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Hollywood's Political Revisionism
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- čas přidán 15. 03. 2021
- With the latest round of Oscar Nominations finally announced, I found myself with a thought that I couldn't shake free. Specifically revolving around the fact that the film with the most nominations was Mank.
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I have always said if The Greatest Showman was entirely and fully fictional and they didn't use the name PT Barnum it would be an amazing film. I love the music and the visuals but the historical inaccuracy makes it difficult to watch. If they had created basically the same movie but just with a fictional ringmaster instead of Barnum it would be a thousand times better.
I'm basically of the same opinion. I wish they'd gone with an original character clearly inspired by Barnum, which would require no real changes to the film and would remove the icky historical issue.
When I first saw the movie, I didn’t even know who Barnum was, I thought it was an original movie inspired by real events.
Honestly, I have no idea why they would use PT Barnum. For me, as someone who know very little about PT Barnum, just a quick browse through the Wikipedia. I felt off putting seeing Hugh Jackman talked up PT Barnum as inspirational figure in interviews and press for this movie.
I have seen in depth analysis of this movie that pointed out how inconsequential the minorities and show characters were. That it looks inspirational but they were still the backdrop and barely had any lines.
I completely agree. It makes the movie problematic when it’s filled with such amazing music and talent. Take Barnum out and the film is elevated so much.
I think there's more issues than just the historical inaccuracy; it pretends to be about diversity and inclusion, but it's still a story about a basic white guy, everyone else is there to serve his story. The music slaps and the choreo is great, there could have been greatness there, but the "freak" characters needed more agency in the story, not just in song.
Imagine they did the "Iron Lady" but it was historically accurate, ending with "Ding dong the witch is dead" or "Honk if Thatcher is dead".
Ah, I remember going out to protest, and topping it all off with a pint of Thatcher's (when I didn't normally go for cider, even back when I did drink). I think the bartender got my meaning. People died of poverty because the government wanted a thinly-veiled party political advertisement of a national ceremony about someone more than half the population were still furious with (and fucking rightly so), that as far as I remember her family didn't even ask for. She could've just had a normal private funeral like anyone else. It was absolutely disgusting from multiple angles.
The sheer awkwardness of those hapless radio DJs feeling obliged to play a portion of the song, it wasn't fair on them really but goodness me was it ever a necessary demonstration of the national will. Well done everyone who got that done (I never even heard of it until it'd already happened, else I'd've purchased a copy myself).
Or descending into hell, reunited with her beloved General Pinochet like the end of Titanic
I don’t think it’s just America. Over here in Britain, we also have a tendency to idolise people who did terrible things. Winston Churchill could be a bad person at times, but would a film like Darkest Hour take that into account? He beat the Nazis, ignore the bad stuff he did.
Given the specific point the film is about it does make sense that it only sticks to that. You are right in that they'd never make a movie about the points in which Churchill did the bad stuff.
Churchill is a good example, because alot of things she mentioned applied to portrayals and opinions of Churchill, alot of stuff critical of Churchill tends to minimize his role in beating the Nazis, and media that idolized Churchill never mentions Bengal. The tendency to pretend that author's work doesn't have value if they turn out to have messed up believes or actions and revisionist approach of omitting terrible things historical figures did plagues any discourse about Churchill.
Honestly, the most painful reality to confront about Churchill and those like him might be that, in some respect, they were part of a social and political climate which helped foster the rise of fascism.
Fascism is an ideology of extreme violence and extreme nationalism , and yet, it did not develop in a vacuum. It developed in 20th-century Europe. It developed in a time where imperialism and colonialism were rampant. And where colonial European nations used ideologies of racial and cultural superiority as a means to justify their violent subjugation of non-European regions and their inhabitants. Sure, the British, the French, and other colonial states did not practise mass genocide upon their colonial subjects in the way that Nazi Germany eventually would, but inflicting violence and mass death upon colonised peoples was integral to the colonial experience. Britain could never have held control over India without the implicit threat of military force to restrain potential rebellion. In this regard, the violence employed during and after the Sepoy Mutiny in the 1850's can be understood as not merely exceptional, but simply standard practise.
Even the Amritsar Massacre, which stands out as an unusually violent incident in British military history, was inspired by the attitudes of acceptable violence towards peoples who were deemed to be inferior. Reginald Dyer, who intentionally ordered his troops to shoot unarmed civilians and fire into the thickest part of the crowd to inflict maximum loss of life and injury, was a monster. But he was a monster created by the society and system which he was a part of.
Knowing that post-WWI Europe was a world of such extreme violence, where attitudes of racial superiority were prevalent, and the conquest of whole peoples could be justified on the basis of national glory, it is not so surprising that an ideology such as fascism came into being.
Fascism was simply the logical extreme of that which came before it.
Bengal cough cough, i mean it was even so bad is subordiate oficer went against his back because he was so inhumane, and they were pretty not great ethical there.
@@HellqueenRoz Pretty much agree with some caveats. Although I wouldn't say, "Fascism was simply the logical extreme of that which came before it.". Everything about the colonial period was extreme, the only way Fascism differed is that it applied the techniques of extreme state terror that existed under Empire, in Asia, Africa and South America to European peoples. If one reads Mike Davis', Victorian Holocaust", for instance, it's pretty clear that through economic violence, the forcing of a market based system on the non monetized agricultural system of India, along with a concomitant ideology of Malthusianism and disdain for the destitute, the British Empire was responsible for the deaths of a good feal more people than the Nazis and for a longer period of time. I write this not as a defence of Fascism, but instead a recognition, that while the mechanised death adminstered by fascism was more deliberate, the economic methods favoured by the colonial empires were every bit as deadly if not more so. In fact, upon realising that their methods of economic and political administration bought about mass death and immiseration, hitherto unimagined in many regions, the colonial powers did not stop these methods of exploitation, they instead doubled down by further developing the ideologies of racism and cultural superiority reffered to in your comment, as justifiying reasons for this mass death. It is no accident that Hitler was a great admirer of the British Empire, and the Confederacy and sought to establish a similar dominion of racial heirarchy in Eastern Europe and Russia, with Slavs and other ethnicities of that region as the helots or enslaved peoples.
It’s much easier to rewrite history than to upset the established order
Viva la revelation?
True, sadly.
"The Iron Lady" had a lot of White Feminism/Girlboss vibes...well, she was the first Spice Girl, according to Geri Halliwell/Ginger Spice. Well, to quote Flavia Dzodan: "My feminism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit!"
“Do you think she effectively utilized girl power by funneling money into illegal paramilitary death camps in Northern Ireland?”
Ha, how embarrassing that you made a Mel Brooks flub. I would be embarrassed and never show my face ever again if I ever did such a thing on, say, a podcast of some kind
thanks for directing me to this channel!
The Patriot example is the equivalent of making an HP Lovecraft biopic but we just ignore his racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, Xenophobia etc.
Time to make a movie about H.P. Lovecraft and pretend he didn't have a cat.
The Patriot (& a chunk of Gibson output) is much more unforgivable than Lovecraft. The drivel Gibson spat out was generated almost 80 years after Lovecraft. We *can* condemn Lovecraft; *and in this age we should* . But there *is* an argument that Lovecraft was less extreme *given his time* than Gibson.
@@audleyshaypurdyce I would actually tend to argue that Lovecraft's bigotry was actually extreme even in the context of his time. Sure, Lovecraft wasn't a *violent* racist like the KKK but he wrote a story in which the protagonist committed suicide because of finding out he had African ancestry. So Lovecraft definitely drank pretty deeply from that well.
It probably played into his psychology to a considerable degree: Lovecraft was an extremely disturbed person who was intensely fearful of nearly anyone and everything which was even slightly outside of his experience and upbringing as a conservative white man in early 20th-century New England.
Lovecraft was sincerely and deeply afraid of the unknown, which to him did include people of other races and ethnicities. Lovecraft's attitudes were a product of their time, but that didn't mean he wasn't a particularly outspoken proponent of said views.
@@legoworld246 I am ok with a running joke his cat never named or made references to imagine what his cat would be named. Thats fine, but is everything-phobia and bigotry , if you could make in understandable with showing his family background, never. It could empathice his bigotry as damaging factor, and how he became less homophobic, and aware.
That would genuine be fascinating as adressing all that ultimately as bad and learned. How you have this antihero harmed a lot negatively mentally by his learned bigotry, and the horror of that. Should he accepted in his rassism and co, no but how it was extreme even thn nd how it screwed him up and how its from trauma, probably, and a toxic household, would make an interesting if hard to pull of portrayal. Just dont excuse his rassism, show it as a thing bad for him too.
Wait, but wasn’t his wife Jewish? And didn't he meet with gay fans? And wasn’t he sympathetic towards people trying to adapt western culture?
As for the racism and Xenophobia, yeah I get your point.
I grew up with Thatcher in power; she is a lot of the reason British politics (and particularly the Conservative party) is in the state it's in today. She laid the foundations for the Monument to Capitalism that's been built over the years since then - sure, she did a few things that were good, but the bad things she did were catastrophic, and we're still feeling the fallout from them even today. Middle-class Londoners and Little Englanders loved her, because she catered to them and their quality of life (which was already pretty good,) but for everywhere north, south and west of the Home Counties, the mining communities, trade unions and the manufacturing industries, she CRUSHED the life out of them. When her own party 'turned on her' and booted her out of her PM job, very few of the British population were in any way sorry to see her go, and when she died the Wizard of Oz song 'Ding Dong The Witch is Dead' actually *re-entered the UK singles charts* in her 'honour.' They could have put all of that into the movie and it would still have been a riveting character study of a driven and single-minded woman. For the majority of people who grew up under her rule (and it WAS a rule,) she may have had her moments of heroism - but she was in no way the People's Hero.
Someone mentions the Patriot:
Every British person: I feel a great disturbance in the force
I had so many problems with that movie and all my friends were like 'Its just a movie'. The problem was I have a History Degree and almost every scene in the movie had something that triggered me.
@@callisto8413 Having a basic understanding of American history is enough to bother you if you see that movie.
To quote Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter: "History prefers legends to men. It prefers nobility to brutality, soaring speeches to quiet deeds. History remembers the battle, but forgets the blood. However history remembers me before I was a president, it shall only remember a fraction of the truth For whatever else I am - a husband, a lawyer, a president - I shall always think of myself first and foremost as a hunter."
@@fruitygarlic3601 If you like the film you may like the book by Seth Grahame-Smith. But I choice those words because its true we
The Iron Lady film definitely didn't show Thatchers big political issues. Though she was played well casting wise.
There's a reason she was called 'Maggie Thatcher the milk snatcher' (at least I've heard it a fair amount in my life )and the hate people had against her. They sang 'ding dong the witch is dead' for a reason when she died. She was incredibly disliked by lots of people for the time and even now by the people who lost so much because of her.
Absolutely nobody called her Maggie Thatcher the Milk snatcher, it was a political slogan that appeared for a few weeks and then got forgotten, there were far more popular insulting names for her. That was nothing to do with her anyway, she was just the minion ordered to implement the policy after the budget was cut by more senior people.
Let me give you a little history. Imagine a school built in the 60s when everyone wanted massive glass panels to let the light in which basically means everything inside the room gets cooked if there's even the slightest amount of sunlight. Now add wall radiators because that was 60s technology.
Milk gets delivered in glass bottles in the 6 or 7 am delivery and left outside where the birds start pecking their way through the tinfoil caps.
Then its gets brought into the classroom by the teacher for the start of class and stored beside the radiator because that's where the clear space is.
There are no fridges, they don't get cheap enough fo another decade or so yet again the milk is getting cooked.
Midday is when the kids get their milk issued. Depending on preference of the teacher alphabetically, girls first or table by table so if your up first you get to pick the ones that haven't been bird pecked or otherwise mauled. Depending on the season it is either still an ice block or in summer its a fetid yoghurt of fermented so there's a nice yellow green layer at the top.
And guess what, drinking this stuff is compulsory, its for your own good. You will be supervised until its all gone. Throwing up is not allowed!
Those of us who were around at the time remember the cancellation of school milk as a relief not a problem.
Well okay some of us ended up with a taste for live yoghurt and cream cheese but milk isn't supposed to come that way!
@@voiceofraisin3778 perhaps it's just a term only used by people near my family group because I've heard if may times growing up whenever anyone discussed her.
@@Lil-Dragon Still used round my neck of the woods by people too young to remember her time in office. The strength of feeling about her will be passed down for years.
There was an entire movement made to make ‘Ding dong, the Witch is dead’ #1 the Week she died, and that was planned out for like six years.
I lost it at photoshopping Mel Brooks' face onto pictures of Mell Gibson 🤣🤣🤣
Whenever we say 'we need to address the elephant in the room', I feel like we're talking about Mel Gibson.
@@christineherrmann205 Facts.
That's the funniest and most self-aware incident of a youtuber effing up and then doubling down I have ever seen or will ever see...
"Who would take it as straight history when they burst into song"
Hamilton
That's it
Its an amazing musical but damn the historical revisionism
Yes, and I would like to build on that. What complicates Hamilton and The Greatest Showman is that they also focus on somewhat lesser-known historical figures.* For many people, the musicals are the first time they learned about the lives of these figures. This forces the audience to take The Greatest Showman and Hamilton as straight history.
*While P. T. Barnum and Alexander Hamilton are far from completely obscure, there is little about them in the public conscience other than Alexander Hamilton being on the $10 bill and the Barnum & Bailey Circus.
As always, nuance exists. It is possible to see and engage with beauty and ugliness at the same time. Our society needs to learn to live with cognitive dissonance.
If “woke” is calling out the wrongful words and actions of people (and existing power structures in general) then papering over a historical figure’s flaws is the very opposite of that...? 🤔
(I say this, knowing the term has been mangled beyond recognition like so many other things)
Seems to me that 'woke' is usually the generic insult applied to opinions rather than insights. These days, opinions are what universally pass for thinking.
But, when this presenter is at their best (like today), the analysis is awesome.
@@audleyshaypurdyce I think it’s just a way to avoid providing your evidence or do any kind of critical thinking. ‘I don’t need to think because my enemies are “woke”, I win!’
@@liittlemiissd well, “Woke” tends to be a term dubbed by idiots onto their enemies because they can’t support their argument
@@liittlemiissd this is ironic, right? when the real thing is as laughable as any parody, it gets hard to tell which is which.
About The Patriot, I believe the historical figure who provided a lot of the basis for the character was Francis “Swamp Fox” Marion who (you’re absolutely right) owned slaves and was kind of an all around terrible and terribly racist person even by the standards of the time.
(Revolutionary War nerd here) Basically, Benjamin Martin was inspired by not only Francis Marion but Thomas "The Carolina Gamecock" Sumner and Andrew Pickens as well. Marion was certainly the biggest bastard of the bunch (his war crimes probably would have drawn ire even at the time if they weren't predominantly aimed at freed slaves and native tribes) but all three men were guerilla leaders and were just as committed to terrorizing Tory (and allied native) populations as harassing the British army.
There's also a hefty dose of Daniel Morgan who is honestly, much cooler (raised and trained his own rifle company that was instrumental at Saratoga; a hard working, frequently wounded officer repeatedly passed for promotion in favor of political appointees; he was the one that won Cowpens by using Tarleton's disdain for militia.) He also owned slaves and, in fact, used Hessian prisoners of war to build his house after the war, but while his use of snipers was seen as dishonorable in his own time, by modern standards, his wartime behavior was basically civil. I know using him as a direct model would have lost that "bad things aren't bad if you do them to bad people while defending your home" theme, but he's still an interesting figure I wish more people knew about.
In all honesty, the Patriot is one of my problematic faves--it's genuinely a well made movie which knows how to play its action and emotional beats, despite its inaccuracies and polarized depiction of the partisan fighters in Carolina. The real Tarleton was no saint (he politically supported the slave trade in England), but not the unmitigated villain the movie needed Tavington to be. (For that matter, Cornwallis was not an effete snob and wrote letters about how he preferred the professionalism of the Hessian mercenary officers to the decadence of Clinton and his ilk.)
I kind of want to see a Mel Brooks version of "The Patriot" now ;-)
Oh, I need this parody
A lot of these movies would have their external problems solved by inventing their own characters rather than using the names of pre-existing people. (Assuming the movie in itself isn't a bad movie)
True but known names sell and at the end of the day, that's what it comes down to for the studios.
You mean like how Chernobyl turned Legasov's team of scientists into one person who didn't exist?
This is one of the reasons I stay away from historical dramas and most documentaries. The real danger is that people will just take what they see in a historical drama and take it as fact, and ignore the historical inaccuracies. To be honest, that’s my one problem with Hamilton. It takes Alexander Hamilton, a man who definitely had slaves, and made him look like an abolitionist, and even Thomas Jefferson’s slaves were brushed over. The distinction needs to be made in entertainment between what is fact, and what is dramatised; something that rarely actually happens.
So he's not black?
I get your point regarding historical dramas but why ignore docs? Don't belive they're fictionalized as well...? Unless your reasoning is that the narration can be one sided which I get
I agree with you on Hamilton, sort of? There's still research being done into whether Hamilton had slaves personally, but he definitely partook by managing the trade for his in-laws. I think something more staggering about the Hamilton play is the portrayal of Hamilton as pro-immigrant, as that seems to be the entire sentiment of the play. Hamilton was pretty anti-foreigner in real life.
@@eduardopantoja9115 Hamilton was white passing.
Yes to all of this (Also love your hair and makeup in this)
This may veer a little off topic, but as a german person, I'm always amazed by how revisionist american depictions of the World Wars are. Like, I'm not a big fan of superhero movies, so I haven't seen a lot of them, but I get the feeling it's perfectly acceptable to invent some kind of super secret weapon that the opposing side allegedly had and make that a major plot point in Hollywood. And that seems to me like an attempt to make people less uneasy about the morality of war. America already has a culture of worshipping military that feels extremely alien to me, and making the other side "a real threat" when a lot of military intervention is based on financial interests also feels like a fabrication of "good" motivation.
Another consideration is that a lot of people go off on films being "too political", so often filmmakers will have people tell them to play down or rewrite historically accurate moments that people would moan about "pushing an agenda". Sometimes justifiable if not relevant to the story they want to tell, but often simply spineless. Like a lot of the entertainment industry, really.
I slightly want to use deep fakes to put Mel brooks in the movie now. And make it a comedy.
Doctor Who has raised similar opinions: Day of The Doctor the Zygon version of Kate goes on about how UNIT took Captain Harkness Wristband thing after his many deaths to prevent some Americans having control of time travel and says "Well you've seen their movies". In Thin Ice Capaldi's Doctor says himself "History is a whitewash"
Yet the same show has the Doctor being buddies with Churchill, someone who did much worse things than Harriet Jones does in the episode he decides to destroy her career.
Don't get me wrong. I'm a fan of Who, but it absolutely has the same problem in its historical episodes.
What's especially dumb with the Mank example is that if they wanted to get into the politics of the day they could easily have focused on Wells' conflict with Hearst. But that wouldn't fit their fixation on Mankowicz....
OK, I really need to know what that green lipstick is, because holy crap, it's amazing.
Thank you for this discussion; very informative. I will say that this tendency to change history to suit various interests is far older than Hollywood; it's older than Shakespeare, but I'll pop in two examples of a Shakespearean variation of the tendency you bring up: MacBeth and Richard III, both of whose lives and characters are far more complex, human and colorful than what Shakespeare presented for us; the plays themselves are masterpieces, and I wouldn't ever wan to lose them; but they are also master classes in why theater should not be a substitute for history; at best, it should be a springboard for curious people to find out approximations to truth.
I couldn’t have even told you that MacBeth was a real guy, but the witches and ghosts definitely give it an air of obvious fiction.
To be fair, that was likely shakespeares intent to give some picture of history an interest in it.
Well, Shakespeare had the excuse that he could have literally lost his head over portaying an ancestor of the monarch in an unflattering light...
Ah 'The Patriot'... I would call it the most historically inaccurate film I'd ever seen, except I've also seen 'Braveheart' (Why does Mel Gibson hate history... and the English?)
Happy upcoming birthday!
I know your focus was on this movie, but on the subject of politically motivated revisionism the one that comes first to my mind is Helen Keller. Everyone knows the story of how she was taught to communicate. Far fewer people know anything whatsoever about what she actually had to say. And that's not by accident. She was a communist. She had a lot of great things to say. I strongly encourage people who did not know this to look into it! And check out the book "Lies My Teacher Told Me." It's really fascinating.
This is a really interesting topic. I've always felt odd about The Greatest Showman, and it's nice to hear your mentioning it as part of this.
'Acceptable villains of history' that is an excellent line. I definitely struggle with this in regards to things I love like Hamilton where we present Hamilton as much more for abolitionism instead of being for general manumissist and even that stance became unvocial in his later years and never seemed to speak out against his in laws owning slaves. But then you have characters in Jefferson where he is very charming and funny but is also against Hamilton and called out as a slave owner but the third cabinet battle is cut that directly addresses that the full government is complicit in the existence and continuation of slavery.
I have an easier time to see the complexities of historical figures, I just kinda assume they were messed up but in regards of living people, because of the juxtaposition of adding to their influence.
Usually it's said that Kane = WRH. Never figured out if that was Welles' idea or not.
I have seen these critiques being made about the Potter books since Rowling's fall from grace that make the claim of 'they weren't that good' but the criticisn, while not invalid, seems pretty reductive considering they are usually the kind of criticisms you could make about most authors, particularly off her generation.
I have no respect for fair weather fans. Even if the person is pure evil if the art they made is good its still good, the person is now a POS. Its kinda like the whole Jeffree Star blow up, people were falling all over themselves about his pallets and lipstick and then all that came out and instead of saying he's awful they start acting like his makeup is awful quality when its far superior to most in store makeup companies.
This reminds me of Hamilton and how it rewrites the Founding Fathers and other people as POC, and seemingly avoids talking about slavery and racism surrounding those people. Also, the Netflix miniseries Hollywood practically creates a whole fantasy land where institutionalized racism and homophobia is just a few people with bad viewpoints/opinions, but it completely disregards how the environment at the time was completely different, and I just could not suspend my disbelief at that, because that’s not how it would’ve gone down; especially in the late 40’s! And then there’s Dumbo (2019) which portrays an interracial marriage during a time when that was illegal! (I think even Murder on the Orient Express 2017 also does something similar). Let’s not forget that there’s a miniseries in the works based on Catherine of Aragon that reimagines her as a Black woman, which makes no sense and it’s becoming infuriating that filmmakers/studios are literally ignoring actual POC historical figures just to rewrite White ones for god knows why! 😤
Now I want a Mel Brooks version of the Patriot. Make it happen, Hollywood!
I suspect one reason that biopic protagonists have their flaws smoothed out more than fictional ones is that the filmmakers need to get it past the estate of whoever they're basing it on. That would also be why antagonists tend to be people who are either entirely fictional (an amalgamation of several people) or that already have a bad rep.
Gosh I love you for this Vera and I agree with you 100%! Critical thinking is so crucial. You know, there is a running gag in Europe that as soon as something happens in the world, there for sure will be a movie at one time how Americans rescued that situation with as much cliché as you can imagine.
I think that movie creators assume that the protagonist must be at least somewhat sympathetic in order for audiences to like the film. This would account for adjusting these characters politics to something more "acceptable". Also, they may be right-- I've seen many book reviews that disparage the book for having a vile protagonist even if it's not framed for the audience to approve. Maybe a lot of people simply assume that the protagonist is the good guy, or at least redeemable.
It's been a while since I saw the Iron Lady but it did seem to focus heavily on Thatcher's reaction to event that came her way, the kind of things most, regardless of political stance, would agree with.
Wish Mel Brooks was the mastermind behind The Patriot now. Thanks Nathaniel! hahaha
I tried to watch the Patriot once with my cousin. After the scene revealing that his workers were not slaves, I kind of lost all respect for the rest of the movie. I ended up going back home (which was next door). I still don't know how it ends.
I'm really interested by your summary at the end. You're absolutely right, that inability to accept criticism (especially equating "I say it did bad things" with "I say it's bad entirely and of no value") is a big American issue (and I expect it's around in other countries too). What absolutely boggles my mind is that so many of the people with this mindset are (at least culturally) Christian. Literally at the base of Christian theology is the understanding that everyone does bad things. Everyone, in fact, is bad. But literally everyone can and does also do good things, because humanity was originally made to be good and that part of us has not fully disappeared. That theological background should produce far more people who understand that humans are complicated, that no one is perfect and no one is irredeemable, than people who don't. But, apparently, it doesn't.
I'd been avoiding the Joss Weadon video because I have just recently started enjoying some of his works and didn't want to face the discomfort of facing that people are not always good but can still produce art that people enjoy. Looks like I'm heading there after this video. Also, you are beautiful and I'm very envious of your lipstick skills.
Youcan enoy the stuf he did, and there re other eople involved that had likely more influence than him, like angel, for most parts, isnt him. It should always be mentioned how abusive it was, and i think, agents of shield, too, and angel, i guarantee the stuff happening with cordy ill give you more reason to hate him. How petty he was. Te video is similar tha youshould at leat not excuse an mention ho abusive he is. If being involved in progressive works.
Personally he has an eye of talent that does make the stuf good, like his stuff,usually great, he is just good at silencing, well was. No shame liking hi work, if he is cancelled now..
You might like grimm too, its from the angel had writers and they have 2 pregnancies to not make the cordy stuff again.
5:29 - played by Bill Nye the Science Guy!!!
While this is a good take on political revisionism it reminds me of something I've heard repeatedly supposedly said by George Orwell; "Those who can control the past control the present, and those who can control the present control the future." Aside from the flub of calling Mel Gibson "Mel Brooks" it worked out well to see Brooks' face placed over Gibson's own.
Taking political revisionism into account the only films I can think of that did something similar are "Hidden Figures" and there was a MsMojo video that pointed out which aspects were fake; Langley had already desegregated the bathrooms by 1958, as an example. Similarly in "Imitation Game" some of the details about Turing's development and interactions with the Bletchley Park team was a lot more complicated but streamlined for the film
Cognitive dissonance is taboo and even shamed in our society, but oh how we need to address it and even treat it as a typical part of a 'hero's journey', rather than insist on 'pure' heroes and 'pure' villains.
It's important to acknowledge when people do terrible things, especially when said horrible things were such huge parts of who they were. In some cases, to do to otherwise is the same as pretending these things never happened.
And happy birthday!
The only complicated person as a "hero" in a biopic that I can think of is Schindler from Schindler's List. But that is a non-American character, which probably contributed to the flawed perspective of him. He was, as far as I remember, a character that was fascinating and yet I also disliked him. Granted I only watched that movie once, it is really good and also horrifically depressing.
You should review Lovecraft Country. I think that would be wonderful for you to see and how it is portrayed
They did that over on the "Breakroom of Geeks" channel!
Great video, and I just want to say that I absolutely am loving your makeup in this!
Your unscripted videos are great 👍
It sounds like the changes in Mank were there to make the "story" more interesting. They wanted a nice strong narrative and he is not exactly the most well known person so the writers fudged the facts. Those fact could have been further smudged by the drafting and finalizing phases.
As a Scotsman, that other Mel Gibson film "Braveheart" is a travesty of history. Not much is known about his story (see what I did there) but he definitely didn't father the next king of England. The battle of Sterling was completely different - it took place on a bridge. And he was a Prince, not a humble farmer. It's all wrong. But still an enjoyable film.
Just one thought: for people with living close relatives (Mank’s grandsons Josh and Ben Mankiewicz are still kicking at 65 and 53 respectively) it is very possible that the subject of the film told their relatives things about their motivations that never made it to the historical record but that made it to the film. An example of this that comes to mind is the Seuss estate’s claiming that Dr. Seuss was starting to have regrets about the racist portrayals of people in some of his books as one of the justification for why they were ending publication of 6 of the more problematic books. Maybe it’s true or maybe it is just something they said to put the author in a better light.
Could be an effect of the relentless drumming in of the "hero's story" formula. A formula that doesn't even question whether or not a tale has to be centered around a hero. It's a bloody weirdly specific role to apply to absolutely every goddamn possibility of making a film, book, show, whatever. But people adore their formulas, and audiences therefore get overexposed to those formulas and underexposed to anything else... and we expect a hero. I think it's more that than being less able to relate to any other type of character, or maybe we're relatively unable to relate because of that. The whole creativity formulization subindustry in general always rubbed me the wrong way and these sorts of gradual consequences could point to why.
I'd have paid to see Mel Gibson in that, and i don't even like him.
Historical revisionism drives me nuts.
I'm a little concerned about the Billy Holiday film, too.
You think well.
I enjoy this.
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I think that yes, in biopics, they often don't want to show the person as doing wrong in certain malicious ways and it sanitizes history in a more unconscious way.
I also think that it is, at least in a small part, a desire to not speak poorly of historical figures in hollywood who aren't already known bastards.
I think the phenomena is a bit larger than historical people. Generally speaking, there is an underline assumption that "entertainment" has to be "for relax" and "innocuous" (consequently, "apolitical"). Indeed, this is impossible, due to the nature of art and human cognition, but this will inevitably push entertainement away from certain topics.
Probably because the stress of... well, being alive bring today, any form of art is used as a relief, for escapism. Thinking about politics that are still relevant today prevent us in doing that.
And there are industries behind any media, industries that want to cash in and they know that the more "apolitical" the more "light hearted" you are, the larger the audience.
Uncofrtable ideas make us to think, force us to take a position, to do some introspection. Catharsis is one of the major point of art, but it's often edulcorated in entertainment. The character has some growth learning a lesson like "did you know you should not be a jerk?" and everything is fine.
One series I like is Ted-Ed's History vs. (Famous Name) they show the good and the bad about a person.
This is exactly the reason why I can't stand Victory of the Daleks. I get why they felt the need to gloss over all this atrocities, it is a kids show after all, but what's unforgivable is having the Doctor buddy up to him as if they never even happened in the first place.
I can't afford a birthday present but can I send you one of my hats?
1:50 Uhh, interesting glitch there.
Thank you for this video! Historical revisionism in movies (and fiction in general) is one of my pet hates. I find it at best irritating, but more often intentionally disingenuous, manipulative, deceitful and yes, even downright dangerous! While , for instance, "Inglorious Basterds" can be dismissed as a relatively harmless power/wishfulfillment fantasy, this is only because it never pretends to be anything else and the historical truth is so well-known that it's unlikely to be subsumed by Tarantino's tall tale. There's a German-produced mini series, I think the international title is "Generation War" (Uuuuurghh!) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_War that is an absolutely infuriating hatchet-job of historical revisionism, it makes me want to scream! Thankfully, media in the USA and Poland called out the fact-fudging and unfortunate implications, but it still pisses me off because it could have been soooo good, if only the creators had had the courage of facing a couple of very uncomfortable truths about that particular generation and Germany as a whole - seriously, fellow Germans, are we *still* doing this? Can we not get atonement and taking responsibilty right after all these years? Aaaargh! We have neo-fascists in parliament now, not least because of attitudes like this series, deliberately or not, perpetuates! This sort of dishonesty in media can really bend the arc of history in ways we really don't want it to...
My go-to is the same as it is for games: studios desperately want to whitewash any potential controversy and to do that they erase nuance enough so that even if there's a problem in the story, the bigger picture will still try to say "it's nobody's fault, really".
Like you said, if there's a historically accepted villain, then sure, _everything_ will be their fault, but if they have to dig any deeper than that we better prepare for some "both sides" bullshit coming our way.
You're videos are getting better and better thank you for all you do!
The problem with trying to tell the story of the creation of a masterpiece is that the audience is going to want to hear about some meaningful and personal motivation behind it. If the storyteller doesn't actually know what that is, or even if there is one, I could see why they'd feel the need to invent one. Historical accuracy in film is always constrained by trying to fit real life events into the confines of an entertaining story and trying to turn real life people into characters and I think most critics and audiences understand this.
whats funny is star trek ds9 brought this up as a issue in entertainment 25 years ago. sisko refuses to join the officers ina 60s style holo program cos its rewrites history
Super interesting. There's a reason the biopic is probably my least favorite movie genre and that isn't even really it, so you just added to the pile. I like your articulation of it. And yes, it's also a problem with historical films. I could watch any number of movies with dinosaurs sharing the screen, but never another Gone with the Wind with its egregious whitewashing of slavery. The Mel Brooks screencaps were hilarious!
I've learnt to accept biopics purely as works of fiction that are loosely based on a real story/person. I never take anything they claim to be historically accurate. They are purely there for entertainment value, which is why I suspect a lot of these changes happen - for the entertainment value. Or at least, what the studio considers entertainment. Other aspects like the politics will come into play of course, it's never just one thing, but ultimately it will come down to what they think will sell better and entertainment sells.
That isn't to justify the changes they make ( U-571) but I can't accept them as anything else but fiction anymore.
@@lwaves The more extreme stylistically the better for me. I like when the biopic reflects the work of the subject - you know like Kafka living inside one of his novels or something - then it's really about a transformation of the real person into a character. But so many "true stories" have trouble walking the tightrope between truth and satisfying entertainment, leaning too far to one side or the other.
But mostly, they give me the feeling that they're made for that part of the audience that dislikes fiction, the part that might read non-fiction but never fiction. They want to be informed, and generally have no patience for works of purer imagination (the more fantastical, the less liked). And this is where Nathaniel's point comes in. When this audience thinks it's receiving something akin to documentary but it's been mangled into a heroic shape, or whitewashed, or whatever the egregious change is, then that audience is betrayed (if it knows it) or misinformed (if it doesn't).
@@siskoid Yes, I completely agree and there is a definite problem where viewers take the work as factual information, rather than as entertainment. I'm obviously not one of them and it seems you aren't either but they are out there.
I do wonder if biopics should add a further bit of text at the start? They often say "Based on a true story" or whatever, so why not a "This should not be taken as historical fact" disclaimer. It would be a small step in the right direction but I can't see it happening. :-)
@@lwaves One of the recent tropes I further hate is when they show you the real people during the credits further cementing the film as "truth". But yeah, I don't take those films at face value, which is why I require them to be artistically interesting and not just this happened and this happened then this happened...
@@siskoid I liked it when they did it with Band Of Brothers, but that's because you saw them talking at the end of every episode without knowing who they were. That way you didn't know who lived or died. Since then, it's definitely been overplayed and misused to try and add legitimacy to a story.
Now I want to see a full Mel Brooks movie about the US Civil War.
I don't want to come off as insencere, I am bad at this online thing, but you're so preeeettyyy it's making my day a bit lighter!
Happy birthday to you fellow water sign!
Another point to be made: Oftentimes, historical figures bigotry is to be assumed and I don‘t mind not being reminded of it.
Of course it‘s different when it‘s relevant to the story or when a movie makes a political point that goes against the actual persons beliefs (greatest showman). The problematic parts of historic figures also absolutely needs to be addressed in some way. But, like, I already know every important person ever was a raging sexist, and sometimes I just want to watch a movie without thinking about how much that person would have hated me.
As someone who hated Trump, I’m sure they could make a Trump biopic and make him seem more likable then he actually was in real life, like they could just NOT show him talking about Mexicans and Muslims nor mention his actual political views or policies at all and frame it like his campaign more about the economy even though it was really more about illegal immigration. They could frame him as a sympathetic outsider or a brilliant (but still bumbling) anti-hero with an edgy and “ironic” sense of humor and they could end the film with his inauguration with Trump making an inspirational speech and then he jumps in the air with triumphant music playing, implying that he somehow really did stumble America into greatness and united the country (even though what I experienced would say otherwise).
Imagine a parody where someone makes a story of the events regarding quanon XD Itcould be incredible , an its powerful becaus eits vague, show it with a parody and, who can defend it. ome sicko aside
This is why I hate stan culture so much. This... celebrity worship and refusing to acknowledge anything bad your idol does. It's damaging, both to the idol because they never see a reason to change, and to the fans because of their extremely unreasonable expectations and blind ignorance when they do actually screw up.
Ok I’m sorry this has nothing to do with the video but I just discovered your channel a few days ago but I just have to say I love the makeup and your entire vibe is mwah *chefs kiss* that’s all byeeeee
I still refuse to watch Pocahontas because of the romantic rewrite of the story. Her history when you look at it is tragic, and it was all glossed over.
I was 16/17 when it came out and it was the first movie where the revision of history was obvious to me and I was unhappy with the thought that they were glossing over the terrible parts for the sake of a children's movie, without considering whether those children would later go looking for the truth.
Absolutely! A historically acurate bio-pic of Pocahontas would be a horror film...
Happy birthday!
It... sucks that we can't discuss a nuanced topic while acknowledging that nuance, like adults should be expected to.
I think it is true with all biographical work and history in general. Like what and how it get told are ultimately depends on who told it. Especially with Biopics where they cannot include everything and ended up cherry pick only the part they want.
Everyone is morally grey and I feel film should reflect that if they are biopics.
Its why I don't have any intention in watching a movie about Churchill, because I live in the UK where for a lot of people, saying anything bad about him is up there with blasphemy.
I 100%agree that we need to acknowledge both the good and bad of people that we admire. At the end of the day, they are still people and people are flawed, some more deeply than others
Very informative video, I was wondering if you have seen the film RKO 281. It focuses more on the actual making of Citizen Kane and Mankiewicz only has a scuffle with Orson Welles over writing credit that gets resolved in a later scene. I feel that film is less manipulative when comes to how the film was written. It shows it was an actual collaboration between Welles and Mankiewicz as they have a scene with them together with a typewriter bouncing ideas off each other. The only fiction I recall is any scene with William Randolph Hearst and Welles, though one last scene with them is debatable if it was a moment of fiction. I say check it out as an alternative to Mank which I was never keen on the premise of that film. Especially since we have this film (RKO) and The Battle for Citizen Kane documentary.
I mean, Mank was good and fun...however, I felt the same.
Also, just the first 10 seconds of this video got me subbed.
Also, also, @JessieGender sent me here.
it's a wonder people ever accepted color instead of black and white from movies or tv's
You're thinking of "Patriotballs." Common mistake.
Just a few things:
Yes, the Academy enjoyed Mank but not as much as you might think. It's a technical masterpiece and has been recognised as such, but its a bit of a narrative mess and missed out on a critical original screenplay nomination. As I'm sure you're aware, David Fincher didn't write Mank, his father Jack Fincher did who is now passed so we'll never know for certain why Jack made those historical changes. Regardless, the temptation to posthumously nominate the screenwriter of the most nominated film of the year which happens to be a film ABOUT screenwriting shows a clear lack of support from within the Academy.
As for your main point about revisionism, I don't think Mank is so bad because he still comes across as an incredibly flawed and (depending on your mileage) quite dislikeable. The Iron Lady is a great example of an incredibly divisive figure who is either loved or hated here in the UK and the film portrays her nearly always as positively as possible which is a real shame. Gandhi, Darkest Hour, John Adams, and practically any film about world leaders are guilty of this.
Also, I'd be happy to explain why Delroy Lindo was egregiously snubbed at the Oscars if you wanted. The reasons aren't great but it may help understand it's more Netflix's fault than the Academy!
Good and bad are not mutually exclusive. That's just how things work. That's the basis for well-written characters in any media and simply how people function. Historical figures are interesting because of what they did despite the norms of the time. Art figures making new art styles that are very different from the typical style of when they lived is what makes them remembered. Science figures coming up with such ideas that are so radical for the time that they get excommunicated from the church. Actors and actresses standing out from what other actors and actresses of the time. But there's a difference between making someone interesting and just lying about what they did or did not do. Making someone in a historical setting have modern standards honestly takes me out of it because nobody would be that forward thinking back then. With more story-creation-based arguments, you don't even have to make the protagonist a good guy. There do exist villain protagonists. Making someone wholly good or bad doesn't inherently make them interesting as characters, regardless of fiction or nonfiction.
I might be losing track of what my point is as I type this...
Yes! AWESOME idea. "Rowling! the musical" should totally be a thing while she's still alive. Make it oversell the washing of her controversy worse than Micheals vs Hogan. "I'm just JK" could be her cute catchphrase. Her real-life annoyance would be pure delight.
This is a cursed idea burn it with fire
@@kat8559 I agree
I've been saying that the Harry Potter books aren't very good for a couple years before J.K. Rowling came out publicly in support of trans-phobes. Her books have serious issues with race, and fat-phobia. Evil people wearing turbans, Troll bankers, and a subservient race of elves who choose to be slaves, just to name a few. I LOVED Harry Potter as a kid, and admired J.K's world building above all, but now that i'm older i can see some extremely large cracks in the foundation. I also find it hypocritical that J.K. Rowling constantly makes fun of big people in her books in their description and turns them into villains , but has just about as manny "magical" sweets in her books and as products as Willy Wonka. And how Magical creatures are super special but they eat meat at Hogwarts every day, even though Magical people aren't any better than non-magical people. =/
The first Potter book was spectacular... possibly the same level as some of Roald Dahl's stuff (not all of it)
The second was really good.
And if there's any difficulty in following the trajectory, I'll happily spell it out...
Irish stereotypes.
13:50 The Patriot would be better with Mel Brooks.
I heard we were lighting systems on fire, and I'm all for it!
Mank seriously felt like Hollywood j*cking itself off.
Promising Young Woman is fantastic. Groundbreaking. Thought provoking. I can’t even begin.
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom was phenomenal. Chadwick just transcendental. Viola was amazing, but they should have pitched her as a supporting actress, as her screen time is quite limited.
The Oscars in a nutshell
Your lipstick is so cool!!!!
I still want a movie called "Bridge" and its about George C. Parker who invented the saying "I have a Bridge to sell ya." True fact he only got busted after selling other parts of NYC to people.
As for me, I don't really care how accurate things are that are movies. If schools did a better job teaching kids history they wouldn't need things to be such. I mean if you watch Mr. Peabody and Sherman Marie Antoinette says the infamous "Let them eat cake." But I'm not gonna tale history from a movie. Documentaries are where I get history, movies are entertainment. Also I'm not bugged by the greatest Showman in the same way I'm not upset with Anastasia making Rasputin the villian and all other things. Idk I wish audiences did more research instead of relying on movies to educate but sadly to most documentaries aren't fun. I'm hoping they make a Biopic on Stephen King and have Bill Hader play him, he looks like a young King when he wears large glasses and I hope they include King's drug stints.
Happy (early) Birthday!!!!
As someone who's studied screen-writing, listening to a lot of American screenwriting gurus (though I'm a European myself), this is a sort of "trend" in "how to write screenplays THAT WILL SELL" (last words in caps to emphasise).
Blake Snyder's book "Save The Cat", which is a screenplay book many screenwriters - and perhaps even more importantly, a lot of producers - have read argues very heavily that you must have a sympathetic protagonist for the audience to root for. Another screen writing guru, Michael Hauge, said that a successful story must: "Enable a sympathetic character to overcome a series of increasingly difficult, seemingly insurmountable obstacles and achieve a compelling desire". Once again, the key word here being sympathetic.
Because I think that's too narrow a view. A protagonist doesn't have to be sympathetic (Two of my all-time favourite movies are A Clockwork Orange and The Wolf Of Wall Street, and Alexander DeLarge and Jordan Belford are far from sympathetic characters), but they do have to be engaging. Sympathy is an easy way to create engagement, but it's not the only way. Something I think that Hollywood often misses.
Not to say your hypothesis of an unwillingness to deal with the reality that people can do both good and bad things is non-valid. I think it's a very astute observation. I just wanted to point out another symptom or factor that I think exacerbates the problem even more.
Also; wishing you a Happy Birthday in advance. Hope you'll have a great day.
I am put into mind of Seven Years in Tibet, where Brad Pitt played a Nazi. Oops.
And also (in differing ways) of Interview with the Vampire (which did grapple with our hero's slave ownership), and The Social Network (which appears to have many errors of fact but is still much loved -- not least because Fincher is a really good director).
Anyway, an interesting discussion, although I can't imagine American film-making starting to take The Straight Story as its template. Then again, it's one of the only Lynch movies I never saw (also inland Empire), so I shouldn't expound at great length on that.
Really interesting talk!
don't know if this counts but a lot of services have a "this may contain things that might be offensive" on older shows and programs on streaming services, sometimes it make sense like with peter pan but sometimes it feels like censorship like with old dr who episodes
People are more grey than many wish to accept. While not necessarily popular, I would call myself "grey" in thinking, actions and emotional reactions, than some might be comfortable with. Regarding historical figures, or fictional characters with grey or dubious personalities (and everything that goes with that), people still feel the need to categorize them either 'good' or 'bad'. This takes away their complexities, and leaves the public to generalize too much instead of critically thinking about who they are/were, what their motivations might be, and whether or not they can be examined for ALL their parts. Warts and all, would be much appreciated in the showing of such characters. Give people a chance to study these individuals with a critical eye, play devil's advocate, and figure out how you wish to consider these characters - either real or fictitious. They might find that they learn more, not only about the persons in question, but a bit about themselves.
P.S. Hope everyone is well, and take care of yourselves.
True, like frank herbert,seemed to be a very bad dad. Ad to degree Gene Roddenberry, there is docu where i think its shown how much an abstient dad he was and him getting to meet the fandom.
Thats why i love aang in legend of korra is a flawed dad, its realistic, heroes often make bad parents, or dead parents. That probably a flaw even the really good people often have.
And especially history figures, the truth is way more interesting than a fiction, like paul reviere, the fact he wasnt the rider arriving, only one, and not cutting it in military but making it in the chopper and so industry with his industry as basis, making mass productions somewhat, being innoventive, and that way becoming an influencal freemason, way more inspiring.
And franklins creepy basement experiments and being a smart guy XD
Its morre inspiring people getting there despite heavily flawed.