RATIONALE 

This assignment asks students to debunk a film of their choice that claims to be based on a true story. This works well as a follow-up to the Rotten Tomatoes assignment since it maintains focus on films but shifts from critical analysis of the object itself to investigating truth claims. Students research and write a traditional research paper investigating the veracity of a film’s representations and ask critical questions about the differences between creative license, haphazard or biased misrepresentation, and deliberate distortion with underlying motives. I scaffold the assignment with readings and discussions about when film accuracy matters and why. 

Students can choose a historical film or one based on recent events, and their choice determines the kind of research they do. In either case, the challenge is always to convince them to move away from sources that discuss the film’s accuracy and towards sources that speak to the film’s subject without reference to the film itself. For example, a student writing about Braveheart will use search terms like “film accuracy in Braveheart” and sources critiquing the movie, but they get much more out of the process if they move towards historical sources about William Wallace and conflicts between Scotland and England in the 13th century. Students are often surprised when I tell them they can and should use sources that don’t reference the movie specifically. 

The question of when and why misrepresentation matters is the crux of the assignment. A student writing about Braveheart might start out writing about how Scots didn’t wear kilts in the 13th century, but when they struggle to explain the impact of that misrepresentation, they start to see the difference between pedantic fussing over strict accuracy and calling out biased and motivated distortions with potential long-ranging cultural consequences. They can probably intuit something off about the excessive credit the film gives Wallace and the cartoonish portrayal of the English, but it takes another step to argue that those portrayals entrench problematically binary, good vs. evil thought and perception that charismatic individuals (in this case, a white, heterosexual, middle-aged Christian man) exclusively drive history, denying the importance of communities, the legions of the unchronicled, the circulation of ideas and ideology, economic forces, chance, etc. 

CORRESPONDING READINGS 

Popular press writing analyzing the significance of film accuracy: 

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20150216-do-films-need-to-be-accurate 

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/23/opinion/History-According-to-Hollywood.html 

Data visualization website on film accuracy: 

https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/based-on-a-true-true-story/ 

Opinion piece and a blogger’s rebuttal re: film accuracy: 

http://www.indiewire.com/2014/04/please-kill-the-expert-review-a-modest-proposal-126646/ 

https://aelarsen.wordpress.com/2014/04/18/why-historical-accuracy-in-film-matters/ 

Pop cognitive science approach: 

https://www.livescience.com/27364-oscars-innacurate-historical-films.html 

SCAFFOLDING 

–Homework readings of and class discussion about the popular press articles above 

–Students write a 1-page paper prospectus for in-class peer review in small writing groups 

–Students write a rough draft of at least 4 pages for in-class peer review in small writing groups 

–One day I cancel class and hold mandatory 10-minute conferences with each student 

–An annotated bibliography, although I’ve moved away from MLA formatting and citation requirements (if we’re not going to fuss over grammatical errors, it seems absurd to require students to learn MLA formatting, which they can just import from software anyway; I ask them to give me enough information to allow me to track down their source down to the page with ease, which at least gets them to think a bit about how texts are stored and accessed). 

–A writer’s letter turned in with the final draft reflecting on the writing process 

–I give students a copy of a paper that I wrote as a model for this assignment about the representation of Thomas More in The Tudors. I walk them through the research process, introduce them to the Baruch databases, show them how to take notes and then structure the essay. I give them a sample prospectus and outline. However, most Baruch students have never heard of Thomas More or The Tudors, so they’re bored by this modelling process, and are unmoved when I passionately implore them to recognize the importance of cultural conceptions of some dead white guy they’ve never heard of. But, some of them look to the model when they’re struggling and they do find it useful.  

–Organic revision exercises 

Assignment

Research Paper Assignment 

In our last assignment, we worked with differing critical perspectives on films, focusing on the development of our own opinions or arguments. In this assignment, we continue to work with arguments and differing critical perspectives and we continue to develop our own opinions, but now we also incorporate research as evidence.  

Choose a film, TV show, video game, work of visual art, novel, short story, poem, or song (basically, any art form) that claims to represent a true story. In a research paper of 7-8 pages, convince your reader that the film or other work of art you choose misrepresents some significant aspect (or aspects) of the historical events it claims to depict. Events in recent history count.  

Your paper should consider why historical accuracy matters (or doesn’t matter) in whatever art form you choose. How does the work rewrite history? Do you think people believe its version of the story is true (as in “Capital-T Truth”)? What motivates the inaccuracies? Were the filmmakers misinformed, trying to make the story more exciting or concise, or did they have some sort of political agenda—or all of the above? Why should we care about the film’s inaccuracies or about the fact that its particular version of history reaches a large audience? Do some inaccuracies matter because they misinform the audience about a significant aspect of our world, while others warrant forgiveness as reasonable manifestations of poetic license? 

Choosing a film: 

Consider your choice of film carefully before proceeding with the writing process. Your film does not need to have a lot of controversy or internet debate surrounding it (although it’s fine if it does). You can surf the internet looking for discussions of films with accuracy problems as a starting point. Once you have a candidate for a topic in mind, do some additional preliminary research to see what kind of argument you can make and support. 

Doing research: 

As you research and consider which sources to use, you should think (hard) about reliability and credibility. What makes a source credible? What are the author’s qualifications? Good qualifications can range from traditional expertise (like fancy degrees and professional titles) to close proximity to events (like eyewitnesses). In what publication does the writing appear, and does it give you any hints about a source’s reliability? Does the publication have any standards for fact-checking, accuracy, or other means of quality control? Does the author or the publication consistently produce work with a significant bias? What motives or interests—political or otherwise—might influence the author’s characterizations? 

Your sources do not need to discuss the historical accuracy of the film you choose, and often the best sources won’t refer to the film. For example, if your paper argues that Shakespeare in Love errs in portraying Queen Elizabeth attending public performances at the Globe theater, you can use scholarly sources or even primary sources from the Renaissance discussing when and where Queen Elizabeth saw plays. Such evidence is much stronger than a blog post regurgitating thirdhand information in the context of a movie review.  

Requirements: 

Technical: 7-8 pages, Times New Roman 12-point font, 1-inch margins, double-spaced (no extra spaces between paragraphs) 

Thesis: Your paper should have a clear thesis that makes an argument supported by the rest of the paper’s sub-arguments, evidence, and analysis. Your thesis should be at least somewhat controversial and subject to analysis and evidentiary support.  

Structure: Your paper should have structural integrity, with a clear introduction, body, and conclusion. Your sub-arguments should support your thesis statement, and your evidence and analysis should support your sub-arguments. Paragraphs should begin with topic sentences that clarify their paragraphs’ main arguments. Your essay should guide your reader logically from idea to idea using transitions. Your essay shouldn’t digress into unrelated ideas or repeat itself excessively. 

Style and grammar: Focus on clarity and word economy. You want clean, clear, direct language that doesn’t force your reader to make guesses about your meaning. Use the grammatical rules we’ve discussed in class.  

Research: 

Minimum of 6 sources, including at least: 

2 primary sources 

2 books 

1 scholarly article from a peer-reviewed journal 

3 sources that are either print or acquired through the Baruch library databases instead of Google 

These can overlap; for example, if you use 3 print primary-source books acquired through the Baruch library database, you’d satisfy all 3 of those requirements (but you’d still need a scholarly article, and a total of 6 sources).  

A few examples of films and TV shows with historical accuracy issues: 

Steve Jobs, Lincoln, Pocahontas, The Queen, JFK, Shakespeare in Love, Braveheart, Gladiator, Pearl Harbor, Elizabeth, The Patriot, The Impossible, American Hustle, Marie Antoinette, The Social Network, The Tudors, Reign, Cleopatra, Ray, The Doors, Straight Outta Compton