-
Gangs of New York
All historical movies take a bit of poetic licence with their subjects. However, this is hardly needed as the truth is most times stranger than fiction. This is also true of the movie Gangs of New York. Set in Five Points around the time of the New York City Draft riots in 1863, it is the story of rival gangs as well as a blood feud between Amsterdam Vallon, played by Leonardo di Caprio, and Bill “the Butcher” Cutter, played by an amazing Daniel Day Lewis. Their struggle plays out against the backdrop of extreme poverty, squalor and violence of the Five Points neighborhood and the volatility of the Civil…
-
U-571
U-571 was an exciting thriller made in 2000 about how an the crew of an American submarine attempting to steal an enigma machine from a German U-Boat. Enigma machines were used by the Germans in World War II to create a very difficult code to send their messages. It was based on the work of Polish mathematicians in 1932. The code was nearly unbreakable for the first part of the war. In the movie, U-571 is disabled from a destroyer attack and our heroes are dispatched to pretend to be the German rescue sub to pick up the remainder of the crew. Their mission is to capture or kill the…
-
HISTORICAL INACCURACIES IN 300
Entertainment and history often cross because most of the time life is much more interesting and stranger than fiction. However, entertainment often takes liberties with the real story to dress it up or make it more “sexy”. That’s fine, since most of us know that a fictional movie is not a documentary. In the movie 300 we are discussing today, the creator Frank Miller was up front about it. He said, “The inaccuracies, almost all of them, are intentional.” and in the same interview, “I was looking for more an evocation than a history lesson. The best result I can hope for is that if the movie excites someone, they’ll…
-
Historical Inaccuracies in Gladiator
I can understand why creative license is taken in film and television. We just do not know every tiny detail that happened throughout history. Sometimes creative license is taken to condense the events to fit into the relatively short time frame of movies and television. However, sometimes there seems to be no rhyme or reason as to why major changes were made. Things have been unchanged needlessly and the real story is not given its due. Gladiator was a box office hit with all-star cast as well as being loaded with fighting, action and blood galore; a mixture for pure success. But what happens when that particularly popular movie tells…
-
Historical inaccuracies in Reign
Reign has been a popular show on the CW for three years now but what has audiences so captivated? There is a list of inaccuracies starting from the pilot episode and continue in every episode thereafter. I will assume then that the audiences watching the show are unfamiliar with Mary Stuart specifically or history in general (or it is a guilty pleasure).With so many inaccuracies, I am hard-pressed to choose only one or two, but I will choose the ones I feel irk me the most. Then, my [...]
