Historical inaccuracies that are not minor

[BrainGlutton]

OK, so, Edward the Prince of Wales (later King Edward II) did not marry Isabella of France until 1308 (and they got married in France, not in England), and William Wallace was executed in 1305, so Wallace could not have met her, etc. But, what the heck, they could have cut that whole subplot and made Braveheart substantially the same story. Fine. Hollywood directors are not historians, artistic license, etc. (I actually have more trouble with the portrayal of the jus primae noctis; The Master Speaks.)

But, now I'm watching Becket (1964) (Richard Burton as Becket, Peter O'Toole as Henry II). And one thing repeated over and over -- the very key to Becket's character in this story -- is that he is a Saxon working for the Normans. Other Saxons despise him as a collaborator, Norman barons despise him as a common Saxon, and it's all indispensable to his character development.

Only, Thomas Becket was no Saxon, he was a Norman. On both sides. What excuse can there be for getting that wrong?! When it's so important to the story?!

Got any? (I'm not talking about Abe Lincoln: Vampire Hunter kinda stuff, I'm talking about films and novels that at least purport to be more or less historical.)

[Astral Rejection]

I think Inglourious Basterds might have gotten a few tiny details wrong.

Joking aside, any rendition of Shakespeare's Richard III is open for debate. Compressed time is the very least of that play's/movie's problems.

(Did anybody see the Ian McKellan Richard III, set in WW2-era times? Awesome!)

[I_Know_Nothing]

Haven't read it but I hear War and Peace has Napoleon burning down Moscow when all evidence shows the Russians did it, a myth widely believed in Russia today.

[Tamerlane]

Well, there are the moderately significant issues of Commodus being promoted to co-Emperor three years before his father Marcus Aurelius' death rather than being passed over. Or the fact that he didn't murder his father. Or the fact that he reigned for ~12 years and didn't perish in an arena.

However he was an accomplished gladiatorial competitor, so that much of Gladiator was accurate at least.

[BrainGlutton]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

I think Inglourious Basterds might have gotten a few tiny details wrong.

Joking aside, any rendition of Shakespeare's Richard III is open for debate. Compressed time is the very least of that play's/movie's problems.

(Did anybody see the Ian McKellan Richard III, set in WW2-era times? Awesome!)

I did. Awesome. But, I think Shakespeare always gets a pass -- we know more true facts now about the times he set his plays in than he could possibly have gleaned from Holinshed.

[rowrrbazzle]

Originally Posted by BrainGlutton

But, now I'm watching Becket (1964) (Richard Burton as Becket, Peter O'Toole as Henry II). And one thing repeated over and over -- the very key to Becket's character in this story -- is that he is a Saxon working for the Normans. Other Saxons despise him as a collaborator, Norman barons despise him as a common Saxon, and it's all indispensable to his character development.

Only, Thomas Becket was no Saxon, he was a Norman. On both sides. What excuse can there be for getting that wrong?! When it's so important to the story?!

The film's Wiki article which you link to explains it.

Actually, Anouilh was made aware of this historical error before his play was produced (he had based the play on a 19th-century account that described Becket as a Saxon), but decided against correcting it because the story was better the way he had written it, and because "history might eventually rediscover that Becket was a Saxon, after all."

He was a playwright, not a historian. In other words, artistic license. (As an aside, if you're watching the DVD, O'Toole says at the very beginning of the commentary that Anouilh told him it was inspired by a rift in a French Marxist theater group.)

[Bryan Ekers]

Well, Krakatoa, East of Java is taking the long way around....

[Dave Hartwick]

Braveheart, previously mentioned, was pretty much end to end inaccuracies. Even people who knows very little about Scottish history must've noticed when the words "Battle of Selkirk Bridge" appeared onscreen and the bridge was conspicuously absent.

John O'Farrell made a crack about how the movie could hardly have been less accurate if they'd added a plasticine dog and called it William Wallace and Gromit.

[Stanislaus]

Originally Posted by Dave Hartwick

Braveheart, previously mentioned, was pretty much end to end inaccuracies. Even people who knows very little about Scottish history must've noticed when the words "Battle of Selkirk Bridge" appeared onscreen and the bridge was conspicuously absent.

John O'Farrell made a crack about how the movie could hardly have been less accurate if they'd added a plasticine dog and called it William Wallace and Gromit.

In the spirit of deploring historical inaccuracy, I should point out that it was the Battle of Stirling Bridge. (The subsequent battle was the Battle of Falkirk.)

[amanset]

"The Patriot" was widely savaged in the press in the UK due to the misrepresentation of, well, a lot but mostly due to a scene involving the locking of people in a church and setting fire to it.

Sometimes it feels like Gibson hates the English as much as he does the Jews.

[Odesio]

Originally Posted by amanset

"The Patriot" was widely savaged in the press in the UK due to the misrepresentation of, well, a lot but mostly due to a scene involving the locking of people in a church and setting fire to it.

Never mind the South Carolina plantation with free African American labor rather than slaves. It was too bad because I think there was actually a germ of an interesting story in The Patriot. Gibson's character was a veteran of the French/Indian War and he was haunted by his own brutal actions to the point where he did not want to fight the English. It might have been a more interesting story had he wrestled with his humanity while sliding into his former brutish self while fighting for independence.

[Lord Mondegreen]

The movie U-571 has the US Navy capturing the first Enigma machine rather than the Royal Navy. Whether this is major or minor is probably up for debate, and the side you take in the debate is probably almost entirely dependant upon which side of the pond you come from.

[Jim's Son]

About the only thing accurate about the 1940 biopic on George Custer "They Died With Their Boots On" was his love of onions. The film about twice-convicted for murder boxer Rubin Carter "Hurricane" ended up with he director changing his spiel from "the truth will set you free " to "who really knows what truth is" once the inaccuracies were pointed out.
Of course when it comes to accuracy, both Oliver Stone and Michael Moore avoid it the way a cat avoids swimming.

[MrDibble]

Originally Posted by BrainGlutton

But, what the heck, they could have cut that whole subplot and made Braveheart substantially the same story.[/url]

Well, except for the kilts, and the swords, and the lack of armour on Wallace and co...and his lack of a human skin belt. Basically, it's the most inaccurate popular portrayal of historical events I know of that isn't Shakespeare.

[Dave Hartwick]

Originally Posted by Stanislaus

In the spirit of deploring historical inaccuracy, I should point out that it was the Battle of Stirling Bridge. (The subsequent battle was the Battle of Falkirk.)

Thanks, I should've checked.

[Alka Seltzer]

JFK deserves equal status with Braveheart as the poster-bearer of revisionism. Amadeus is also worth mentioning. A superb film, but I'm glad I knew before I saw it that it's highly fictionalized, or I'd have felt cheated.

[Lumpy]

it's debatable whether 300 even counts as "inaccurate" or more like "a fable inspired by true events".

[CalMeacham]

Originally Posted by rowrrbazzle

The film's Wiki article which you link to explains it. He was a playwright, not a historian. In other words, artistic license. (As an aside, if you're watching the DVD, O'Toole says at the very beginning of the commentary that Anouilh told him it was inspired by a rift in a French Marxist theater group.)

Becket himself explains this in his forward to the play. When he wrote it, it was not only what he believed, but what an awful lot of people believed as well. He was made aware of the change in attitude before the play premiered. As he pout it, a friend told him that "history, like everything else, progresses." and that then-recent scholarship had decided that Becket was Norman.


So what was Anoiulh going to do? The play wasd already written, and on the verge of being put before the public. Rewriting it to correct the historical error would have destroyed the play, removing the conflict at the very heart of it. As Anouilh himself wrote, (I'm paraphrasing) 'If history makes progress, it might as easily be discovered that they were wrong, and Becket really was Saxon.'


but, as i say, what other option was open? "Sorry, folks, it turns out my initial assumptioon was wrong. We'll have to scrap the play. Pity, really."

[Bridget Burke]

Originally Posted by BrainGlutton

I did. Awesome. But, I think Shakespeare always gets a pass -- we know more true facts now about the times he set his plays in than he could possibly have gleaned from Holinshed.

Houston's Main Street Theater's recent production of Richard III was stunning. Notes in the program explained all the inaccuracies. But the main thing was that the part of Richard was a feast for an actor--the star (& director) of the production feasted....

Historical inaccuracy is easier to forgive on stage. The audience can understand about symbolism, reflection on modern times, Tudor propaganda--whatever drives the story beyond what you'll find in the history books. (Not that all history books agree.)

In movies, everything looks so real that it can be jarring to realize that the story you're seeing is not The Truth. (I'll forgive Amadeus; Prague is so beautiful & all that music really was Mozart's.)

[JohnT]

Almost a decade ago, Joseph Fiennes starred in a documentary about Martin Luther, which I saw on opening day because of an interest in that period of history.

Let's just say that if Mr. Luther was as peaceful and calm as Mr. Fiennes portrayed him, we'd all be Catholics today. It also didn't touch on his anti-semitism, and IIRC (as I said, it's been a decade since the film was released) in the film Luther was on the peasants side in the Peasant's Rebellion of 1524, when in fact the guy wrote a tract called Against the Murderous and Thieving Hoardes of Peasants denouncing the revolt. Luther wasn't stupid - his Reformation and even his life depended upon his keeping the trust of the Princes who protected him, so he (in his mind) really had no choice.

But I don't think that would have served the purposes of the film-makers, so there you go.

[astorian]

Originally Posted by Lumpy

it's debatable whether 300 even counts as "inaccurate" or more like "a fable inspired by true events".

As you say, a HUGE percentage of that film was just plain silly. But for me, the silliest part was the oiled-up Spartans at Thermopylae fighting in little more than jock straps!

I suppose that appealed to the gays and 98-pound nerds who flocked to see it, but in reality, the Spartans who fought at Thermopylae were heavily armored from head to toe- that's precisely why they were so hard for the lightly armored Persians to dislodge.

[astorian]

Originally Posted by Alka Seltzer

JFK deserves equal status with Braveheart as the poster-bearer of revisionism. Amadeus is also worth mentioning. A superb film, but I'm glad I knew before I saw it that it's highly fictionalized, or I'd have felt cheated.

Amadeus is a separate case, because playwright Peter Shaffer would gladly have TOLD you that he wasn't writing history, but fiction based on real historical characters. Shaffer, a successful and acclaimed artist, has always had nagging doubts about the quality of his own work. "Sure, I'm considered a great playwright NOW," Shaffer thoughgt, "But what if I'm not really that good? What if there are REAL geniuses out there that the public is just too dumb to appreciate? After all, Salieri was far more acclaiemd than Mozart in his day, but who remembers Salieri any more?" Amadeus was Shaffer's way of working out his own selfdoubts using real people as fictional characters.

In the same way, Nikos Kazantzakis would freely have admitted that The Last Temptation of Christ was a work of FICTION, in which he was working out his own issues by imagining Jesus as a weak, sinful man like himself.

Many audience members, of course, came away from Amadeus thinking they'd seen a serious biopic.

[BrainGlutton]

Then there's U-571. In fact, an Enigma machine was captured from a crippled German U-boat early in WWII-- by the British Royal Navy, not the U.S. Navy; and this was in May 1941, when the U.S. was still trying to stay out of the war.

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by Dave Hartwick

Braveheart, previously mentioned, was pretty much end to end inaccuracies. Even people who knows very little about Scottish history must've noticed when the words "Battle of Selkirk Bridge" appeared onscreen and the bridge was conspicuously absent.

John O'Farrell made a crack about how the movie could hardly have been less accurate if they'd added a plasticine dog and called it William Wallace and Gromit.

My uncle joked that it would have been like a movie in which Lyndon Johnson invades Vietnam to avenge the death of his father, JFK, at the hands of Communist assassins.

He also noted that the movie was absurdly popular in Scotland among nationalists who knew nothing of the country they claimed to be obsessively proud of.

[Marley23]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

Joking aside, any rendition of Shakespeare's Richard III is open for debate. Compressed time is the very least of that play's/movie's problems.

There's very little accurate history in any of his history plays. He was much more interested in entertaining his audience and putting on a good story than in documenting historical events. As a subject and a recipient of patronage in a medieval monarchy Shakespeare also knew where his bread was buttered. He didn't want trouble and didn't want his business ruined. Even if you forget the witches, for instance, Macbeth is totally inaccurate- it's written the way it is because King James I believed he was a descendant of Banquo. And it's possible the only reason the witches are in there in the first place is that James was fascinated by them. In real life, Duncan I was young man and maybe not that good at beign a king, and Macbeth was a good king who ruled for around 15 years.

Shakespeare still managed to make important people angry at least once: the character of Falstaff was named Oldcastle in his first appearance in Henry IV part I, and he may have been called that in later plays, too. Sir John Oldcastle was a real historical figure, and Oldcastle's descendants were very powerful. Not surprisingly they were pissed off when Shakespeare portrayed their ancestor as a coward and a drunk, so Shakespeare changed the character's name to Falstaff (which comes from a different historical figure who was evidently fair game) and he wrote an epilogue for Henry IV pt. 2 that carefully explains Sir John Falstaff is not Sir John Oldcastle. You can almost feel the strain of the forced apology, and in some places you can bits of Henry IV were not rewritten to reflect the change.

Did anybody see the Ian McKellan Richard III, set in WW2-era times? Awesome!

Yes, and yes.

Originally Posted by Bridget Burke

Houston's Main Street Theater's recent production of Richard III was stunning. Notes in the program explained all the inaccuracies. But the main thing was that the part of Richard was a feast for an actor--the star (& director) of the production feasted....

I'm only guessing here, but it sounds like their version of Richard is influenced by a famous 1980s production starring Antony Sher.

[CalMeacham]

Originally Posted by astorian

Amadeus is a separate case, because playwright Peter Shaffer would gladly have TOLD you that he wasn't writing history, but fiction based on real historical characters. Shaffer, a successful and acclaimed artist, has always had nagging doubts about the quality of his own work. "Sure, I'm considered a great playwright NOW," Shaffer thoughgt, "But what if I'm not really that good? What if there are REAL geniuses out there that the public is just too dumb to appreciate? After all, Salieri was far more acclaiemd than Mozart in his day, but who remembers Salieri any more?" Amadeus was Shaffer's way of working out his own selfdoubts using real people as fictional characters.

In the same way, Nikos Kazantzakis would freely have admitted that The Last Temptation of Christ was a work of FICTION, in which he was working out his own issues by imagining Jesus as a weak, sinful man like himself.

Many audience members, of course, came away from Amadeus thinking they'd seen a serious biopic.

as I've mentioned many times on this Board, a lot of Shaffer's work is like this -- he takes real historical incidents and turns them into philosophical daramas that are realy about God and Man, and not realy about their nominal inspiration at all. So Amadeus isn't really about Mozart and Salieri -- it's about Salieri's War With God and how Talent isn't apportioned by moral merit. The Royal Hunt of the Sun isn't about Francisco Pizarro and the Conquest of the Incas -- it's about how God Talks to Man. Equss isn't about some British boy blinding six horses in his care (a real case that Shaffer heard about), it's about making one's interaction with God real and palpable.


After all, if Shaffer wanted to make a biography of Mozart, why not cal it Mozart? Or better still, Salieri, since it's more about him? He called it Amadeus, because it means "beloved of God", which was largely the point.

Shaffer has never denied his practice of writing quasi-historical philosophical plays, but I think neither he nor his producers or filmmakers have ever been careful to make it clear.



At least when Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee made Inherit the Wind they changed all the names, which should've made it obvious that they weren't telling the straightforward history of the Scopes trial. But people still didn't catch on.

Then there's U-571. In fact, an Enigma machine was captured from a crippled German U-boat early in WWII-- by the British Royal Navy, not the U.S. Navy; and this was in May 1941, when the U.S. was still trying to stay out of the war.

There is a tendency, when making movies for an American audience, to make the heroes Americans, or at least enlarge their role. They seem to figure we wouldn't be interested if it wasn't Americans in the lead. They did the same thing with The Great Escape, in which they generally depicted things properly and got the details right (owing to using former inmates as advisors), but they kept Americans in as msajor characters. In reality, although Americans were At Stalag Luft III and did contribute to the effort, they were separated by the Geremans months before the Big Break because they were getting along too well (trhe Germans hoped there'd be friction, which would've kept anyone from working on escape). That could've made for a dramatic scene in the movie, because apparently the X Organization did discuss trying to ove the gbreak earlier to let the Americans escape, too. But it's not in the film. But the James Garner role was really British, and the Steve McQueen part is virtually complete fabrication (It'd be hard to believe anyone letting himself be recaptured after escape, let alone assaulting as many Germans as he did, or performing motorcycle stunts to escape).

[Kimstu]

Originally Posted by BrainGlutton

Then there's U-571. In fact, an Enigma machine was captured from a crippled German U-boat early in WWII-- by the British Royal Navy, not the U.S. Navy; and this was in May 1941, when the U.S. was still trying to stay out of the war.

Sounds vaguely familiar.

[TriPolar]

The movie that comes to mind is The Sound Barrier (US title Breaking the Sound Barrier). When the movie came out in 1952 people generally didn't know that Chuck Yeager had already flown faster than Mach 1, and many people to this day believe that at supersonic speeds airplane control surfaces have to be reversed to operate. It is unlikely anybody with this belief will be in a position to apply this though.

[ralph124c]

There is a persistent belief that the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand started WW1.
This was a minor incident..it was more of an excuse for Kaiser Wilhelm to start the war. Wilhelm had been planning a war against France for years-his personal journal recorded his thoughts on this (August 1914).."now or never".
Wilhelm knew that this was the best time to attack France-if he waited, the balance of power would shift away from Germany.
He had planned it all along-the assassination was a good excuse to get things rolling.

[tdn]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

(Did anybody see the Ian McKellan Richard III, set in WW2-era times? Awesome!)

Yes, and I loved how the last line was treated.

As far as historical accuracy goes, doen't even get me started on Fargo.

[notquitekarpov]

Originally Posted by CalMeacham

There is a tendency, when making movies for an American audience, to make the heroes Americans, or at least enlarge their role. They seem to figure we wouldn't be interested if it wasn't Americans in the lead. They did the same thing with The Great Escape, in which they generally depicted things properly and got the details right (owing to using former inmates as advisors), but they kept Americans in as msajor characters. In reality, although Americans were At Stalag Luft III and did contribute to the effort, they were separated by the Geremans months before the Big Break because they were getting along too well (trhe Germans hoped there'd be friction, which would've kept anyone from working on escape). That could've made for a dramatic scene in the movie, because apparently the X Organization did discuss trying to ove the gbreak earlier to let the Americans escape, too. But it's not in the film. But the James Garner role was really British, and the Steve McQueen part is virtually complete fabrication (It'd be hard to believe anyone letting himself be recaptured after escape, let alone assaulting as many Germans as he did, or performing motorcycle stunts to escape).

That McQueen could turn up in a POW camp dressed is chinos and a sweat shirt is perhaps the oddest thing of all. Apparently he insisted and would not do the part in uniform. The strange bit is the producers agreed.

[Soylent Juicy]

My first thought was Disney's Pocahontas - wasn't the real Captain John Smith a middle-aged man and Pocahontas a 14-year-old girl? Which in reality would make him a bit of a pedo.

[notquitekarpov]

Originally Posted by tdn

As far as historical accuracy goes, doen't even get me started on Fargo.

But the caption at the start of the film was a joke.

The Cohen Brothers have admitted it was never intended to be anything other than a made up story, parts of which were stolen from a real case.

Or am I being whooshed here?

[tdn]

You are being whooshed.

[Ethilrist]

In the first edition of Ringworld, the Earth rotates the wrong direction.

[CalMeacham]

Originally Posted by Soylent Juicy

My first thought was Disney's Pocahontas - wasn't the real Captain John Smith a middle-aged man and Pocahontas a 14-year-old girl? Which in reality would make him a bit of a pedo.

Actually, what I really like were the cliffs and mountains and waterfalls so close to the ocean.


Have you ever been in that part of Virginia? It's flat.

[BrainGlutton]

Originally Posted by ralph124c

There is a persistent belief that the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand started WW1.
This was a minor incident..it was more of an excuse for Kaiser Wilhelm to start the war. Wilhelm had been planning a war against France for years-his personal journal recorded his thoughts on this (August 1914).."now or never".
Wilhelm knew that this was the best time to attack France-if he waited, the balance of power would shift away from Germany.
He had planned it all along-the assassination was a good excuse to get things rolling.

I agree, but, any film that plays that the usual way is not guilty of historical inaccuracy; it's a matter of historical interpretation. Diplomatic relations are so complicated and multi-factored, now and then -- one could still make a reasonable case that the war could have been avoided, or significantly delayed (and delay changes everything), if Gavrilo Princip had missed his shot.

[Bridget Burke]

Originally Posted by notquitekarpov

But the caption at the start of the film was a joke.

The Cohen Brothers have admitted it was never intended to be anything other than a made up story, parts of which were stolen from a real case.

Or am I being whooshed here?

And O Brother Where Art Thou was hardly a faithful version of the Odyssey!

[madsircool]

Originally Posted by ralph124c

There is a persistent belief that the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand started WW1.
This was a minor incident..it was more of an excuse for Kaiser Wilhelm to start the war. Wilhelm had been planning a war against France for years-his personal journal recorded his thoughts on this (August 1914).."now or never".
Wilhelm knew that this was the best time to attack France-if he waited, the balance of power would shift away from Germany.
He had planned it all along-the assassination was a good excuse to get things rolling.

Please try to support this argument.

[Ashley Pomeroy]

I remember catching one of those Oscar bait historical films on TV about Albert Einstein - like Gandhi, Malcolm X, you know. I can't remember what it was called, but it was absolutely bizarre. The details of relativity were explained well, and the portrayal of Marie Curie was spot on, but it took place mostly in Australia and had Einstein inventing rock and roll! Which can't be true, because he died only a few months after Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock" came out.

Also, fizzy beer long predates Albert Einstein. I admit he might have developed a more effective technique - atoms are a bit like bubbles, if you think about it - but I felt the film oversold that aspect of his career. I mean, the film was entertaining enough. Einstein was played by a talented, zany guy who must have died shortly afterwards, because I haven't seen him in anything else, and his talent was too big to hide. Or contain within the body of one man.

[TriPolar]

Originally Posted by ralph124c

There is a persistent belief that the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand started WW1.
This was a minor incident..it was more of an excuse for Kaiser Wilhelm to start the war. Wilhelm had been planning a war against France for years-his personal journal recorded his thoughts on this (August 1914).."now or never".
Wilhelm knew that this was the best time to attack France-if he waited, the balance of power would shift away from Germany.
He had planned it all along-the assassination was a good excuse to get things rolling.

It may get reduced to that belief, but every written account I've seen indicated the assasination was just a trigger, the straw that broke the camel's back, not the cause of the war.

[RealityChuck]

Originally Posted by Ashley Pomeroy

I remember catching one of those Oscar bait historical films on TV about Albert Einstein - like Gandhi, Malcolm X, you know. I can't remember what it was called, but it was absolutely bizarre. The details of relativity were explained well, and the portrayal of Marie Curie was spot on, but it took place mostly in Australia and had Einstein inventing rock and roll! Which can't be true, because he died only a few months after Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock" came out.

Also, fizzy beer long predates Albert Einstein. I admit he might have developed a more effective technique - atoms are a bit like bubbles, if you think about it - but I felt the film oversold that aspect of his career. I mean, the film was entertaining enough. Einstein was played by a talented, zany guy who must have died shortly afterwards, because I haven't seen him in anything else, and his talent was too big to hide. Or contain within the body of one man.

Are you being Serious? You should go to Yahoo to check out your facts.

[CalMeacham]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

Are you being Serious? You should go to Yahoo to check out your facts.

Clap! Clap! Clap! Clap! Clap!

[Martin Hyde]

Originally Posted by Odesio

Never mind the South Carolina plantation with free African American labor rather than slaves. It was too bad because I think there was actually a germ of an interesting story in The Patriot. Gibson's character was a veteran of the French/Indian War and he was haunted by his own brutal actions to the point where he did not want to fight the English. It might have been a more interesting story had he wrestled with his humanity while sliding into his former brutish self while fighting for independence.

There were a few plantations like that, but they were such a minority that it's kind of objectionable to create a character in the deep south in that time out of that, it smacks of "creating the unambiguously noble hero."

One of the Founding Fathers from my neck of the woods, George Wythe, actually practiced what he preached and ran a plantation of freedmen. Lots of FFs deplored slavery and a few even freed their slaves in their wills (once they were done with them), but Wythe freed his slaves in his own time, and tried to grant the ones who stayed on with him a share of his estate when he died.

[Loach]

Originally Posted by Lord Mondegreen

The movie U-571 has the US Navy capturing the first Enigma machine rather than the Royal Navy. Whether this is major or minor is probably up for debate, and the side you take in the debate is probably almost entirely dependant upon which side of the pond you come from.

I believe that lip service was paid to history with a caption at the end. It said something like the movie was fiction but several Enigma machines were captured by both British and Americans and the film was dedicated to them.

[aruvqan]

Originally Posted by Bridget Burke

(I'll forgive Amadeus; Prague is so beautiful & all that music really was Mozart's.)

and the costuming

[Irishman]

But what about U-571? The British were the first to capture an Enigma machine, not the Americans. *gets punched in the face*

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

Are you being Serious? You should go to Yahoo to check out your facts.

[JohnT]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

Are you being Serious? You should go to Yahoo to check out your facts.

You know, I thought you were wooshed... until I checked IMDB and "re-learned" that the lead in that movie was not played by Pauly Shore.

Well played.

[RickJay]

Originally Posted by Dave Hartwick

Braveheart, previously mentioned, was pretty much end to end inaccuracies. Even people who knows very little about Scottish history must've noticed when the words "Battle of Selkirk Bridge" appeared onscreen and the bridge was conspicuously absent.

Stirling Bridge. And I do not believe the words "Battle of Stirling Bridge" appear on screen; IIRC it just said "Stirling."

Battles are often named after geographic features that didn't feature prominently in the battle. The Battle of Bunker Hill was not fought on Bunker Hill, the Battle of Midway was mostly fought so far from Midway that you could not even have seen the island. The Battle of Stirling Bridge as it was actually fought had effectively the same outcome, but would have been less heroic-looking.

People never seem to have problems with the Scottish wearing clan tartan kilts, despite the fact that this is about as historically accurate as having the soldiers in a World War II epic using phasers and spaceships.

[Sampiro]

Originally Posted by Soylent Juicy

My first thought was Disney's Pocahontas - wasn't the real Captain John Smith a middle-aged man and Pocahontas a 14-year-old girl? Which in reality would make him a bit of a pedo.

In addition to which there's a lot of discussion as to whether the incident of her sparing his life ever even happened. John Smith wrote about it many years later, by which time he'd already told an almost identical story that happened in Turkey, and it's known that he was a notorious liar to begin with. (Among other things, he depicted himself as a poor orphan abused by his foster parents- he was middle class and he was grown and long gone from home when his parents died.)
The frustrating thing about Smith is that he did have some adventures, some of them probably really the swashbuckling Jack Sparrow sort involving Turks and possibly the Countess Bathory (yep, the Blood Countess- there's a good chance he really did enter her service) and "red Indians" and other sorts, but he also liked to gild the lily, so it's impossible to know which of his tales is true and isn't.

Adding to the melee of fact and fiction is that some Indian tribes did have a ritual similar to the one Smith depicted- it was less an "actually going to kill you" thing and more like a baptism into the tribe- so it could have been that. And Pocahontas does seem to have been particularly beloved by her father, [the chief usually known to history as] Powhatan, which was an achievement considering he had dozens of children and gave many of them away. On the other other hand, some biographers believe she may have been married or betrothed to a tribe member by the time she married John Rolfe as well. (In a case of 'sometimes there is some truth to the romantic side of history', while her marriage to Rolfe [a grieving widower when he met her] certainly had advantages for both sides, he seems to have genuinely loved her as well, possibly more than she did him.)
Pocahontas probably would have seen some of Shakespeare's plays enacted as she stayed in an inn frequented by actors in England. It was also an inn where disease spread a lot, which led to her death.

In any case, Pocahontas definitely did know and like John Smith when he was in Virginia. There's no evidence she was in love with him.