When films and books take artisitc liberty with History

[Kingu Kurimuzon]

I just watched Hidden Figures. I wasn't super familiar with these women, although I was aware there were women computers in the early days of NASA (as most human computers were female in those days). Overall I found it to be entertaining and it seemed like a good companion piece to films like The Right Stuff.

However, after doing some more research I was a little disappointed to find the film had taken some artistic liberties with historical events. This is pretty common in historical dramas, often understandably, as it can be difficult to create a compelling narrative with the actual sequence of events, or in some cases we simply don't have the most accurate account of events, so we have to fill in the blanks--a good example of the latter would be in The Perfect Storm, since no one would've been there when the boat capsized. In the film the fishermen are portrayed as having a few seconds of dignity before their demise. Of course in reality, it was probably pitch black with freezing water in those final moments, and there would have been a lot of screaming, pain and fear in those final moments, but then that doesn't really make for a very "Hollywood" ending.

I'll post some more examples of historical inaccuracies as I think of them. Feel free to share your own, and links to videos are welcome.

 

[Population: 1]

The show Turn is about a cabbage farmer turned colonial spy during the American Revolutionary War. It’s taken quite a bit of liberties (ugh unintended pun) with actual history but I think if you go into the series knowing that it is decent drama and it may prompt people to read actual accounts of the historical setting. I was recently reading about the real life Robert Rogers whose portrayed in the series as a sociopathic masochist, which makes for a fun character but isn’t a realistic profile of him. Still the show has been fairly entertaining and I think that’s it’s ultimate goal. If it generates interest in the real thing why not?

Overall if I know things have been changed in a historical account for a bit of drama I’ll read up on or watch documentaries about the event to get real perspective.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

You mean Abraham Lincoln:Vampire Hunter isn't an accurate retelling of historical events? I think it's funny that both North and South deny the real reason for the civil war: vampires.