with those sorts of objections. Too many times has the western media referred to "Polish concentration camps", for example.

I don't think anyone can really dispute that random Polish citizens ended up on the wrong side of history.

While random Polish citizens did end up in 'Polish' camps, random Polish antisemitism also helped getting random Jewish Polish citizens in said camps.

By the way, Polish doesn't necessarily mean 'operated by Poland': it could simply mean 'located in Poland'. Which would seem to be the obvious interpretation.