A star-studded cast delivers a highly involving and endlessly interesting historical journey through America's quest for civil rights and racial equality. A small measure of being out-of-balance in that way is the only glaring flaw that can be thrust upon Lee Daniels' The Butler.īeyond a few large leaps of over-convenient fictional story weaving, the film is a remarkable and powerful experience that everyone should see. If a movie can find the right balance to punctuate its real history with reliable, believable, and appropriate fiction, the entertainment experience and historical value both come out intact. If the movie's fiction content is too thick, too convenient, too self-serving, or too heavy-handed it can drown out the real history too much and take away from the enjoyment of the overall film. That brings up that aforementioned important balance between fact and fiction. For example, we want the Battle of Thermopylae to be as cool as 300, even though we are smart enough (at least those who do their homework) to know that it is not. With movies being a far greater shortcut for the average person (myself included) to reading endless volumes and articles about the real history involved, we want and will our historical movies to end up being the "real story" when so often they are not. Do your homework and you can compare and label the fact from the fiction from those two films. Even last year's Lincoln and Argo bent a great deal of truth on their given subjects. It's an accepted practice to allow a few liberties. "Dramatization," the reconstruction of events to add more drama and appeal, is a necessary tool that every historical Hollywood movie uses, from B.C.-set stories like Troy and T he Ten Commandments all the way up to the 2008-set Fruitvale Station. That's because, no matter the era and time period or how fervently they say they cling to fact, all Hollywood movies that are "based on" or "inspired by" historical events or "a true story" have more fiction than fact. When movies take on the tall orders to tell historical stories, the biggest complication to their success is the tenuous blend between fact and fiction.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |