Historical inaccuracy in films

[Clun]

Just watching Elizabeth : The Golden Age and it cuts to a scene in the Highlands with majestic mountains (Munro’s?), locks and rivers, then the subtitle comes up Fotheringay Castle . I recall that was actually somewhere out towards Rutland way, generally flat and a bit woody.

I’m sure there are others?

@terrywynne yes indeed Lucy Worsley described her as the Duchess of Northumberland rather than Norfolk for a WHOLE book when the fundamental point about Catherine Howard was that her uncle was the Duke of Norfolk. Either sloppy beyond forgiveness or pig ignorant....

Saddlery. They rarely get that right.

[quote londonmummy1966]@terrywynne yes indeed Lucy Worsley described her as the Duchess of Northumberland rather than Norfolk for a WHOLE book when the fundamental point about Catherine Howard was that her uncle was the Duke of Norfolk. Either sloppy beyond forgiveness or pig ignorant....[/quote]
That is very odd. Especially as the dowager Duchess of Norfolk is an interesting character in her own right and her household was full of young women. It's not like it's a scenario where there is a historical "blank" that an author has to fill, or a dramatic need for an extra character or event to help with pacing.

@Fernando072020

One that always really bothered me was in the Tudors. They had Henry's sister, Margaret, marry a Portuguese king. In reality, she married the Scottish king, which was a pivotal event in British history leasing to the union of the crowns. Even thinking of it makes me angry 😅

I think they kind of combined his two sisters into one and then embellished a bit/lot as well - his younger sister Mary was married to the king of France who was much older than her and died within a few months. She then went on to marry Charles Brandon without Henry's permission and they got in lots of trouble for it, as in the Tudors. But nobody watches that for historical accuracy!

Downton is terrible, no way would the Earl have been so bloody kind to all his servants. Paying for the cook's eye operation etc.
It's car crash tv- you can't take your eyes off it.

@MrsJackRackham

Teeth. When poor people are shown on screen, regardless if the time period, they nearly always have rotten teeth. Only sugar causes tooth decay and poor people wouldn't have been able to afford sugar especially prior to the slave trade.

But not everyone cleaned their teeth, or did so well, so horrible teeth could have been more common. Wasn't it once fashionable to blacken teeth to appear richer (have tooth decay) - possibly in Tudor times?

I seem to remember hearing once that assesses and teeth getting ground down by gritty food was an issue. Also that people just generally existed with a low level of pain that many of us in the UK don't experience day to day. Injuries that haven't healed. Skeletal distortion due to overloading at a young age etc. But people in films don't tend to look like they are suffering.

*abscesses and teeth getting ground down

@DameAlyson

Also Victorian street children with shiny washed hair and boots with socks. Street children would probably be barefoot, if they did have boots they would be scruffy and have holes in them.

Costumes always look too new, as if they were put on for the first time that morning. To be realistic, there should be a few creases, and the fabric should be a little bit worn - unless it's a situation where the character would be wearing a brand new outfit.

Yes, and Victorian dresses often had to be picked into different components to be washed separately, or sometimes just brushed or spots dabbed with chemicals, and Victorian and Edwardian women just didn’t wash their hair anywhere near as often as women do now — they brushed out dirt a lot. It would look a lot oilier.

One of the very few films I think that did this well in terms of clothes and hair was Jane Campion’s The Piano.

I'm pretty sure I remember watching an episode of the White Queen where Richard the Third is riding off to the battle of Bosworth and there's snow on the ground.

The only problem being that the battle took place on 22nd August!

@oneglassandpuzzled

I’ve just watched Argo, about the rescue of six Americans from Teheran. The Americans had to rescue their own because the six had tried the New Zealander’s and Brits. Who wouldn’t help.

Except, in reality, they did: at risk of their own lives. And the Canadians did far, far more than was portrayed in the film.

It was a very interesting and suspenseful film. But this annoyed me.

Off topic, Netflix has 'The red sea diving resort', it probably has glaring inaccuracies but is a good watch.

Oh and can I go for future inaccuracies?

Sci Fi set in the future, an international crew and they are measuring things in imperial.

Also dropping things in space - if you are outside a space ship your hammer will not drop out of your hand and down into infinity.

To be honest, I think this review of “To Kill A King is generous, if anything.

Rupert Everett is a full foot taller than Charles I was - Tim Roth being 2” shorter than Cromwell’s 5’8” isn’t disastrous, you can’t really cast so precisely (esp as his 5’8” is a Best Guess); but having a looming lanky Charles I ranging about the place is ridiculous. The exchange where Cromwell came barrelling into a room where Charles I was playing a harpsichord (2003 is some time ago now, but am sure it was harpsichord-size rather than spinet [and their shape, rather than a virginal or clavichord]) & the monarch brightly asked the frothing rageferno “Can you carry a tune, Mr Cromwell?” made me laugh, but in a “slightly hysterical” rather than “oh, the hilarity & wit” fashion… (I suspect it still might were I to rewatch: the scars from that A-Level module run deep; & Papers 4&9 did not help them heal… but I continue to maintain Shetland Ponies wrote the King James Bible ).

The Tudors

What a load of baloney that was. I think the only accurate events were the executions

I actually really enjoy historical fiction. I think with something like The Last Kingdom, you know the main characters are fictional and that the author is just setting a story in those times. So, while you have real people there, like Alfred the Great, you know they didn't say or do most of those things, but it's still fun to watch/read and there are nuggets of things that are based on historical research of that time, so that's interesting too.

Prince Harry said The Crown doesn't bother him because the people watching know that it is fiction, but I think it can be hard because some of it is based on fact, so maybe it's hard for viewers to know where the line is, especially as many of the characters are still living people.

Great thread. My husband tells me that in a film called The Great Sarah a steam train conveying Sarah Bernhardt arrives at a station with signs on the platform saying London.

I think a lot of people think that The Crown is fact rather than fiction! It's a little naïve of Harry to have said that.

Oh and can I go for future inaccuracies?

Sci Fi set in the future.....

You wouldn't hear the sound of the weapons firing in a space battle, and the starships wouldn't be fighting at close quarters like an old fashioned naval battle, they'd probably be lightyears apart. Yes, Gene Roddenberry, I'm looking at you. It would be difficult to make it exciting if you did it accurately, though.

I gave up watching The Crown after the scene, where Queen Mary us told of George VI's death. Her Lady in waiting wrote about how she was told in her diary. And they got it wrong! It really annoyed me!

@DameAlyson

Oh and can I go for future inaccuracies?

Sci Fi set in the future.....

You wouldn't hear the sound of the weapons firing in a space battle, and the starships wouldn't be fighting at close quarters like an old fashioned naval battle, they'd probably be lightyears apart. Yes, Gene Roddenberry, I'm looking at you. It would be difficult to make it exciting if you did it accurately, though.

I agree with the sound, yes good point.

Also instant communication, nope there would be a gap, all aliens would not have American accents.

Oh and Stowaway - would you really get on a space ship heading for mars with no way of repairing the oxygen/CO2 filter/breathable gasses?

@MarieVanGoethem

To be honest, I think this review of “To Kill A King is generous, if anything.

Rupert Everett is a full foot taller than Charles I was - Tim Roth being 2” shorter than Cromwell’s 5’8” isn’t disastrous, you can’t really cast so precisely (esp as his 5’8” is a Best Guess); but having a looming lanky Charles I ranging about the place is ridiculous. The exchange where Cromwell came barrelling into a room where Charles I was playing a harpsichord (2003 is some time ago now, but am sure it was harpsichord-size rather than spinet [and their shape, rather than a virginal or clavichord]) & the monarch brightly asked the frothing rageferno “Can you carry a tune, Mr Cromwell?” made me laugh, but in a “slightly hysterical” rather than “oh, the hilarity & wit” fashion… (I suspect it still might were I to rewatch: the scars from that A-Level module run deep; & Papers 4&9 did not help them heal… but I continue to maintain Shetland Ponies wrote the King James Bible ).

I was an extra in this when I was an Oxford student, but have never actually seen it, though friends said I was visible for a nanosecond in a crowd scene. I can well believe it’s total codswallop.

All I remember was making eyes at Dougray Scott. (It was around the time of casting the new Bond, and the word was he was one of the lead candidates before it went to Daniel Craig…)

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Great thread. My husband tells me that in a film called The Great Sarah a steam train conveying Sarah Bernhardt arrives at a station with signs on the platform saying London.

At least it didn’t say ‘London, England’ (in case La Bernhardt was given to hanging out in London, Arkansas).

Sci Fi set in the future.....

A bit off topic as the tim wasn't a serious attempt to show the future, but it's interesting to watch Back to the Future II and note what they got wrong and what they got right.

For example, paying for things with a thumb print doesn't look very odd now, but back in 1988 that was very futuristic (I saw it at the cinema at the time). Video-calling was also mainstream by the real 2015. But fax machines, which were everywhere in the film, had been more or less superseded by the real 2015 - and we are still awaiting flying cars and hover boards.

^ tim = film

For historical accuracy (or otherwise) of costumes in films, Bernadette Banner has done some YouTube videos which are rather lovely, as she is so enthusiastic when films get things right!

[quote PurpleParrotfish]For historical accuracy (or otherwise) of costumes in films, Bernadette Banner has done some YouTube videos which are rather lovely, as she is so enthusiastic when films get things right!

[/quote] I watched one of her older recently. I can't remember which one but it was wonderfully scathing about Ugg boots in Little Women and corsets without undergarments underneath. It was actually really interesting on how using the wrong stays means that the posture and silhouette is wrong.