Historical Accuracy in Films
Historically accurate movies that are also captivating have an immense burden to meet. To capture the essence of the time through a personal story that captivates movie executives who regularly make movies with Steven Seagall and Bruce Willis seems an almost insurmountable task. But difficulties in sales aside, there are two crucial elements for movies about history to be the most effective they can be. These elements are historical accuracy in a personal story, and a sense of hope.
Historical accuracy does not mean trying to encompass everything that happened in a particular time period. Rather, it requires a story that highlights key elements of the period involved while containing nothing that could never have happened in the time. For example, for slavery, the key elements certainly include slave family life, slave work, master-slave relations, the master's family life, and the financial situation in which slavery exists. Each of these general categories can be broken down further; for example, slave family life would include living quarters, families being separated, families coming together, and the essential problem of creating a personal identity in an inhuman institution. But again, the historical veracity of an historical film does not mean the film must represent everyone throughout that time period. Such a film would be pretty boring. Also, an attempt to represent the "average" slave life would probably result in a banal story. So the answer for historical accuracy in movies must lie in finding an original story that hits on the key points of the era while not disabusing realities of the period in question.
Historical accuracy is not the only requirement for a fantastic historical work. The key in illustrating history through a personal story is to have it contain a strong sense of hope, even in the most devastating circumstances. The reason for this is that, for a story to be the most powerful it can be, it must be understood with the brain as well as the heart. It must have an intellectual question as well as an emotional feeling. If a film is based mainly on emotion, then any ideological feelings about the practices of humanity in the past may be lost with the sickening of the heart. Titanic is a good example of this effect. It is only secondarily a story about the Titanic. Primarily, it is a fictional love story; Romeo and Juliet on the sea. Yes, it does attempt to give some social commentary on the horrible treatment of the peasants on the Titanic. This is most memorable in the scene of the musicians playing as the ship goes down. But any cerebral problems this movie might pose are literally drowned with Leonardo DiCaprio's character Jack. The torrent flow of tears by moviegoers at Titanic replaced the thoughtfulness that characterizes films that have a more romantic sense of righteousness. Too much emotion floods the senses and the brain takes a back seat to depression. Because the most powerful movies stimulate in every way they can, they must reach the brain. And the only way to do this in a personal story about a tragic situation in history is to give the viewer hope, and in turn, make the story more about the bigger picture than the immediate tragedy.
Of the movies we have watched for class, only three satisfy these criteria. One, The Last Supper, because it is a foreign film on a tighter budget, is more about an incident than a personal story. But in a way, this incident tells us perhaps more about the institution of slavery in Cuba than simply an account of the Count's or Sebastien's life. This film is based on a true story, and although the event in reality was most likely far different from what happens in the movie, it is enough to know that the events are at least similar. What matters most is that it could have happened in the atmosphere of the time, and The Last Supper is very good at getting across the zeitgeist of Cuban slavery. It reveals the major reactions to slavery by the slaves and free men, even though that is not the focus of the film. And even though the end is ostensibly a disaster - the Count has compared Don Manuel to Christ and killed most of the slaves who were at the Last Supper - there is still a strong element of hope in the character of Sebastien. He has essentially risen from the dead life of being a slave to the land of the free, where the horses run as free as men. The Last Supper is a successful film on both emotional and intellectual levels because it panders to the heart with a personal incident and gives the mind hope to ponder.
Amistad desperately wants to be as important in American culture as The Last Supper is in Cuban culture. Even though that success was not attained, it is still a very powerful historical epic. Again, the story is true, but embellished for the screen. And again, this is not a problem, because in its embellishment it has not truly distorted the realities of slavery in Southern society. And Amistad, even more than The Last Supper, has a very clear level of academic entertainment. The slavery in Amistad is fought on a purely ideological level. We are given a white man's court to decide the fate of the prisoners of the Amistad - it's a clear picture of the interaction between Europeans and Africans. The questions Spielberg poses are many: Should this be the proper way to handle justice on a people that do not understand or respect the system? How is it that justice could be served in this case without making the participants protest the very essence of slavery itself? And was America truly an enlightened land, or merely a deluded one? But to be the most potent, Amistad is also an emotional story. The scenes on the Amistad during the ride to America are some of the most brutal ever made about slavery, and hurt emotionally. So while Spielberg's main focus in the film is the courtroom drama, it is also a harrowing vision of the Cinqué's fellow Africans and their personal struggles in oppression. It stimulates the brain and the heart, and presents an effective historical picture.
Finally, the critically acclaimed Nightjohn (recognized for best achievement in 1996 by the National Motion Picture Critics Association) is an extremely emotional story that presents a truly interesting circumstance while still being truthful to the realities of slavery in the South. This is the only movie we watched where the master really got out and worked with the slaves - a much more common phenomenon than master sitting in the house all day and doing nothing. Yes, it is unlikely that a child like Sarny would wield the kind of power she did in church that day, and also that a slave would steal back into the south to teach other slaves to read. But the life that these events breathe into the story is critical to its success as a good film, in addition to being an historical film. And, like Amistad and The Last Supper, the trappings that Charles Burnett adds to Nightjohn do not inherently damage its historical realities. And the hope that Burnett passes from Nightjohn to Sarny is triumphant while still sobering. This movie is the perfect example of a historically significant personal story that has the key element of hope to make it a truly fantastic film.
No other movies fully realized personal history accuracy and hope as those three films did. It is not necessary to take each film that did not and analyze it fully, but it is interesting to examine one film that is highly critically acclaimed, Birth of a Nation, and one that could only be explained by popular culture, Mandingo.
Birth of a Nation obvious fails the test of a great historical film because in creating its compelling personal story, it mangles history beyond repair. But if the history is correct, it would fit completely within these two guidelines. It is a personal story, about the clash of two families on opposite sides of the Civil War. Griffith goes through the critical events of the period, and give a persuasive picture of the era in question (albeit an incorrect picture). Furthermore, the story gives the viewer hope in humanity as the Ku Klux Klan rides away to the sunset with justice, power, and the women. The problem with history is what keeps Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind from being the greatest films about Southern slavery.
Mandingo, on the other hand, is clearly not a great film by any stretch of the imagination. But one could make the point that it is a historically accurate personal story. True, the breeding of slaves as portrayed in the movie was not a common practice, and really no pictures of slave life or slave work are shown with any conviction, but the travesties committed under slavery were certainly possible. Sexual relations destroyed marriages and white family life, and there were certainly some incidences of fighting slaves for money. But Mandingo cannot qualify as a great historical film because it has no hope. Not only does it have no hope for its participants - wife poisoned, dad shot, prime slave impaled and boiled at the same time, and main character stunned and alone - but it also doesn't show much hope for mankind. If there is not hope in film, it does not allow us to identify with the situations in the film as much as we might be able to. And thus, Mandingo fails the test of historical greatness.
Of course, nothing is as simple as a two-criterion formula, and Hollywood has many problems figuring out which films will be made. Not to mention the fact that Hollywood's goal is not to make a great historical film, but to make money. (It is possible, perhaps, to make Schindler's List an exception here). The American public wants blood and sex; history can take a back seat to E.T. and Star Wars. But still, it seems that great history films about any era are personal stories that are built on hope and intellectual questioning. Saving Private Ryan and Schindler's List, our most critically acclaimed films about World War II, undoubtedly have these two elements resonating throughout. Therefore, while a personal story with historical accuracy and hope is not the decisive formula for wonderful films about history, it is a characteristic that the most powerful and compelling films concerning slavery have in common. And history can be the most captivating story of all, because it is about us.