The fight for success has never been as simple as walking in a bed of roses or in a smooth road. It has always been a long and winding road most of the rough in all sides. Independence costs too much. For so many reasons, there had been many instances and incidents of fights for independence and most of these fights were bloody and dreadful. In exchange of what we call freedom, several lives were lost and people were killed regardless of their age, gender and participation. The innocents too were killed despite of being neutral about the situation.
The cost of freedom could be one’s life, probably the lives of the greater population and we cannot get hold of it. The fight for freedom though terrible allows us to simply have a hope that we will embrace independence and have it until forever. It was never a silent fight for a cause but a loud and full of anger call for a cause. In every country’s history, freedom had been a subject worth knowing because all tried to free themselves from the dictatorial authorities who runs our lives and takes away our liberty.
However, using historical facts in a movie calls for the accuracy of shared information and the well inclination of each fact to the fictional story and characters but then in the movie “The Patriot”, critics claimed that there was no accuracy in history as depicted in the movie that may result to false information being shared to the general public. The Movie and Critiquing the Movie In 2000, Columbia Pictures distributed an Epic War Film entitled “The Patriot” which was directed by Roland Emmerich. Starring Mel Gibson as Benjamin Martin, it was a story of war and love for the family.
A fictional account of a hero who was part of the American Revolution, Mel Gibson as Benjamin Martin was threatened to go to war when his son was killed in front of him. This movie was nominated in the Academy Awards for three categories namely, Best Sound, Best Cinematography and Best Original Score. Set in 18th century South Carolina, the story focuses on Benjamin Martin’s family and the war for independence against the British colonizers. This movie talked more about the drama of the father having his son in the war and his second son killed upon trying to save his older brother from the British soldiers who went into their house.
Their house was burned later and being the father, Benjamin was forced to save his eldest son together with his other two young sons (Beale, Lewis & Mitchell, 2000). Considering how the movie was made, we can say that it was indeed a good film and yet we could also stick to the saying that nothing is perfect. The good delivery of the film and the good acting of the characters did not close the possibilities of having negative feedbacks. As a movie, it was not rated for general patronage nor with parental guidance since it was graded as rated R.
There were scenes in the movie when it shows too much violence already and for the eyes of a child, it might inflict negative effect to them. Furthermore, it is too violent and contains false information though it is fiction. The accuracy of the historical content of the film is one of the things being questioned by the critics since people will watch it and it might bring out untrue facts. Movie Issues and the Historical Accounts Using movies as the creative presentation of reality is a job well done regardless of how it was executed as long as it is really entertaining.
People watch movies to be entertained and yet they too needs information and knew knowledge about life which they can get from what they were watching. However, not all films have educational films were educational. Some were made to entertain only while other was made to inform or share knowledge. Well indeed not all movies could please every people and this Mel Gibson movie did not please every people in the world. There had been issues raised against the film and two film centers in London did not allow it to be shown claiming that they need not to talk more about it.
British were stereotyped as cruel in American movies (Beale, Lewis & Mitchell, 2000). They call for the end of the issue since it was long been ended and yet, several Hollywood films were made against them with no intentions on the side of the film makers. Probably they were only depicting history and placing them in slides and films but not entirely to inflict damage to British citizens. These British critics were more upset in how they were portrayed in the film that the reality that they lose in the battle.
Though the movie is really creative, they seem not to like the idea of making them cruel even if it is fiction since it is a narrative of history (“Hollywood Scripts have Rarely Offered Historical Accuracy, 2000). Also the critics claimed that the makers of this movie were portraying the wrong guy in the person of Colonel William Tavington since he was based into a real person who as they said was loving and not cruel. They were also inaccurate of the hero they used in the film who was supposed to be a slayer of Indians and a person who rapes his female slaves (Beale, Lewis & Mitchell, 2000).
However, the film makers do understand that if they will retain their original character who was Francis Marion, they will not have an ideal hero or patriot who will fit in the story. It will spoil the story and ruin it entirely. The main issue about this film is the use of the characters though they were just fictions since they were based with real life soldiers who fought in the war. The misuse of the characters and how they were portrayed is the subject of the controversy aside from the violent scenes that is not suitable for the child’s eyes.
The portrayals of the characters were inaccurate in the sense that they were not made to be aligned with the history but to create an imaginary person from the war. Wring Information equals complications In almost majority of the sources we used in this paper, it is understandable that the film did not pleased everybody and most of the Brits were not happy of the creativity of the film though it was made to entertain and not to educate people about American history and the revolutionary war.
The Brits were arguing that it should be ended all the depictions and the stereotyping of British army during the War of Independence. However, the film makers were also arguing that they need not to be accurate about it and that there was nothing wrong of the story since it was highly made to entertain people and create a beautiful story and not to lecture the viewers of the life during the years of War in America. In the first place, the movie was focused in the lives of the Martin family and how they were able to live their lives during the times of War considering that Benjamin was a widower and he has seven children.
Furthermore, it was made to appeal to the human emotion and not to inflict intellectual knowledge to the viewers. It was made for relaxation and not to inculcate more things and knowledge to the people watching it. However despite of all the arguments we can raise to protect the film, we will always end up accepting the fact that there was something wrong in how the characters were portrayed wherein the lead character was known to be a hero type while the Brits were cruel people especially Tavington who was claimed to be a different person.
The inaccuracy of the historical contents in the film paves way to having the chance of knowing more things and yet, we also have to understand that there is really the intention of changing the characters and basing it to real people which caused them their down fall. There is a need to be accurate in all the facts we are sharing though it is in film alone since there are several people who will watch it and that people all over the world will have the knowledge about the film. False information may cause too much damage in the stock knowledge of the people and it will only feed wrong historical accounts to the greater public.
That would not be helpful. Works Cited Beale, Lewis, and Deborah Mitchell. “Brits in a snit over `The Patriot’ Movie’s accuracy challenged. ” The Seattle Times (Seattle, WA) (June 30, 2000): I9. General OneFile. Gale. Canada Community College. 20 Nov. 2008 <http://find. galegroup. com/ips/start. do? prodId=IPS>. Dir. Emmerich Roland and Roberts, Rosemary (writer). “The Patriot”. 2000 “HOLLYWOOD SCRIPTS HAVE RARELY OFFERED HISTORICAL ACCURACY. ” The News & Record (Piedmont Triad, NC) (July 17, 2000): A6. Full Text Newspapers. Gale. Canada Community College. 20 Nov. 2008 <http://find. galegroup. com/ips/start. do? prodId=IPS>.