Yeah I completely agree, Troy's not even accurate to the Iliad, though in all fairness if it had been, it would have been many hours long and would have ended right after Hector died. Also, Menelaos didn't die at Troy, and Paris did. Also, Aeneas was not some young man uncertain of himself, he was a brother of Paris and by all accounts nearly as vicious as Hector or any of those other guys. Alexander I can't speak for since I never spent a great deal of time learning about the history of that time period. Iliad, Odyssey and the Aeneid are the three ancient epics that I've spent all the time reading about.
William Wallace was so badass he rewrote history it would seem. I'm surprised they didn't make mention of the white van that makes an appearance in one scene apparently.
Good points. But according to the ever so truthful wikipedia, it seems Dilios was a cross between Aristodemus, who suffered an eye injury, and Pantites who was sent away by Leonidis to rally the greek troops: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonidas_I As for the list, I am sure there are a lot of inaccuracies, but I really love a bunch of those movies, and I am a HUGE Mel Gibson fan - Braveheart is in my top three - so I really care less about historical accuracy. I am a History geek but enjoy movies for their entertainment value. Cool list though smkspy
I think the best thing movies like this can do is inspire the audience to research the real history. Only someone who is naive or a fool takes film, any film, as factual. On a related note, I remember seeing a talk by Neil DeGrasse Tyson, the director of the Hayden Planetarium/Rose Center in NYC, in which he told the story of how he met James Cameron twice, and each time pointed out that the stars in Titanic were completely wrong. How, he wondered, could they spend $200 million on a film, and not get a $75 Starry Night program? (When the latest DVD was released, he got a note that it was fixed).
Has it honestly gotten to the point in education systems that history is so ignored that these films are taken as accurate? When I first heard about 300 I asked a mate what it was about and he was a huge history buff and he gave me a streamlined version of the real events, which in turn inspiried my own research into the subject. And frankly I don't give a toss if the Iranians get their turbans in a twist over a movie, based on a comic novel, inspired by a film, in turn based on History after being told via word of mouth and eventually put to paper. Their ancestors lost the conflict in the end, so I'm told, as the decendants of the victors, we can tell the story any way we want. You think that if the real Xerxes the Second had won his war of conquest the Iranians wouldn't make a movie where the Persian Empire brought enlightenment to Greece?
Alexander wasn't that bad. Biggest ones are Roxanne (who was from Afghanistan or there abouts) was played by a black woman. Next up was where Bucephalus died. He died long before Alexander got his chest wound. Which is another, how Alexander got his chest wound. The movie show him taking an arrow. Really it was a spear. Which only happened because he was first into the breach of a fortress they were taking. Alexander fought the entire garrison, by himself, for 10 minutes, and was winning. Till he got shanked.
I saw part of Moses tonight. If I had to wager a guess, I would say that it's probably not 100% historically accurate. Be cool if the burning bush not only happened, but looked and sounded like that, though, and if the Pharaoh was that melodramatic and spoke such great English. . .the same could be said for Moses, for that matter. . . Now that I think about it, Planet of the Apes is probably more future accurate than that movie is historically accurate.
Or the fact it was filmed in Ireland and not Scotland. Mind you I have never actually seen it, nor do I wish to.
Ok looking at the movies you mentioned one at a time: Troy: First let me say I like this movie, but it's not historically accurate at all (assuming that the Trojan War haponed at all). The biggest complaint I have with this movie is what they did to Aeneas. If you what great (imo) historical fiction about Troy read David Gemmell's Troy series (Lord of the Silver Bow,Shield of Thunder, and Fall of Kings). Alexander: Let me just say this movie has quite posibly the most historically accurate battle ever put on film (Gaugamela). Others have mentioned some of the inaccuacys so I will not cover them again. I do have one big bone to pick with this movie and the 1956 movie Alexander the Great (aside from being crap and more historicly inaccurate than Troy) and that is they depicte Megas Alexandros as blonde when in the only two (as far as I know) surviving mosaics (from Pella and Pompeii) he had Brown or black hair. Passion of The Christ: I like the fact that they did it in Aramaic, but the fact that there is no Koine Greek spoken as that was the lingua franca of the time, the Latin is Ecclesiastical Latin not Classical Latin. That and the way the surging of Jesus is dipicted it would have kiiled him (or any other man ever alive) well before he had that cross to bare. I disagree respecfully, as I can think of a lot of wholely fictional storys that were more boring than even the most slavishly historicly accurate movie or book could ever be (Star Wars prequils I'm looking at you, you too Matrix sequils). Some exemples of things that would rock even if done accurately are The Persian Wars (from Marathon to Thermopylae,Plataea, and Salamis to Megas Alexandros conquest of Persia). The fall of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Roman Empire (about 110 b.c. to 27 b.c.). How about movies set during the Viking Age (good ones not crap like Pathfinder). Or moving away from western history how about a Samurai epic set during the Sengoku Jidai, there's alot to play with there. There's more I can think of but I don't want to get long winded, well any more that this anyway.
Historically inaccurate movies? What is the world coming to?? Who can we trust and believe when the upstanding moral people of Hollywood start to defraud us in their movies?? Oh, next they'll be telling us global warming is not as bad as they're making it out to be.
Honestly, I think people have always taken fiction for history, from Hollywood to Parson Weems to Shakespeare to Homer and probably back even further. It has little to do with the state of modern education, and everything to do with the general populace's inability (for whatever reason, from aptitude to time to interet to initiative) to ferret out the truth themselves.
Did you watch these movies and get rubbed the wrong way or something, dude? Who watches movies for Historical Accuracy? I mean seriously, this is why we have Encyclopedia and History Books to read at the library or on the Computer. I mean, who watched Tombstone for historical accuracy (Or even Wyatt Earp)? I didn't, I enjoyed it for what it was --- a damn good, but slow, western starring Kurt Russell and Val Kramer (among others). Oh, yeah, movies like 10,000 B.C. and 300 were never supposed to be Historically Accurate in the terms on is thinking of. That much was obvious from the trailers and the fact that 300 was based off a Graphic Novel for cripes sake. Other Movies like Gladiator*, The Last Samurai*, Apocalypto*, Memoirs of a Geisha, Braveheart, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, and, The Patriot* were all based in or in some particular timeline in history, but I don't (IMHO) that were trying to be too faithful to the history text books, seeing as they were embellished and based on original characters*. The others not marked by stars, are all probably in the same category without the original characters bit (as far as I know). Seriously, don't get your panties in a twist. Pick up a History Book. I actually enjoyed all these movies, ironically (especially The Last Samurai). And When concerning The Passion Of the Christ, seeing as I've got as much Biblical Knowledge as the next person, but it seemed rather accurate --- given as my Mother didn't rag it on being Biblically incorrect or completely wrong for that matter. She knows her stuff about Biblcial History and whatnot. What happened, what didn't happen, what's ignored or simply unacknowledged in that catagory. I didn't know any better, you were Anti-Mel Gibson or something.
The Trojan war did happen, in some form. More than likely a bunch of barely civilized Dorian Greek pirates raiding the much more advanced Trojan civilization. The mosaic from Pompeii shows Bucephalus as being brown. Where as written accounts of the beast have him black with a white stripe on his nose. So who knows. Scourging could kill. But the lictors weren't supposed too. Beat him half to death with bone/metal tipped whips, then nail him to a cross, then break legs. Cruxifition.
Damn girl, sounds to me like your the one with your panties in a bunch. Its a funny little list that I found (no I'm not the author which you apparently think) nothing more. No need to get all preachy about subject...over-reaction FTL seriously. I think historical films tend to fill forgotten ideas about historical events whether accurate or not. Has a historian, I'm shocked by the amount of people that reference/confuse movie with what actually happened. A little rude aren't we? In all due respect, it doesn't matter where or not you nor I give a toss, but the fact remains that there was a huge controversy in the Persians' portrayal in what to most is a historical film. Hence, its inclusion in the list. Was their presentation meant to be exaggerated? Yes, but a large population who frankly aren't gonna research either the film or the historical events they might take it for truth. While I wish that people would've latched on to the film being a graphic novel rather than historical, the simple truth is that for most the historical setting overrides the artistic endeavor.
Yeah, I probably did over-react at the list , I missed the top part of your list (the INTRO amd the link, as it were). Good to know your not author, though...
I actually own most of those films, and their inaccuracy doesn't bother me in the least. I study history for a living, and believe that most of those films would be incredibility boring if historically accurate.
