So they’re doing a movie about Troy. Again. And the Alamo. Again. And one about King Arthur. Again.
There’s a lot of history in this world, so why not do a movie about something people haven’t seen 37 versions of already? If you were to pick historical events to make into movies (even those of quasi-legitimacy like King Arthur and Troy), what would they be? And would they be based on any particular author’s book?
I’d like to see a movie about Angel Island. It’d be a very depressing movie, but I think it’s something more people should know about, so it never happens again. http://www.angelisland.org/immigr02.html
I love Sharon Kay Penman’s books, and I think they could make a good movie from When Christ and His Saints Slept. I’ve read another book about Maude (Henry I’s daughter) and her cousin Stephen of Blois, but this one was much better. They don’t make enough movies about the 12th century…though movies have been made about her son (Henry II) and his wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, of course.
Then, her triology (Here be dragons/the reckoning/falls the shadow) about the gradual take over of Wales by England in the 13 century could make interesting movies too. I’m probably in the minority of like her “human” Richard III, so maybe that book (Sunne in Spendor) wouldn’t go over big.
I’d like to see the story of the Spanish conquest of Tenochtitlan. IIRC, there was a book written about it almost concurrent with the events, so that’d be a good source.
Problem with alot of these historical events is the lack of either A) documentation of the event or B) interesting characters, circumstances, and so on. I mean, maybe a film about the Norman Conquest and the Battle of Hastings would be good, maybe not, we won’t ever know because nobody seems to care about it enough and there aren’t any well-known dramatic events surrounding it. I don’t forsee long lines at the box office for 1066: Conquest of Some People by Some Other People.
I’d like to see something about Boston’s Great Molasses Spill of 1919. Heck, even a documentary. You’d think the History Channel or someone would have done a show by now.
For more recent history, I’ve wanted to see a move about Vancouver’s Great Fire of 1886 for a long time.
Of course, it’s pretty small potatoes compared to other notable infernos, like the one in San Francisco in 1906. There’s no comparison, really-- Vancouver had been incorporated as a city for less than three months-- but I’ve obsessed over that fire for years, and collected every first-hand account I could lay my hands on.
It has a number of elements that I think make the groundwork for great drama.
The speed of it-- only about half an hour, and the entire city was gone. (That was about 1000 buildings in what is now the downtown eastside.) The heat was intense. One man reported lying down in the middle of Hastings Street, because the air above-ground was too hot to breathe. He put his pack over his head for protection, forgetting that that’s where he kept all his ammunition. It wasn’t until after the fire had passed that he realized what all the noise was – his ammo had discharged inches away from his head. He was unharmed. A city archivist ran down the street with his most treasured papers. They were charred black and illegible when he escaped the flames. Others weren’t so lucky. A woman with an infant daughter sought refuge from the heat in a well. They didn’t burn, but suffocated when the fire consumed all the oxygen.
The fire was started when a freak high wind blew up as some CPR railworkers were clearing some densely grown land. (All of Vancouver was pretty much forest, back then.) The wind blew the fire out of bounds and then continued to feed it. It was such a strong wind that it blew a ship anchored at Deadman’s Island, all the way across Burrard Inlet to the Hastings Sawmill, which was a stroke of good luck for dozens of people who had fled into the water to try to avoid the flames. The killing wind gave them a gift.
Of course, the story would have to be padded out, but it would be easy enough to draw sympathetic characters from the history of Vancouver’s Boomtown days.
Maybe when I’m finished the novel that’s been making my life miserable I’ll try to pitch a Vancouver Fire screenplay. Hmmm. I smell a grant.
I’d like them to make a movie about when George W. Bush was impeached, removed from office, sent to prison, and gang raped in the shower. Wait, that hasn’t happened yet…
I would like to see a non-jingoist, non-bowdlerized, accurate, and balanced movie about the American Revolution–essentially, everything that Gibson’s miserable joke was not.
I can’t think of a specific event but I think more movies with knigths, crusaders, vikings (not in the same movie) and general medievalness is required. I guess it would be an uphill struggle to get funding for a movie about the siege of Jerusalem (or something similar) these days.
I saw the Boudica TV film last year. It wasn’t very good. It tried to make out that the fate of the whole Roman empire depended on the final battle, which was fought by about 20 extras running about and shouting. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338806/)
There has been a film about Thermopylae, The 300 Spartans. I have seen it, but I don’t remember much about it. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055719/)
I heard somewhere that someone was planning to film 300, the graphic novel version by Alan Moore, but I can’t find any confirmation of it.
Waterloo, starring Rod Steiger as Napoleon, covered most of the Hundred Days. It’s quite a long film, if memory serves. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066549/)
I’d love to see some sort of dramatic tragedy - whether movie or play - about the fall of King Josiah of Judah.
Sticking to the Biblical narrative and the Midrashic commentaries gives a very compelling story - about a Judaic king who, after 57 years of rule by idolaters, plus another 18 (I think) not doing anything about it himself, suddenly unearths a mysteious book which compels him to turn to righteousness (as defined by Torah law) and crusade for the nation to do so as well. Due to unwarranted faith in the fidelity of his people to Torah law, he denies (against the advice of the prophets) Pharaoh passage through Judah and pays the price for his people’s betrayal.
All this would be narrated by a Jeremiah character.
I’ve always thought the story just cried out for dramatic interpretation.
Since all American wars eventually get the full epic treatment, I would like to see the battle of the Chosin Reservoir from Korea (The Frozen Chosin). 16,000 allied soldiers fought for 5 days straight in freezing temperatures against more than 100,000 Chinese troops as they attempted to retreat back to the coast for evacuation. Allied troops suffered nearly 10,000 casualties. Survivors refer to themselves as “The Chosin Few.”
Nothing screams “epic” to me like the Riel Rebellion. A corrupt government, charges of treason, gory battles on horseback, and the hero dies in the end.
Too bad it all took place in Canada - Hollywood would probably have to change the location to Alaska to make people want to see it.
I’d love to see a movie about the Lost Colony at Manteo (a screenwriters dream since s/he could make up her own ending [within reason: no UFO abductions]), or about any of a thousand Byzantine plots (history that wrote its own screenplay as it went along), a good movie about the First Crusade (preferably one that had heroes and villains on both sides like the real one) or about the Fourth Crusade (which would get an NC17 for violence), a film version of Gore Vidal’s Creation (which features as characters Zoroaster, Buddha, Confucius, Socrates and Pericles), one about the Trail of Tears (pitifully underrepresented in film), one that portrays Andrew Jackson as the (even by 19th century standards) racist Anglophobic horror that he was, a movie about Göring… there are so many superrich untapped veins to choose from.
The Second Punic War is a great story. A movie would probably not be good, however, since it took too long and the film maker would screw it up.
The contest to do the bronze doors of that famous church in Florence might be a good story. Competiting geniuses, brillian artworks, and one intransigent artist who would never stoop to cooperating with the other.
A meticulously accurate account of life in a city when the Black Death comes to town would be pretty interesting.
Anything involving lots and lots of beautiful nude women.