and they were called called
1) Lessons from Reel Life: Movies, Meaning and Myth-Making by Michael Frost and Robert Banks
2) Flicks: Studying Film as a Text by Dinah Partridge and Peter Hughes
3) An Introduction to Film Studies: Second Edition (edited by Jill Neimes)
...I wanted to cry after reading the chapters relevant to my new question. Why? Because these books are my holy grail.
Heres some stuff I wrote down today after sifting through these books :
Should movies be considered valid historical sources?
Perspective
- Film is entertainment so it doesn’t matter if its right or wrong
- Film can have grains of truth but is mostly wrong
- Films can be quite accurate with a few mistakes.
- Films aren’t records of history- they’re just based on history
Distortion of events
- Cinematic techniques and creative licence
- Accidental distortion- the watch incident in ben hurr durr a derp derpity derp.
- The confusion of eras
- Applying modern standards upon the past
- Director, actor and audience reception of the actual event.
- Historical fictions → Stories based in the past that never happened.
Motivation behind movies
- Money
- Fame
- Awards / acclamation
- Entertainment
- To tell a story???
-
Accuracy/ Inaccuracy
- Does it matter? (discuss if it matters within history anyway- post modern support, YEAH !)
- Films are designed primarily to be entertaining, so should this detract from inaccuracy?
- The idea of history as a story is raised once more as films closely relate to history’s written by Thucydides and Taticus
- The idea that history within films may not be 100 % factual, but they can capture the spirit of the time and moment.
- “Don’t let the truth get in the way of a true story”
- Address the idea that film isn’t mean to be factual and it doesn’t claim to be factual.
→ historical fiction?
- There is so such thing as bare facts in history anyway- historians pick and choose and so do films.
List of films to use as examples
• Ben Hur
• 300
• Gladiator
• Frost v Nixon
• Robin Hood
• Saving Private Ryan
• Black Hawk Down (?)
• Coco (the history of Coco Chanel)
• That Johnny Depp movie about John Dillinger
• Sophie’s choice (Almost like an annalist view of history)
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Wow that is awesome wat your doing....i love how ur project has developed into this lol. Umm it would b easier to comment on how these movies wrap the actual historical event for entertainment..that isnt a bad topic to work with at all. Just one question, where does this fit in the project listings? History in the media?? and something else or just that??
ReplyDeleteHistory in the media and the use and misuse of history.
ReplyDeleteThat's awesome progress Alex!!! I like all of your qs and movie choices-you'll have fun analysing them!
ReplyDeleteEncouraging Alex - but i still think, despite all the possibilities, that the depth will come from a deeeeeeeeeeep discussion of just one or two movies - or - radical thought - even one or two scenes...
ReplyDelete