Irritating historical misstakes in movies
Number24
NorwayPosts: 22,334MI6 Agent
I`m a history-buff (is that a word?) and a film-buff. It`s only natural that I like watching films set in the past. But some common errors pop up again and again in movies and it lessens the experience for me. Here are some of the worst historical mistakes often seen in movies:
- Women in westerns wearing trousers. They always wore skirts or dresses, trousers on women was considered undecent.
- Unpainted statues in movies set in ancient Rome or Greece.
- Vikings with horns on their hemets. Even more uncommon than viking movies nowadays, but the dammage is done.
What often seen historical mistakes irritates you?
- Women in westerns wearing trousers. They always wore skirts or dresses, trousers on women was considered undecent.
- Unpainted statues in movies set in ancient Rome or Greece.
- Vikings with horns on their hemets. Even more uncommon than viking movies nowadays, but the dammage is done.
What often seen historical mistakes irritates you?
Comments
Period dramas with furniture and decor from only that era - they would have antiques and older pieces like everybody else.
Weapons in action films which fire the wrong amount of ammunition without reloading.
People dying instantly from snake bites. Even the most deadliest give you a painful hour or two!
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- WW2 German units allmost exclusively armed with SMGs. The Russians sometimes armed whole regiments that way, but even German elite units mostly had rifles.
Unfortunately, there are countless films that have mislead people either in a general sense such as the examples above or in specific senses with the portrayal of genuine persons...like Oliver Stone's "Nixon". "The Right Stuff"'s Gus Grissom, Cameron's "Titanic" etc etc etc. Sadly, once something hits the screen that portrayal becomes a part of the accepted history. It's enormously reckless and for me, very frustrating.
Ad "The Patriot " to that long list. The war crimes against civilians were not commited by the English during that war,but in that movie they do.
Anaksunamun was Tut's wife...not another pharaoh's mistress
Imhotep was the architect who designed the pyramids, not a muscled up priest.
That whole Scorpion King business? there is ONE instance of a king with a cartouche containing a scorpion seen next to the carving of this king..."Scorpion King" is just the nickname that Archaeologists gave him for lack of a better one. and he sure as hell never commanded a legion of Jackal Headed demon things or ever took on the body of a scorpion.
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Another one is the insistence that a tourniquet is a good idea. Unless the entire limb has been lost from the wound to the extremities of the limb where the wound is, you should not simply cut circulation to the rest of the limb. Medical professionals say this is a dangerous movie mistake and you should apply pressure to slow the bleeding rather than cut circulation and lose an entire or partial limb after too long.
I somewhat disagree re: gunshots. I've done a fair amount of research about people's reactions to being shot, and they run the gamut. Consider these two cases, both documented: 1. An individual takes two .357 rounds to the chest, but still manages to call 911 and sit calmly waiting for an ambulance; and 2. A young police officer is shot in the arm with a .22 and dies of shock. I recall a few episodes of the TV show "Cops" in which people got shot but remained unfazed. One involved a perp being shot point-blank in the abdomen by a highway patrolman and responding by saying, "Hey man, why'd you shoot me?" as if nothing serious had happened. There are also many instances of soldiers being shot in combat but still managing to function.
I'm not downplaying the trauma and seriousness of being shot by a firearm. It's just that reactions to being shot are surprisingly complicated. In his excellent book "Meditations on Violence," Rory Miller suggests that people's mindset has a big effect on how they react to gunshots. Good sources for more info include the works of Evan P. Marshall and Edwin J. Sanow, as well as Mas Ayoob.
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A member of the Norwegian resitance during the German occupation was in a shootout. He jumped on his bicycle and rode it to the other side of Oslo before geting off and discovering he had been shot in the abdomen. Adrenaline is powerfull stuff!
Roger Moore 1927-2017
While I see what your saying, this is not the fault of the people making the movies, it is the fault of the audience.
My biggest bug-bear with historical inaccuracies within films is people moaning about them. There is nothing worse, imo, than watching a film with someone who complains loudly at all the 'mistakes'. Films on the whole are just another persons take on a given story, whether it be fictional or not. If you are going to watch a historically set film and view it as a history lesson then more fool you. When you are watching Saving Private Ryan, does it matter that some of the uniforms are slightly wrong; when watching a western does it really matter that incorrect ammunition is shown or people are wearing the wrong type of clothing? No, it doesn't. Liberties are taken with historic fact for different reasons. Sometimes there are mistakes made due simply to error, sometimes to facilitate a certain storyline.
Movies are entertainment and to suggest that they have a moral obligation to be 100% accurate is a bit of a stretch. They should only have any obligation to be 100% historically accurate if that is what they claim to be, and not many movies do claim that.
I can appreciate that some people may find inaccuracies irritating but personally, as long as I enjoy the film, I don't give a hoot.
-{
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Executive Order 11110
RIP John
Then again, Bobby was always more of a hero for me.
had a bridge! ?:)
Roger Moore 1927-2017
You are right up to a point. Small technical inaccurasies such as the number of rivets on the Titanic or a slightly wrong calibre on a gun are mistakes only experts would notice. Letting English kings proir to Henry V and other changes most likely made to make the story work for the audience can also be excusable. But sometimes a mistake can be jarring and take you out of the film. In Gladiator it didn`t happen for me when a Roman emperor was klled in the arena, but when a senator claimed Roma was founded as a republic. That is compareble to letting an US senator say George Washington was the first American king. The first was done to make the story work. The latter was just pure incompetance.
I thought George Washington was the first American King?
Just kidding.
Fair enough; for someone who is well versed in history of a certain subject I can appreciate why they may be irked by certain mistakes, especially when it is purely down to poor research.
In short, one of the most horrifically inaccurate depictions of Scottish history ever, siezed on by an opportunistic, bitter Nationalist party at a time of political discord within the UK and thus trumpeted by the great uneducated who support the ridiculous notion of Scottish independence, not to mention acted out in isolated incidents by knuckle-dragging, fat-slurping troglodytes and their blank-eyed spawn in hideous bouts of Anglophobia.
Rant over.
Now, U-571... :v
Or when they fly it upside down...
One that gets me, is when they fly a union jack from the back of a British boats/yachts - and not a red or blue ensign instead!
Not historical, but incorrect wording.... and in it's in the majority of military films.... when someone is on comms, or radio and they say "over and out"
IT'S NEVER "over and out".... it's just "out" - that's a real peeve of mine...
One of many reasons I like CR and The Bourne Idenitity is because they don`t follow this rule. (CR after the stairwell fight and Bourn Identity after the fight in the Paris appartment)