Are Movies Re-Writing History?
Inaccuracy in history-oriented films are the bane of my existence for two reasons: 1) the audience takes what it sees on the silver screen as gospel; 2) in writing my historical novels, I am fanatical about being accurate as I feel I have a duty to the reader.
Apparently, movie directors and screenwriters do not feel such compunction. The first time I was aware of these historical re-writes was when I saw “Ben Hur” (1959, William Wyler). Sheikh Ilderim the Arab makes the observation to Judah Ben Hur the Jew that, while he understands worshipping one God, he thinks it frivolous to have only one wife.
At the time of Christ, Islam did not yet exist. The inhabitants of the Arabian peninsula, where Islam would eventually be born, were polytheists and moon goddess worshippers who did not yet practice polygamy. But it suited director Wyler to reflect the current times in his movie – the Arab-Israeli conflict was making big news – no matter how far-fetched and inaccurate.
Since then, I have seen many history-oriented movies filled with factual errors, anachronisms, and alteration of events to suit storylines. In “Titanic” (1997, James Cameron) First Officer Murdoch, a real person, was depicted as committing suicide. In reality, he went down with the ship. Another example is “Gladiator” (2000, Ridley Scott) which has Emperor Commodus dying heroically in the arena, instead of being strangled ignominiously in the bathtub, as really happened.
Such license makes fiction of history. In my books I embrace history within fiction.
Re: Are Movies Re-Writing History?
I loved this blog entry for you're asking an interesting question. Avtually I think answer can only be yes, movies ARE re-writing history and so do books, no matter if they are fiction or non-fiction. It is simply not possible to tell about any event (may it be in written, spoken, "picturesque" form) in history without re-telling/re-writing it - just because we're human and can't grasp the whole of an event, plus we tend to forget, not-know, "decorate" when we (re-)tell.
I understand what's bothering you is that some authors/directors don't seem to care about given facts (e. g. like you said the non-existance of Islam in Ben-Hur-times) and sell "lies" to their audience that they take for facts without thinking. To me the problem here is not really the author or director - unless s/he's as ignorant as not to be well-inoformed about the time s/he's trying to re-create and by that fooling the audience with his own ignorance and stupidity. An author/director who is well aware that s/he is using "lies" to point out some issue or bringing up a fact of the time the book/movie is coming into existance is ok by me for s/he challenges the audience. S/he would do it by purpose but without treating the audience like idiots - except if used as propaganda or justification of war or so. My problem is more with the laziness of the recipient. Of course you cannot know about everything and sense all the "mistakes dressed up as facts", but oftentimes nowadays recipients are just too lazy to check back on certain information given in films they watch or books they read and therefore don't realise that basically someone has played a trick on them. They just accept it as A truth. Well, novels and movies are about illusion...so I am ok with readers/viewers drowning in a fake world, I must say, as long as they don't take it as THE truth. There should ALWAYS be some awareness of the fact you're reading a novel or watching a movie which can be far from reality. But then, define reality ... ok, I'll stop now.