Analysis of Historical Movies - Movie Review Example

The Patriot” (2000) The British are very, very bad people in the 2000 film “The Patriot,” which focuses on the effects of the American Revolution on a small Southern family. The family’s widowed patriarch, Ben Martin, fought in the French and Indian War, and as a witness to those wartime horrors, he tries to dissuade his son Gabriel from joining the fray this time around. Gabriel, of course, ignores his father’s wishes and joins the war. Gabriel is captured by British troops, and his younger brother dies trying to save him. Here the movie shifts to revenge drama, Charles Bronson-style, as Ben grabs his knife and tomahawk and proceeds to wreak his vengeance on the British troops, rescuing Gabriel and taking out a series of British officers. Lucky for Ben — and for the Revolutionary troops, apparently — Ben is a military genius who quickly comes up with a guerilla warfare strategy that will give the colonial troops the edge over the better-trained Brits. Gabriel is killed by the same Colonel Tavington who ordered the death of his brother, but Ben has the satisfaction of running his sword through Tavington in the end and of knowing that America no longer belongs to the British. Though the costumes are sumptuous, this movie is little more than a revenge fantasy dressed up in breeches and tri-cornered hats. The Revolutionary troops are dirt-smudged, wide-eyed, Heath Ledger-handsome innocents dreaming of freedom, pitted against the merciless efficiency of murderous British troops, who burn down churches and plantations to get personal revenge against people like Ben. (After spending all that time and effort pursuing personal grudges, it’s a wonder the Brits put up as good a show on the field as they did.) The war for American Independence becomes a Hollywood battle of Good vs. Evil in a way that’s ultimately, well, boring and that fails to communicate the complicated allegiances of the Revolutionary period. By turning its characters into mere caricatures of good and evil, “The Patriot” misses the opportunity to say anything interesting about the colonial period. “Apocalypto” (2006) It’s hard to determine the message of the film “Apocalypto,” a grisly tale about the Mayan civilization before the arrival of Western ships. Is director Mel Gibson taking an apologist stance toward Western imperialism by graphically outlining the blatant violence of the existing Mayan culture? Is he using the story as a metaphor to illustrate the dangers of venturing into civilization? It’s hard to know because the movie’s little more than a gore fest. Kudos to Gibson for his gorgeous locations, but other than the breathtaking setting, there’s nothing beautiful about “Apocalypto.” Gibson has envisioned a Mayan society built on ritualistic cruelty: Apparently, the native South Americans could choose between being good and simple jungle folk or evil and corrupt city dwellers with a taste for human sacrifice. In the film, Jaguar Paw is a happy member of little jungle tribe with a pretty, pregnant wife and a knack for hunting. When Mayan troops invade his village, he keeps his head and hides his very pregnant wife in a well, effectively preserving the line of his people. Jaguar Paw is captured along with the rest of his tribe, and forced on a long, brutal march to the Mayan capital, where the tribe’s women are sold for slaves and the tribe’s men discover that they are destined to be sacrifices to the gods. After much violence and drama, Jaguar Paw escapes back into the jungle and makes his way home, just in time to rescue his wife who has given birth to twin boys. In the distance, he sees the ships of the Spanish nearing the shore, but Jaguar Paw has learned his lesson about the perils of civilization and opts to head deeper into the jungle instead of toward the ships. What’s particularly interesting about this film is that it’s set during an historically fascinating period. Though the Spanish are often credited with taking out the Mayan civilization (a credit that’s not completely undue), in fact, the Mayan civilization had been in a period of decline for some time. The arriving Spaniards found abandoned cities and fields, and there’s much historical speculation about what led to the civilization’s ruin. (And the interesting question arises: If the Spaniards had arrived fifty years earlier, would the Mayans have overthrown them?) “Apocalypto” misses the opportunity to explore these questions, focusing instead on a dehumanizing view of bloodthirsty Mayans. “The New World” (2005) Though it focuses a great deal of attention on the romantic triangle between Pocahontas, John Smith and John Rolfe, “The New World” gets points for historical accuracy, as it charts the settlement of Jamestown, Virginia by English settlers. Unlike many glib retellings, “The New World” lets itself dwell on the struggles of founding a colony, including the uneasy and shifting alliances formed by the colonists and their relationships with the native Americans. “The New World” begins with the arrival of the first English ships at Jamestown. As the ships dock on dry land, Captain Smith is pardoned for his mutiny and Pocahontas watches from a secret place, two motifs that will carry throughout the film. Desperate for fresh supplies, the colonists choose Smith to journey upriver to the Native city, where he spends time with Pocahontas and her family. Inevitably, the two fall in love, and while Pocahontas acts on her love, angering her father and being exiled from her tribe for her efforts to help the settlers, Smith can’t seem to make up his mind what he wants and ultimately leaves the colony for fresh explorations, asking a friend to tell Pocahontas of his death. Pocahontas grieves for Smith but ultimately marries John Rolfe and goes to England with him, where she meets Smith again years later. “The New World” tries hard to show the reality of settling a new colony and the reality of a changing world in the Americas, and often succeeds. Though it necessarily glosses over some events for cinematic effects, the film is faithful to the historical records of the Jamestown settlement, effectively illustrating the struggles and personality conflicts that challenged the young colony. Pocahontas’s story is romanticized, but it works to give a sense of the ways in which the English settlers changed the lives of the Native Americans in the New World. “Birth of a Nation” (1915) “Birth of a Nation” is one of the first feature-length films ever made as well as one of the most controversial. It tells the story of the American Civil War through the eyes of two families: the northern Stoneman family and the Southern Cameron family. The first half of the film focuses on the charms of the antebellum South and the events of the Civil War, during which the Stonemans and Camerons fight for their respective sides. The second part of the film is concerned with the horrors of Reconstruction in the South and the founding of the Ku Klux Klan, treated in “Birth of a Nation” as a necessary measure against violent and malicious former slaves. Though the film was based on the historical evidence of the time — some of the ideas about the Ku Klux Klan and Reconstruction come from then-President Wilson’s own history book — there’s no question that it doesn’t stand up to modern historical scholarship. The dramatic scene in which a white woman must leap to her death rather than submit to the amorous advances of a black slave who is determined to marry her sums up the tone the film takes toward Reconstruction: If black people aren’t controlled, things are going to get out of hand. Rescuing women from inappropriate advances by black men is a recurring theme in “Birth of a Nation,” and the film’s undisputed hero, Ben Cameron, helps form the Ku Klux Klan to protect women. (His love interest, Elsie Stoneman, initially rejects the idea of the Klan but ultimately has to be rescued by it when she’s taken prisoner by another aggressive black man. (This time, he’s a mulatto, suggesting that even a little bit of black blood is enough to engender violence in a man.) The film may not be historically accurate in the truest sense of the words, but it perfectly captures the turn-of-the-century attitude many people, both Northerners and Southerners, had about the Civil War and the rights of the newly enfranchised former slaves. These issues would be the catalyst for the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. “Gone With the Wind” (1939) “Gone With the Wind” works as an historical film only if you’re willing to accept the film’s central metaphor of Scarlett O’Hara as a figurative embodiment of the city of Atlanta. Scarlett, a small-town belle with a big-time crush on neighbor boy Ashley Wilkes, survives the Civil War and Reconstruction by allying herself with the right people through marriage and strategic partnerships, by insisting that money can solve all the problems in the world and by refusing to dwell on the golden past and its time-honored rituals. In the film, she’s contrasted with sweet Melanie, who tries to keep the grace and beauty of the Old South alive, but it’s telling that sweet Melanie dies, while strong-willed Scarlett continues. The old South is gone; Scarlett is the new South. The movie is a paean to the charms of antebellum life, reflecting a halcyon time of happy union between slaves and slave owners before war disrupted this essential relationship. “Gone With the Wind” idealizes the Old South and the Civil War to such an extent that the South it describes is historically unrecognizable. The romance between Scarlett and the undeniably dashing Rhett Butler is second-fiddle to the romance of the South, first of its antebellum charm, then of its noble collapse and finally of its determined rebirth. The movie’s historical value lies not in its adherence to historical fact but in the fact that it represents the way most people like to envision the circumstances of the Civil War. “Gone With the Wind” tells us more about the South we imagine than about the South that actually was, and for that reason, it’s an historically valuable film. Read More