There are a number of reasons why I chose to do a rather straightforward project like this - catch up on movies I've missed and haven't had a chance to see (e.g. Lincoln and Django Unchained), learn more facts about the United States for Jeopardy!, have an excuse to watch more movies, etc., etc. But the biggest factor is that I just love the history of the United States - its minutiae, the cast of strange and eccentric characters, reading about and stewing over its bad qualities. Even my hate is love! Because, if you'll forgive me for quoting Christopher Hitchens:
What a subject America [is]: an inexhaustible one, in fact, begun by written publications and assertions that were open to rewriting and revision and amendment, and thus constituting an enormous "work-in-progress," which one might hope to play a tiny part.
But the big-wigs also like a good story. And the problems surrounding a good story like Argo caught my attention.
I saw Argo opening weekend, and I enjoyed it. And while the film got rave reviews after its release, Ben Affleck's historical thriller came under close scrutiny leading up to and immediately following its Oscar win, and not just from Canadians who felt jilted at our nation's role being underplayed. What was true and what wasn't true suddenly made Argo not worth the gold it won, and Affleck was attacked from all corners for adding things to make the story- a very real story- more action-packed. The close call at the airport? Never happened. The Iranian security chase as the plane taxied off the Tehran runway with the six American hostages? Didn't happen either. Reading the Wired article the film is based on, you learn it certainly was tense for the Americans who managed to escape their besieged embassy during the Iranian revolution. But a minor, routine delay at the airport (what actually happened) isn't great for a story, so the facts were embellished.
The Globe and Mail came to Argo's quasi-defense: "Anyone who watches U.S movies should realize that there is often something very false in the depictions of people, society and history and, paradoxically, a reflection of something very true to the U.S mythos." There's a mindset you have to have going into and coming out of a movie: what you are about to see and/or just saw may have been based on reality, but it wasn't real. And to be fair, it is more than a little stupid to get your facts from mainstream films; crucial details are often changed, added, or omitted to ramp up the drama in every movie, not just Argo.
I think the only way of getting past this is always, always, always taking everything with a grain of salt. Like a screenwriting professor says in this Boston Herald article, "People going for a history lesson are going to the wrong place."
Unfortunately, people do get their history from the wrong place. For the longest time after seeing Amadeus, I thought that it was the real-life story of Mozart, and not until I got interested in the deeper story that I found out it was mostly BS (albeit very entertaining BS). If people don't get interested in the deeper stories (something that really isn't their responsibility, movies being entertainment after all), they'll come out with a wrong version of history.
So in the interest of setting the record straight (as much as one blogger can) and for the love of both cinema and American history, I'll be watching movies that either tell the stories of the United States or reflect them, from the voyages of Christopher Columbus to the presidency of Barack Obama.
I'm going to try and concentrate on fictional films, and though documentaries are used as sparingly as possible (this is a project looking at America through fictional storytelling), movies like 2016: Obama's America and Fahrenheit 9/11 are about versions of reality that critics claim are the opposite of the reality, and thus have been criticized as fictional. Even if that means me clawing my eyes out watching those movies.
And the itinerary:
1492: Conquest of Paradise / Christopher Columbus: The DiscoveryThe New World / PocahontasThe CrucibleThe Patriot1776The AlamoThe Devil and Daniel WebsterAmistadGangs of New YorkGods and Generals / GettysburgAbe Lincoln in Illinois / Young Mr. LincolnAbraham Lincoln (1930 DW Griffith) / LincolnThe Birth of a NationJesse James (1939) / I Shot Jesse James (1949) / The True Story of Jesse James (1957) / The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert FordThere Will Be Blood- Inherit the Wind
- The Grapes of Wrath / Bound for Glory
- Public Enemies / Bonnie and Clyde / The Untouchables
- Modern Times
- Pearl Harbor / Tora! Tora! Tora!
- U-571
- The Great Escape / The Big Red One
- Red Tails / Miracle at St Anna
- The Great Dictator
- Dr. Strangelove
- The Steel Helmet / M*A*S*H
- The Front / Guilty by Suspicion
- Thirteen Days
- JFK / Bobby
- Mississippi Burning / Ghosts of Mississippi
- Malcolm X
- The Green Berets / Full Metal Jacket
- Born on the Fourth of July / Platoon / Heaven and Earth
- Easy Rider
- Nixon / All the President's Men / Dick / Frost/Nixon / Secret Honor
- Argo
- Red Dawn
- Wall Street
- Do the Right Thing
- Jarhead / Three Kings
- Slacker
- Primary Colors
- The Straight Story
- W.
- United 93 / World Trade Center / Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close / 25th Hour
- The Hurt Locker / Zero Dark Thirty / Green Zone
- Fahrenheit 9/11 / 2016: Obama's America
"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend," says Maxwell Scott in The Man Who Shot Liberty Vance. And when legend becomes fact, print a lengthy blog post about why it isn't. Or is. Or maybe both.
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