[Y. Perez]

Hello everyone

The other day I watch the movie Black Death (Sean Bean). In my opinion, it depicts pretty well the medieval mind/psyche of the people having something so catastrophic in front of them without any explanation besides the miasma theory/astrology.

Sure it has some anachronism but for those who had watched it also, what do you think about it?.. I'm particularly interested in the costume design for the period (1348 England). Is the coat of plates/armour of the soldiers (men at arms) and the villeins cloathing appropriate for the time?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1181791/mediaindex




*Great site*

[Glennan Carnie]

The clothing is complete and utter Hollywood rubbish. It bears no relation to the clothing worn at the time. Most of the cast look like they've just walked off the set of Lord of The Rings or Game of Thrones.

Do a Google Image Search on

Luttrell Psalter

or

Romance of Alexander

To see period images of clothing.

[Colt Reeves]

At a glance I see a lot of bracers (Hollywood likes bracers, probably because they're handy and cheap pieces for protecting the forearm in movie fights) and that's a nice 16th centuryish parrying dagger in picture 13.

[Jojo Zerach]

That's a horrific attempt at mid 14th century armour and clothing.
These are examples of clothing and armour from England during the 1340's
http://effigiesandbrasses.com/monuments/edmun...973/large/
http://effigiesandbrasses.com/monuments/willi...72/medium/

I also see a lot of dark, dingy colored clothing in the movie photos, which isn't historically accurate. Manuscripts from this time show about every color of clothing imaginable except brown, black or dark green.
(Red, blue and yellow were popular historical colors.)
The Romance of Alexander manuscript is a great reference for clothing during this period.

[Y. Perez]

Some of them have the aketon or some sort of padded jacket underneath the breastplate. Others have it without anything else. The leather vambraces were used in 14th century though seems more atone to Conan the Barbarian in this movie. I don't think your tyipical men at arms would look like this especially if compared to the Lutrell Psalter. But at least they didn't put them in shiny armour on a quest to save the fair damsel...

Anyway, if a group of soldiers/men at arms of 14th century England were sent to a similar venture like the one in the movie, do they have to always look like the effigies? or can we also expect something similar to what they are wearing?



Can you spot something 14th 'ish'..?

[Nathan Quarantillo]

The only 14th century things on those men is their hair.

[Jojo Zerach]

I just can't find much historical about their clothing or armour.
The look of the armour and the color/look of the clothing is typical of movie makers that don't know (or care) about historical accuracy. (Which would include most movies.)
The fact that they have leather vambraces is probably coincidence, rather than the result of any research. (Judging by their style.)

[Patrick Kelly]

Overall it made me want to put a gun to my head to stop the misery.

[Chuck Russell]

nothing was right about any of it. heheh was just a movie not history hhehe

[Dan Howard]

I actually enjoyed the movie but I have to switch off my brain during these things, otherwise I would have thrown something through my TV screen years ago. Thirteenth Warrior and Highlander are two of my all time favourite movies. Keep in mind that they are movies not documentaries - entertainment, not education. In many cases the so-called documentaries on the History Channel are just as bad. Actually they are even worse because they pretend to be educational.

[Thomas R.]

The best piece of the film's props was the small wooden kite shield with metal edges, they used to fight off the bandits in one scene. Me and my group literally broke out in laughter at the cinema, because one of us had bought the very same shield some months ago and upon the first use in a fight it was utterly destroyed by one single sword blow. :o) It was hilarious to see them parry clubs and swords with it... The rest of the audience didn't get it and wondered, why we were laughing so hard...

[Ian S LaSpina]

I really enjoyed the movie. I thought it was very entertaining and had a great dark feel to it.

I know there's a past time in some circles to turn up their noses at any movie that dares depict anything historical in nature and tear it to shreds because it's not accurate, but remember, that's not what a movie is for. It's no more valid to get mad at a comic book for not being historically accurate. A movie, first and foremost, is a piece of fictional entertainment, yes, even the ones that depict historical occurrences. And here's a dirty little secret about those movies for history geeks like us, you're allowed to like them!!

Don't go in to a movie with the expectation that it will be anything remotely accurate to history. People don't get upset when they go see Lord of the Rings because the armor's not accurate 15th century high gothic armor, because that would be ridiculous to have such an expectation. Even if the movie is historically-based, it's still a fantasy. The only question you really need ask yourself is did you find the movie entertaining. Be pleasantly surprised if it does portray things accurately.

Like Dan said above, the things you should be upset about are documentaries that claim to be educational and are just as fantastical as movies!

[Johan K]

If most movies are rubbish on their historical side, lets turn the question around: Are there any historically 'correct' movies out there that are still entertaining as a movie?

[Chad Arnow]

[Craig Peters]

Like so many others here, I found myself thinking that one of the thing that annoys me most about modern medieval movies is how drably people always seem to be dressed. Where are the bright and cheery colours actually worn from the Middle Ages?

Another pet peeve of mine is Hollywoods obsession for making medieval movies with "pseudo-Dark Ages" props, like animal furs, pseudo Germanic halls (at least in this film) and things like that.

The other thing that would be nice to see is if less Hollywood films cheaped out and actually depicted warriors in mail, or coats of plates, and similar armings. All this leather armour has got to go.

It was an entertaining film for what it was, but that's all.

[Y. Perez]

You know, is a shame movie makers can't do some research. They always have money/mainstream on mind keeping accuracy as least as possible. As a blind man shooting backwards. As if medieval times weren't interesting enough.

This movie has so much potential if only the time setting/props/cloathing were a bit more accurate. Sure is still a movie but doing it the right way it will not hurt anyone. Balance is the key. Seems like they throw it away.

Thank you guys for your thoughts.

[Quinn W.]

I realize in films like these the writers, directors and designers are shooting for entertainment. And to a degree I am able to turn my brain off and separate my nitpicking from my ability to enjoy it as an enjoyable piece of storytelling.
Entertainment is their ultimate goal, and I totally understand that, which is why I would have no problem with them picking an inaccurate prop or idea over an accurate for those or other reasons. Like when they dressed everyone up in 15th century plate armor even though the film took place in the mid 1300s, presumably because plate is more impressive looking and made filming a good deal safer. Or when people don't use helmets or shields as often because they obscure the protagonist's face.
The problem, in my opinion, is that there are many historical props, sword moves, etc that are much less cool than their authentic counterparts. Take, for example, that ill-fitted sheet of basically unshaped leather covering the torso of the man on the far right in the above picture. A coat of plates would not only have been more accurate, but it would have been more visually exciting as well.

My main issue, though, is how the middle ages seems to get singled out. You wouldn't see a Sherman tank in a civil war movie, and yet those two are a mere century apart - a small length of time considering how I've seen movies with characters wearing a kit with individual pieces that existed almost 500 years apart. A movie where George Bush led a cavalry charge against Hitler would probably be labeled as a comedy, yet Historian Sharon Krossa noted that the historical accuracy of Braveheart was akin to "a film about Colonial America showing the colonial men wearing 20th century business suits, but with the jackets worn back-to-front instead of the right way around." And yet it receives the label "Epic adventure."
I loved 13th Warrior and I'm fine with sacrificing accuracy if the creators of the film have even a halfway decent reason to do so. But most of the time the inaccuracies do not benefit the film at all. And if you don't have any particular reason to get it wrong, you might as well get it right.

[Thomas R.]

[Patrick Kelly]

I no longer expect anything approaching historical accuracy from the movie industry. What I do expect is to be entertained and diverted for a short space of time. This movie was not a quality production in any way shape or form, shoddy production values from begining to end.

[Y. Perez]

I think they wanted a Knight Hospitaller... with a leather coat of plates? o.0