# "Bad history! BAD!!!": Historically inaccurate movies and TV shows **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 17, 2009, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013 "2009-06-17T01:17:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/61 "2009-06-18T02:05:15Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > However, I can zsemi-forgive the appearance of Lincoln, too. It didn’t claim he was President, but he definitely didn’t ever go to California. Ironically, seeing California was his dream for the last half of his life. It was a journey he had always _wanted_ to make- he came closest in 1849 when he was offered the governorship of Oregon, which he _did_ consider, but with a family that consisted of a sickly little boy and a wife who didn’t suffer in silence the idea of several weeks in a wagon train or on a ship was out of the question so he never got further west than a few miles beyond the Mississippi. On what she recalled as the happiest conversation she ever had with him after he was elected president, Mary said he told her he did not intend to seek reelection in 1868, that by then the Transcontinental Railroad would be complete, and that they would travel together by train to San Francisco, have a good long “look see”, then board a ship to tour Europe and the Holy Land. Then- no exaggeration- they went home and got ready to go to Ford’s Theater, so on the last day of his life he actually discussed wanting to see California. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/62 "2009-06-18T02:06:13Z")
> [@The New and Improved Superman](#): > > If you scrutinize the film really, really hard, I’ll just bet you find a few inconsistencies in “History of the World, Part I.” Yeah, impossible for Oedipus to be in Rome at the time of Caesar, but the joke made me forgive Mel for that. 😃 ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/o6tri_VmkEM/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/o6tri_VmkEM?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque Not safe for work language in the video clip. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/63 "2009-06-18T03:21:45Z")
Here’s the IMDb page on **Fall of a Nation**. Apparently, it’s one of the Lost Films. > **[The Fall of a Nation (1916) ⭐ 5.1 | Drama](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0006664/)** > > 1h 15m Many thanks – I never heard of this one. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/64 "2009-06-18T03:25:26Z")
[geekish chortling] In _Glory_ the 54th Massachusetts is shown attacking Ft Wagner from the North because the light was better, but IRL they attacked from the South. How stupid was THAT? [/geekish chortling] Reading up on it, \*Glory \*may be the one that got it the most right. Sure, compromises were made, but, as films go, they changed little. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/65 "2009-06-18T03:29:27Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Hattie McDaniel (who was a maid for white people before stardom, as were her mother and her many sisters) was taken to task in her own lifetime for her portrayal of smiling happy slaves and maids, prompting the classic comeback “I smile because I’d rather be _playing_ somebody’s maid for $700 a week than _being_ somebody’s maid for $7 a week”. (She eventually earned far more than $700/wk. and in fact had a [large house](http://www.flickr.com/photos/8perf/2267872289/) and maids of her own.) Hmmm, nice digs. Glad that things went well for her and, when it got tough, she had something to fall back on. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/66 "2009-06-18T03:41:12Z")
In Braveheart, the main battle was at Stirling Bridge. But the film forgot the bridge. The Wiki article about Braveheart includes this choice quote: > [@](#): > > Moreover, when highlanders finally did begin wearing the belted plaid, it was not “in the rather bizarre style depicted in the film.”[22] She compares the inaccuracy to “… a film about Colonial America showing the colonial men wearing 20th century business suits, but with the jackets worn back-to-front instead of the right way around.”[22] Heh. I can forgive that, though; we’d all expect them to be wearing tartan kilts. Missing out the bridge, though? Kinda missing out the battle. I bet there’s a similar movie including the battle of Banockburn that forgets to include the burn. ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/67 "2009-06-18T03:53:42Z")
[My Darling Clementine](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038762/), directed by John Ford and starring Henry Fonda, is the most egregious mangling of history I have ever seen, and I’ve seen most of the films in this thread. It’s supposedly based on the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, but it’s as if the writer heard some names offhand (Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, Clanton Brothers) and then made the story up out of whole cloth. There is not one shred of accuracy in the whole movie. The worst offense? Making Doc Holliday a medical doctor, and having that be a significant plot point. Anyone who has ever cracked a book about the subject would know that Doc Holliday was so named because he was a _dentist_. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/68 "2009-06-18T03:59:11Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > I’ve never seen it, but I’ve heard plenty of people complain about U571, a movie about capturing a German Enigma machine. The real life incident involved Brits, the movie made them Americans. At the end of the movie they dedicate it to those who risked their lives to recover Enigma machines. Then they list 5 or 6 actual incidents which included both America and British units. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/69 "2009-06-18T04:06:15Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > In Braveheart, the main battle was at Stirling Bridge. But the film forgot the bridge. > > The Wiki article about Braveheart includes this choice quote: > > Heh. I can forgive that, though; we’d all expect them to be wearing tartan kilts. Missing out the bridge, though? Kinda missing out the battle. I bet there’s a similar movie including the battle of Banockburn that forgets to include the burn. Never let reality get in the way of plot. Reality would not have made for a very good movie. The English were stupid and allowed their forces to be divided while crossing a narrow bridge, thus eliminating the advantage of their cavalry. It is much more dramatic to have William defeat them with pointed sticks. The movie works for me. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/70 "2009-06-18T04:17:10Z")
I pointedly change the channel before Mine Wife notices that the program is about the various Tudors or the Roman emporors Ca0001AD. After all these years I prefer to watch frickin’ ADS then to listen to the same stories again and again. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/71 "2009-06-18T06:10:52Z")
> [@Pyper](#): > > The worst offense? Making Doc Holliday a medical doctor, and having that be a significant plot point. Anyone who has ever cracked a book about the subject would know that Doc Holliday was so named because he was a _dentist_. And he wasn’t even practicing by that time, he was a FT gambler. ---
**Author:** ![emcee2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7bcc69/32.png) [@emcee2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emcee2k)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/72 "2009-06-18T07:05:58Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > [Six Movies Based on a True Story (That are Also Full of Shit)](http://www.cracked.com/article_17326_movies-based-on-true-story-that-are-also-full-shit.html) Was “The Last King of Scotland” advertised as being based on a true story? If it was it shouldn’t have been. It was based on a fictional book. The book used the regime of Idi Amin in the plot and setting, but it wasn’t supposed to be a true story. ---
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/73 "2009-06-18T07:06:07Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Of course, the movie U-571 is historically inaccurate. But if we are going to cite WWII adventure movies for historical inaccuracies, we’ll be at it forever. For instance, I highly doubt that movies like _Where Eagles Dare_ and _Force 10 From Navarone_ are based closely on real-life incidents. _Objective Burma_ starring Errol Flynn. I don’t think the Americans were in Burma ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/74 "2009-06-18T09:14:18Z")
> [@chowder](#): > > _Objective Burma_ starring Errol Flynn. > > I don’t think the Americans were in Burma [Merrill’s Marauders](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrill%27s_Marauders) would like a word with you… As George MacDonald Fraser - who _was_ in Burma with the British forces - pointed out about \*\*Objective Burma \*\*in his splendid book _The Hollywood History of the World_, "There were American units fighting there, admittedly in a sideshow to the main British-Indian campaign, but if Warner Brothers wanted to make a movie about their own troops, why not?’ ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/75 "2009-06-18T12:09:24Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Never let reality get in the way of plot. Reality would not have made for a very good movie. The English were stupid and allowed their forces to be divided while crossing a narrow bridge, thus eliminating the advantage of their cavalry. It is much more dramatic to have William defeat them with pointed sticks. The movie works for me. Actually, the original plan was to make fairly accurate battles, whivch would focus on Wallace as a thinker as well as a leader. However, weather just did not cooperate. The final battle scenes, though effective, are a compromise “we have to shoot the movie somehow” backstop. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/76 "2009-06-18T14:07:28Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Here’s the IMDb page on **Fall of a Nation**. Apparently, it’s one of the Lost Films. > [The Fall of a Nation (1916) - IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0006664/) > Many thanks – I never heard of this one. :dubious: [Really?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=160605) Well, a lotta good [that post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2966370&postcount=80) did. But, serially, there used to be a review on the movie by F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre. It has since been deleted. I thought that that based on his review that he had actually seen it, and that he even mentioned where a copy of it existed (somewhere in Virginia, maybe?). However, he might have based his review and the presence of a copy on archival material as opposed to actually having seen it. And has been mentioned, it was really a sequel in name only. The \*“Red Dawn” analogy is pretty accurate. \*Which I heard this morning has been greenlighted for a remake! ---
**Author:** ![Jane\_Elliot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jane_elliot/32/6166_2.png) [@Jane\_Elliot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jane_Elliot)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/77 "2009-06-18T15:23:55Z")
My vote for worst recent historical movie is “The Other Boleyn Girl”. Yes, it’s based on a book, but I think that even the book was more historically accurate then the movie. I went to see it with my Mom, and when she asked how accurate it was, I ranted for at least a half an hour on how bad it was. Now I just tell myself that it was a movie about a King named “Henry”, a Queen named “Katherine” and another Queen named “Anne”, set in a fictional Kingdom called “England”. ---
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/78 "2009-06-18T15:45:44Z")
> [@Scissorjack](#): > > [Merrill’s Marauders](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrill%27s_Marauders) would like a word with you… As George MacDonald Fraser - who _was_ in Burma with the British forces - pointed out about \*\*Objective Burma \*\*in his splendid book _The Hollywood History of the World_, "There were American units fighting there, admittedly in a sideshow to the main British-Indian campaign, but if Warner Brothers wanted to make a movie about their own troops, why not?’ :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/79 "2009-06-18T16:32:47Z")
A slightly off-topic question: is there a term for movies like _Inherit the Wind_ that are based on but at the same time different from the actual events? _Inherit the Wind_ has some elements that are extremely different from the real events. The real teacher on trial wasn’t an intellectual martyr- he wasn’t even a teacher “Hell, he ain’t even old timey”] and the entire trial was basically a publicity stunt to drum up business for Dayton Tennessee. There were actually a lot more lawyers on both sides than just Darrow (Drummond) and Bryan (Brady). On the other hand, even if it was a staged event passions did run high: there really were people in the community and elsewhere who showed up with “I’m Not a Monkey” signs and the “Read Your Bible” placard at the door of the courthouse was real. The judge really was a very religious man who opened with prayer and forgave, as a Christian, Darrow for a contempt of court charge when he apologized to the court. And the most improbable events are actually almost identical to the trial: Darrow really did call Bryan to the stand as an expert on the Bible and their exchanges are sometimes verbatim and always a close paraphrase of the actual transcripts. Bryan really did say “I don’t think about things I don’t think about” and other trip ups. Bryan really was a three-time presidential candidate and career politician who really did die shortly after the trial (he didn’t die in the courtroom but he was still in the town). Not historical exactly, but a similar film is [To Die For](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Die_For), which is Nicole Kidman as a New Hampshire schoolteacher who seduces a “wrong side of the tracks” teenaged student to kill her husband. As with _Inherit the Wind_ and _The Scopes Trial_ much is changed from the Pamela Smart case (mainly the characterization of Smart’s parents and in-laws and of course the ending) but at the same time the most unlikely and unrealistic events are actually true (the video recordings of the students that crucified her, her asking the boys who were going to kill her husband to put the dog in the bathroom so he wouldn’t be traumatized, two kids doing a contract murder for some CDs and a tiny amount of cash, etc.). The producers actually included the “any resemblance to real people is coincidental” disclaimer at the end, but as with INHERIT THE WIND if the writers tried to claim it was absolutely unconnected to the actual trials and events they’d have been laughed at because there was way more than a casual resemblance. I’m familiar with the term [roman à clef](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_%C3%A0_clef)comes to mind, but I was wondering if there’s a term that’s a little bit tighter- something that basically means “a dramatization with some changes” rather than “some similarity to actual events”? ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2009, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013/80 "2009-06-18T16:33:31Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Speaking, Cate Blanchett’s _Elizabeth_ movies: did they manage to get anything _right_? My vote for possibly the worst big budget interpretation of a historical figure ever. > > 1. Some of the interior shots, most of her wardrobe, her dead white ‘virgin face’ makeup [lead and arsenic based. I doubt that she could have had an undamaged child with as much heavy metal toxicity as she must have had] Hm, IIRC there was a scene with her and a few dancing to a small group of musicians, frequently that was a common way to pass an evening, playing cards and dancing, and light snacking to music provided by servants. That dress that her lady in waiting borrowed and got poisoned by, pure bullcrap. With as many layers between the body and the dress, it would have to have been wetted down from going out in the rain, and soaked through and into all the layers of chemise, bodys, corset and body clothes. I really feel great sympathy for Elizabeth 1. She had seriously good brains, was very well educated and the only thing that most men considered her good for was the venerial transmission of the crown, and as a broodmare. I would absolutely hate having to always wonder if someone loved me for ME or my ability to grant rank and station … [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-history-bad-historically-inaccurate-movies-and-tv-shows/500013.md?page=5)