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Peter Morwood
Location: Co. Wicklow, Ireland Joined: 27 Sep 2004
Posts: 41
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 Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 11:18 am Post subject: |
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Having mentioned the Director's Commentary, I went back and gave it another hearing, with the result that I can no longer cut Mr. Scott the slack of admitting the errors in costuming resulted because of bulk costume rentals.
'Fraid not.
He says (at approximately 54:56 on my DVD player's timer - during the first Zucchabar fight) | Quote: | | All these helmets are probably built around (a frame)... They're fibreglass, actually, but they look really great. You see, this one's built around a motor-cycle helmet, so he's got a nice bit of padding... |
Now, whether he's referring to just the helmets on-screen at that moment, or all the (gladiatorial) helmets in the movie, I don't know. Sufficient to say that his commentary sometimes sounds disdainful, even contemptuous, of the movie's historical advisor (Kathleen Coleman, as I mentioned in my earlier post.) He doesn't give a name, but refers to the "expert" as "she". | Quote: | | Everything...the armour, the uh...everything you see that people wear, were made, and my only criticism I got from an expert was... She snapped that Roman women didn't wear colours, they only wore white, and I was going "O-kaay..." and basically, you know, was that written? Is it real? Who really knows? It's like saying... In London we only wear bowler hats. You know? |
Well, "who really knows" is probably the expert hired to give advice, otherwise why bother hiring one at all? And as for London, as recently as the late 1950s-early 1960s, it would seem to any visitor that a principal identifying feature of some upper-strata male groups (Guards officers in "mufti" (civilian clothing), barristers and stockbrokers) was indeed the bowler hat.
I've mentioned this before (on NetSword, I think) but if an expert is brought in to advise on a film, that expert's contract will feature clauses covering what they're to be paid and how their contribution will be credited (with the proviso that this credit can be removed if the advisor feels their advice is ignored/misinterpreted sufficiently to make them look bad). However, to the best of my knowledge there's no clause insisting that any advice given must be heeded.
Here's another director on the subject of accuracy: Josef von Sternberg, directing I Claudius in 1937, was told, after much research by his costume designer, that the Temple of Vesta was attended by six Vestal Virgins, who wore elaborate robes and tiaras. Sternberg's response was "That won't do! I want sixty of them! I want them naked! And I want them on the set tomorrow morning!"
For all its faults, I enjoy Gladiator for what it's meant to be: entertainment, not education. At least it was finished. Sternberg's I Claudius wasn't so lucky.
"I care little for your Cause; I fight not for your Crown, but for your half-crown, and your handsome women!" - Capt. Carlo Fantom (from Aubrey's "Brief Lives")
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Martin Wallgren
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 11:39 am Post subject: |
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[quote=
For all its faults, I enjoy Gladiator for what it's meant to be: entertainment, not education.[/quote]
I agree with Mr Morwood, and my answer to Maximus question is;
YEAAAAAH! I´m Entertained!!!!
Seriously It´s great to get info on how the moviebuissnes distort and destroy history in many of their films. And I will start a new thread on witch movie is the one you think depicts history most correctly...
Swordsman, Archer and Dad
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Jean Thibodeau
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 1:31 pm Post subject: |
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Peter;
I realise self promotion was not the reason for your posting here but I am now at least motivated to find out more about your books and maybe help you " buy more pointy things": So can you give us a heads-up about who will be bringing your books back in print and about when they will be available. ( Horselord series. )
Now back to "Movies": As to experts, I question when historians make blanket statements like "Roman Women " didn't wear colors! Now, I don't know the sources for this information and it is certain that the expert knows a lot more about it than the film director, but is this true for the entire Roman period and for all classes of society? Might be very true for the upper classes but not apply to Roman prostitutes or ethnic groups absorbed as Roman citizens. Women belonging to these ethnic groups might wear colors at home or for casual functions and wear only white for public functions.
On the one side you have a director who may not have very much of a commitment to historical accuracy and on the other experts who have the certainty, in their minds based on available sources, about what things were like.
History is the record of what was written at the time or later and came to us, and is accepted as being the best information still in existence cross referenced with surviving art, architecture, legend and logical extrapolation.
History should not be confused with the certainty of what really happened or was so.
Even yesterday's news can be wrong or biased, and when it become the news from 1000 years ago it does not become more accurate just because it is the only surviving source.
Anyway, I am always suspicious of absolutes and certainty about history or just about everything: Not all historical truths are equaly certain, but the historical inaccuracies in many movies are completely certain!
You can easily give up your freedom. You have to fight hard to get it back!
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Matt G. Meekma
Location: Horicon, Wi Joined: 03 Mar 2004
Posts: 61
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 2:05 pm Post subject: |
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Wow!
Jean, That was a mouthful, But a mouthful that I feel is right on the money.
Not sure who said it or if i even have it right but wasn't it said that the history of war is written by the victor/survivor?
Just cuz they survived or won doesn't mean that they are recording the God's honest truth, just their version of the incident, or the version that they want to be remembered.
Just my $0.02.
Beer is God's way of saying He wants Us to be Happy. - Ben Franklin
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Aaron Schnatterly
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 2:56 pm Post subject: |
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| Matt G. Meekma wrote: | | Not sure who said it or if i even have it right but wasn't it said that the history of war is written by the victor/survivor? |
There's definitely something to this statement, or, at least, from the author's point of view. Case in point - take a peek in any U.S. History book - take a look at that little piece of our history called the Revolutionary War. Now... check for that same bit of history in an English History book. I don't want to start the fight all over again... but the accounts are different. Glad we can be friends now  .
-Aaron Schnatterly
_______________
Fortior Qui Se Vincit
(He is stronger who conquers himself.)
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Steve Grisetti
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 3:12 pm Post subject: |
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| Jean Thibodeau wrote: | | I realise self promotion was not the reason for your posting here but I am now at least motivated to find out more about your books and maybe help you " buy more pointy things": So can you give us a heads-up about who will be bringing your books back in print and about when they will be available. ( Horselord series. ) |
My interest is piqued, also. Hey, and we can all say that we know the author!! You'll vouch for that, won't you Peter?
| Jean Thibodeau wrote: | | On the one side you have a director who may not have very much of a commitment to historical accuracy and on the other experts who have the certainty, in their minds based on available sources, about what things were like. |
I think we should also consider that, in the case of this particular DVD, we are hearing the input of the expert as stated by the director. There could be a great deal of distortion in that communication chain.
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Douglas G.
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 4:08 pm Post subject: |
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Bad movie cameos? Hah! I have everyone beat here. I was in a crowd scene
in "The Kansas City Bomber"! No pay, long, long day but well worth the brief
glimpse of Raquel Welch, esp. if you were 14 like I was.
My vote for crummiest helms has to be those in Ladyhawk.
Best,
Doug
"Mayonnnaise. What the French in place of state religion"
G.B. Shaw
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Douglas G.
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 4:12 pm Post subject: |
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Amend that last, it should have read
..........what the French HAVE in place of...........
I fell alot as a kid, thats my excuse
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Patrick Kelly
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 4:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | My vote for crummiest helms has to be those in Ladyhawk. |
What!
You mean you didn't care for the Super Bowl sunday look? 
"In valor there is hope.".................. Tacitus
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Kirk Lee Spencer
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 6:04 pm Post subject: |
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| Jean Thibodeau wrote: | .
...History is the record of what was written at the time or later and came to us, and is accepted as being the best information still in existence cross referenced with surviving art, architecture, legend and logical extrapolation.
History should not be confused with the certainty of what really happened or was so.
Even yesterday's news can be wrong or biased, and when it become the news from 1000 years ago it does not become more accurate just because it is the only surviving source...
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Hey Jean...
At first I thought you were repeating all the "cultural history" gobeldigook I had to listen to at the university. You know something like this...
"Everything is culturally bound and we can not really understand different cultures, especially when we are separated in time... so we have to just accept a primary text as just a text... It only means what it means to us. Because, even if we were of the same culture with those of the past, we are still a bunch of biased liars making up history to empower ourselves... So we moderns/postmoderns should do the same and use any text that comes to us to empower ourselves by making up our own useful fictions."
Yuk! 
If historians really believed this (I mean really believed it) Nietzsche would have been right and history would have died along with God.
However, in Jean's quote I noticed that he used the words "best information" meaning we can discern levels of bias and ideological (and other) corruptions. Also I saw the phrase "cross referenced with" indicating we have other perspectives on the past such as art and archeology. I also like Jean reference to the idea of "logical extrapolation." Although we are not of that culture or time period we are still rational/ logical beings who can extrapolate from what we know to what we may not know. And lastly, Jean said: "History should not be confused with the certainty of what really happened or was so." I am so glad he inserted the word "cetainty." Without it I would have to disagree.
It is possible that one reason that hollywood has to give the audience what they want (expect) rather than what is historical is because of all these cultural "folk" histories we have embedded in our collective consciousness. 
ks
Two swords
Lit in Eden’s flame
One of iron and one of ink
To place within a bloody hand
One of God or one of man
Our souls to one of
Two eternities
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Steve Grisetti
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| Posted: Mon 21 Mar, 2005 6:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Kirk Lee Spencer wrote: | ...It is possible that one reason that hollywood has to give the audience what they want (expect) rather than what is historical is because of all these cultural "folk" histories we have embedded in our collective consciousness.
ks |
plus a dash of political correctness for the new cultural folk history that they wish to embed in our consciousness.
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Marcos Cantu
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| Posted: Sat 31 Dec, 2005 9:35 am Post subject: |
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I just finished watching the 'Extended Edition" and it brought some questions to mind. I noticed that the muscled armor that Crowe, Phoenix and the other main characters wear was hardened leather, not metal (you can see the grain of the leather in his death scene at the end). The hardened leather armor recreations that I've seen have been very hard and also fairly thick...how effective would this be against cutting/slashing strikes?
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Addison C. de Lisle
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| Posted: Sat 31 Dec, 2005 10:07 am Post subject: |
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I think hardened leather would be effective against slashing strikes, as the Japanese often wore leather scale-armor to protect against katanas.
I just watched this movie last week, and noticed the Migration period helm too. Then this thread pops up. At least it was historically accurate-looking.
As for the Winter King, I think that Christopher Lloyd (if he's not dead/retired) could be a good Merlin.
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