Reel V. Real: How Hollywood Turns Fact into Fiction
If you know much history, going to the movies is irritating on a regular basis. You either suspect that the moguls and their minions are deviating from the truth, or you detect the aroma of dead herring wafting up the aisles. To such moviegoers, Sanello's comparison of the screen to the record for 70 "historical" flicks administers not calamine lotion, perhaps, but lots of good scratching. It seems such Oscar winners asBraveheart,Dances with Wolves,Shakespeare in Love,Titanic, andA Beautiful Mindare rife with what the late Roger Miller called "big B, little u, double-l--Bull!" Worse, taken-for-docudrama featuresBoys Don't CryandSilkwoodare, respectively, libelous and irresponsibly alarmist. White-washing reputations continues today inAliandErin Brockovich, while Oliver Stone has turned tarring them into, if not high art, at least high decoration. This is all gratifying to learn definitely, despite Sanello's cheap shots at the viewers (e.g., "subtitles" are "dreaded by the multiplex crowd who move their lips while they read") of cinematic mendacity.Ray OlsonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved