# Most accurate westerns? other period films? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 18, 2012, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914 "2012-08-18T23:33:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2012, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/1 "2012-08-18T23:33:43Z")
What are some of the more accurate westerns? I know over the years the orthodoxy of how cowboys etc. would have dressed has changed in cinema as have other western cinematic conventions so which are the more accurate portrayals? Are they all typically more myth based than documentary? What other period films have you seen that are as true as they can be to the times they’re portraying? Obviously no one posting on SDMB was alive in the days of the Old West so I suppose I’m looking for accuracy in attire, mores, and historical fact where historical figures are portrayed. Again, the floor is open to other period films, not necessarily of a western setting. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/2 "2012-08-19T02:36:37Z")
You might like _ **Heartland** _, a 1979 Western starring Conchata Ferrell and Rip Torn. There’s no gunfighting, no conventional Western action… just a solid attempt at showing what life on a remote Wyoming ranch would have been like a century ago. ---
**Author:** ![panamajack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/47e85d/32.png) [@panamajack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panamajack)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/3 "2012-08-19T05:02:59Z")
Buster Keaton’s _The General_ took great pains to authentically recreate the Civil War era it is set in. Consider that it was made about as close in time to its period as _Saving Private Ryan_, and there were probably veterans that could give it that feel. It’s also famous, of course, for creating a scene of a train going off a bridge into a river by … [filming a train going off a bridge into a river](http://www.offbeatoregon.com/H1002b_TheGeneral.html). ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/4 "2012-08-19T05:42:10Z")
_[Topsy Turvy](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0151568/)_ is considered an accurate portrayal of Victorian England. ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/5 "2012-08-19T16:53:57Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > You might like _ **Heartland** _, a 1979 Western starring Conchata Ferrell and Rip Torn. > > There’s no gunfighting, no conventional Western action… just a solid attempt at showing what life on a remote Wyoming ranch would have been like a century ago. I love that movie. When I got a Kindle, one of the first free books I downloaded was [Letters from a Woman Homesteader](http://www.amazon.com/Letters-Homesteader-Elinore-Pruitt-Stewart/dp/0395911516) by Elinore Pruitt Stewart. I’m reading it and thinking, “Hmmmm, this sounds a lot like the movie _Heartland_”. Well duh, that’s what it was. That woman is my hero. There’s a lot in the book that didn’t make it to the movie. I also love westerns but have no clue about accuracy. Seems like if a movie gets the clothing correct, it’s inaccurate somewhere else, like in its treatment of Indians or women, or it’ll have every man wearing a six-shooter, or it’ll be set in a cattle town and there’s nary a cowpie on the street. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/6 "2012-08-19T16:59:38Z")
While it did not strictly follow the actual events, I found _Heaven’s Gate_ to be accurate in its portrayal of the times. I especially liked the costuming and accoutrements. ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/7 "2012-08-19T17:25:03Z")
It’s been years since I’ve seen it, but as I recall [McCabe & Mrs. Miller](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067411/) was a western that gave the sense of being realistic. Also (and this I haven’t seen at all) isn’t [Deadwood](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0348914/) considered pretty accurate? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/8 "2012-08-19T17:32:44Z")
[Will Penny](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063811/) pretty much gets a lot of it right. ---
**Author:** ![phxjcc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phxjcc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phxjcc)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/9 "2012-08-19T22:04:56Z")
Meeks Cutoff was very good. Just take a Prozac after you see it. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/10 "2012-08-19T22:29:06Z")
> [@phxjcc](#): > > Meeks Cutoff was very good. > > Just take a Prozac after you see it. First take an upper to stay awake through it. 😃 I’d also say Deadwood was likely not too far off. One of the big problems with period pieces, particularly those that take place in the 1800s and earlier, is that everyone is too damned clean. People in England and America in the 1800s, including royalty, were largely unwashed. It was considered unhealthy to bathe too often. Film actors would most likely balk at being filthy, and the focus is on the stars for the most part. _Deadwood_ had a pretty grungy cast of characters; the streets were muck, the rooms crude, and the men and women cruder yet. Even Swearengen sat around in his filthy long-johns. ---
**Author:** ![LawMonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d6d6ee/32.png) [@LawMonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LawMonkey)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-accurate-westerns-other-period-films/631914/11 "2012-08-19T22:46:03Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > I’d also say Deadwood was likely not too far off. One of the big problems with period pieces, particularly those that take place in the 1800s and earlier, is that everyone is too damned clean. People in England and America in the 1800s, including royalty, were largely unwashed. It was considered unhealthy to bathe too often. Film actors would most likely balk at being filthy, and the focus is on the stars for the most part. _Deadwood_ had a pretty grungy cast of characters; the streets were muck, the rooms crude, and the men and women cruder yet. Even Swearengen sat around in his filthy long-johns. My understanding is that the swearing is more accurate-in-spirit than accurate-to-the-letter–I read somewhere that blasphemy was the thing there; had they followed it in form, it would’ve sounded quaint. So instead, we got a lot of cocksuckers. 😃 I’ve always enjoyed the griminess of the classic Leone spaghetti westerns. I doubt they’re accurate in general, but the spirit–no one’s really a white-hat, and no one’s taken a bath in a month (except for Tuco, heh!)–always seemed about right.