You're such a grown-up, Anders; I doubt anything I've ever watched would be of interest to you. But you should at least consider:
* Netflix' Outlander, a romance set in 18th century Scotland. I'm not a historian, but it's obvious that a great deal of attention was paid to historical accuracy - and I liked it much better than the book. (IDC what anyone says, Claire in the book was an extremely unlikable heroine)
* Covered Wagon (1923), a classic Western.
* Season 1 of BBC's (1984) Robin of Sherwood, a proper English retelling of a proper English legend. Later seasons went downhill, particularly after they got rid of Michael Praed as Robin, but the first season is brilliant. As with Outlander I don't know how much you'll tolerate its forays into magic and witchcraft, but this is my favorite of the three.
Now that I have actually had time to watch your suggestions I will be able to reply more constructively.
Covered Wagon was interesting mostly for the chance to show a silent movie for the kids, a first for them. They were not overly impressed and neither am I. The lack of sound and the archaic cinematography makes it more or less impossible to get that feeling for the period which is my motivation for watching historical films.
Robin of Sherwood seemed to be a decent depiction of late 12th century England. But it was very conventional (except the additions of magic and satanism, which did not really add anything of value). It also fell in all of the conventional traps when depicting the period, for example missing most of the ethnic components of the story. England in the 12th century was really two nations: the French-speaking nobility and their retinues and the English-speaking peasantry. The very idea that there could be some sort of consensus between the Anglosaxon Robin and the Norman Marion seems far-fetched, to say the least.
The best of the three is Outlander. While time traveling is a cheap trick with unpredictable consequences, the rendering of 18th century Scotland seemed genuine. At the very least it made me read up on the Jacobite uprising of 1745 which is the very definition of success in these circumstances. A fictional depiction that makes me want to learn more of the real history. I think that is as much as anyone can demand from a historical movie Friday.
Wow, that was fast! I suspected you'd reverse your initial suspicion that Robin would be better than Outlander. My own interest in history takes more of an anthropological character; I love to know what inventions were available, how status hierarchies were filled out, beliefs and rituals, and the like.
I will say that you must have missed something about Robin of Sherwood, though - Maid Marion was not a Norman, but a "headstrong Saxon virgin" whom the Normans were ready to sacrifice. Moreover, the creators had some sensitivity about this; later episodes show that while many Norman characters take their heritage seriously, the Sheriff is more fatalistic, seeing the country as having absorbed him and the other invaders "like a sponge."
But I definitely agree that much of the value of fiction and film comes from the lessons that can be learned - just watching films from other countries is wonderful for the feel of the language and the climate. With that in mind, I do have another recommendation you might consider: Brat (Russian: Brother). It's a bit recent for a historical film, but it did give me an awareness of the Chechen War which otherwise I'd have ignored completely.
Well. I must admit that I did not watch all 75 episodes of Outlander. I only watched the first episodes of both Robin of Sherwood and Outlander. One of the main drawbacks of TV series is that they take forever to go through. Most of the time a unitary film can say the same thing in a much shorter time frame.
I was child rearing while watching Robin of Sherwood and naturally missed some details. But as I understood it Marion was the daughter of some nobleman who had "died in Palestine" and was now primed for the nunnery. I interpreted it as she was Norman but that might very well have been a misunderstanding on my part. Part of the problem with Robin of Sherwood that I wanted to highlight was the very difficulty of determining who was Norman and who was Saxon. In the real world of 12th century England that would hardly have been a problem.
Is it the film Brother from 1997 you are talking about (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_(1997_film))? From the Wikipedia description I might have seen it a long time ago. On the other hand I was a completely different person back then so it might be worth watching again.
By the way, thank you for all the recommendations. This was what I was hoping for when publishing the article.
No I assumed you only watched a bit of the three; most people I know are still much slower to get through recommendations - probably they're not so avidly seeking new material! I read a lot more than I watch, and I find the best way is to try a page for a short story or a chapter for a novel, and by then it's enough to know if it isn't my kind of thing or not.
And ultimately, I don't think Robin Hood is your kind of thing. Frankly I'm impressed with your English; I watch foreign language shows and can barely follow along with German. Russian and (Peninsular) Spanish are wonderful, but without subtitles I'd be lost. Growing up I watched Robin in my own language and without distractions, and Robin of Sherwood actually taught me about the ethnic component to the conflict. Most Americans perceive the Norman/Saxon conflict purely in class terms, and have trouble understanding what the Jacobite rebellion is at all. (In fairness, though, I suppose the Jacobite rebellion did mean different things to different people at different places.)
Brat is indeed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_(1997_film) . Nobody I talk to has ever seen it, whether they are completely different people or just themselves. Given the current state of affairs in that part of the world, Brat is probably even less popular nowadays than ever.
Now I am not sure if you are trying to flatter me or provoke me. Do I not seem fluent enough in English to keep up with the smattering of not so archaic prose in a television show like Robin of Sherwood? In fact, English is the only language I can watch films in. Despite having lived in France for well over a year I can not watch a French film without subtitling. Spoken languages are hard.
To be fair, I have only vague ideas about the meaning of ethnicity and class in 12th century England. And I suspect that academics in general are about as clueless as I am. As far as I know historians have only a limited understanding of the Normans view of their own ethnicity, much less of their view on other ethnicities. I know there is ongoing scholarly debate about whether William the Conqueror spoke Danish or not. This is not insignificant since Danish and English were much more similar in the 11th and 12th centuries than they are today. If the Normans spoke Danish as well as French they would have had it much easier making themselves understood among their new subjects.
I wasn't really trying to flatter or provoke you - sorry if it came across that way. But if William the Conqueror spoke Danish it would feel quite shocking; the Domesday Book, the castles William built, all of it feels inextricably French.
I will have to reply in more depth when I have actually seen any of these. From the description Outlander seems not really my type. Time travel is generally not a good sign. Robin of Sherwood looks more promising. Although I did once read a scholarly book about the English longbowman tradition and its impact on the Robin Hood legend, which probably makes me harder than average to impress. Covered Wagon is at least easily available on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rImU9gzjW5k) and silent films are refreshingly unusual. At the very least I can let Tove watch it for me. Thank you for the suggestions.
Really? In that case have the two of you ever seen Forever Knight? The historical flashbacks are what make seasons 1 and 2 so great. Rome, the Roaring 20's, WW2, and quite a lot of medieval France in Forever Knight.
I will have to pass the question to Anders when he is un-busy enough to reply. My attention span is almost always too short for TV series. For me, "watching a film" very often means watching the first 20 minutes, concluding that I probably have got the charachters and then reading the plot on Wikipedia. No wonder that Anders wants to discuss films with internet people. I'm not of much help there.
In opposition to the instructions of the blog post above, I intend to make a recommendation of a historic book and an anti-recommendation of a historic film. The book in question is The Last Duel: A True Story of Crime, Scandal, and Trial by Combat in Medieval France, by Eric Jager. The film is The Last Duel (2021), which was inspired by Jager's book.
Unfortunately, I "watched the film" (that is, watched half of it) before I read the book. Admittedly, I wouldn't have known about the book if I didn't see the film first, so I can't exactly complain that someone made a film of it. Still, I think it is better to read the book first, for two very simple reasons:
1. In the film, Count Pierre d'Alençon, played by Ben Affleck, has ridiculous hair. I don't know why, but he dyed it yellow-ish for the role. I guess it is supposed to look blond, but people with really light-blond hair never have such dark eyebrows. No late medieval count can possibly have looked like that.
2. The heroine, Marguerite de Carrouges, wears mascara. As far as I have understood, that product was invented in the 19th century.
I know, I am being nitpicky. But why should I watch a historical film if I can imagine the charachters better without seeing the film? I already know what is considered a beautiful woman today. A good historical film should make a serious attempt to recreate the looks of a 14th century beauty, I think.
At least reading the book first is a good idea, in order to avoid being haunted by a yellow-headed Ben Affleck through the pages.
Queen Margot is great!
La veuve de Saint-Pierre
Thank you. I will check it out .
You're such a grown-up, Anders; I doubt anything I've ever watched would be of interest to you. But you should at least consider:
* Netflix' Outlander, a romance set in 18th century Scotland. I'm not a historian, but it's obvious that a great deal of attention was paid to historical accuracy - and I liked it much better than the book. (IDC what anyone says, Claire in the book was an extremely unlikable heroine)
* Covered Wagon (1923), a classic Western.
* Season 1 of BBC's (1984) Robin of Sherwood, a proper English retelling of a proper English legend. Later seasons went downhill, particularly after they got rid of Michael Praed as Robin, but the first season is brilliant. As with Outlander I don't know how much you'll tolerate its forays into magic and witchcraft, but this is my favorite of the three.
Now that I have actually had time to watch your suggestions I will be able to reply more constructively.
Covered Wagon was interesting mostly for the chance to show a silent movie for the kids, a first for them. They were not overly impressed and neither am I. The lack of sound and the archaic cinematography makes it more or less impossible to get that feeling for the period which is my motivation for watching historical films.
Robin of Sherwood seemed to be a decent depiction of late 12th century England. But it was very conventional (except the additions of magic and satanism, which did not really add anything of value). It also fell in all of the conventional traps when depicting the period, for example missing most of the ethnic components of the story. England in the 12th century was really two nations: the French-speaking nobility and their retinues and the English-speaking peasantry. The very idea that there could be some sort of consensus between the Anglosaxon Robin and the Norman Marion seems far-fetched, to say the least.
The best of the three is Outlander. While time traveling is a cheap trick with unpredictable consequences, the rendering of 18th century Scotland seemed genuine. At the very least it made me read up on the Jacobite uprising of 1745 which is the very definition of success in these circumstances. A fictional depiction that makes me want to learn more of the real history. I think that is as much as anyone can demand from a historical movie Friday.
Wow, that was fast! I suspected you'd reverse your initial suspicion that Robin would be better than Outlander. My own interest in history takes more of an anthropological character; I love to know what inventions were available, how status hierarchies were filled out, beliefs and rituals, and the like.
I will say that you must have missed something about Robin of Sherwood, though - Maid Marion was not a Norman, but a "headstrong Saxon virgin" whom the Normans were ready to sacrifice. Moreover, the creators had some sensitivity about this; later episodes show that while many Norman characters take their heritage seriously, the Sheriff is more fatalistic, seeing the country as having absorbed him and the other invaders "like a sponge."
But I definitely agree that much of the value of fiction and film comes from the lessons that can be learned - just watching films from other countries is wonderful for the feel of the language and the climate. With that in mind, I do have another recommendation you might consider: Brat (Russian: Brother). It's a bit recent for a historical film, but it did give me an awareness of the Chechen War which otherwise I'd have ignored completely.
Well. I must admit that I did not watch all 75 episodes of Outlander. I only watched the first episodes of both Robin of Sherwood and Outlander. One of the main drawbacks of TV series is that they take forever to go through. Most of the time a unitary film can say the same thing in a much shorter time frame.
I was child rearing while watching Robin of Sherwood and naturally missed some details. But as I understood it Marion was the daughter of some nobleman who had "died in Palestine" and was now primed for the nunnery. I interpreted it as she was Norman but that might very well have been a misunderstanding on my part. Part of the problem with Robin of Sherwood that I wanted to highlight was the very difficulty of determining who was Norman and who was Saxon. In the real world of 12th century England that would hardly have been a problem.
Is it the film Brother from 1997 you are talking about (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_(1997_film))? From the Wikipedia description I might have seen it a long time ago. On the other hand I was a completely different person back then so it might be worth watching again.
By the way, thank you for all the recommendations. This was what I was hoping for when publishing the article.
No I assumed you only watched a bit of the three; most people I know are still much slower to get through recommendations - probably they're not so avidly seeking new material! I read a lot more than I watch, and I find the best way is to try a page for a short story or a chapter for a novel, and by then it's enough to know if it isn't my kind of thing or not.
And ultimately, I don't think Robin Hood is your kind of thing. Frankly I'm impressed with your English; I watch foreign language shows and can barely follow along with German. Russian and (Peninsular) Spanish are wonderful, but without subtitles I'd be lost. Growing up I watched Robin in my own language and without distractions, and Robin of Sherwood actually taught me about the ethnic component to the conflict. Most Americans perceive the Norman/Saxon conflict purely in class terms, and have trouble understanding what the Jacobite rebellion is at all. (In fairness, though, I suppose the Jacobite rebellion did mean different things to different people at different places.)
Brat is indeed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_(1997_film) . Nobody I talk to has ever seen it, whether they are completely different people or just themselves. Given the current state of affairs in that part of the world, Brat is probably even less popular nowadays than ever.
Now I am not sure if you are trying to flatter me or provoke me. Do I not seem fluent enough in English to keep up with the smattering of not so archaic prose in a television show like Robin of Sherwood? In fact, English is the only language I can watch films in. Despite having lived in France for well over a year I can not watch a French film without subtitling. Spoken languages are hard.
To be fair, I have only vague ideas about the meaning of ethnicity and class in 12th century England. And I suspect that academics in general are about as clueless as I am. As far as I know historians have only a limited understanding of the Normans view of their own ethnicity, much less of their view on other ethnicities. I know there is ongoing scholarly debate about whether William the Conqueror spoke Danish or not. This is not insignificant since Danish and English were much more similar in the 11th and 12th centuries than they are today. If the Normans spoke Danish as well as French they would have had it much easier making themselves understood among their new subjects.
I wasn't really trying to flatter or provoke you - sorry if it came across that way. But if William the Conqueror spoke Danish it would feel quite shocking; the Domesday Book, the castles William built, all of it feels inextricably French.
I will have to reply in more depth when I have actually seen any of these. From the description Outlander seems not really my type. Time travel is generally not a good sign. Robin of Sherwood looks more promising. Although I did once read a scholarly book about the English longbowman tradition and its impact on the Robin Hood legend, which probably makes me harder than average to impress. Covered Wagon is at least easily available on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rImU9gzjW5k) and silent films are refreshingly unusual. At the very least I can let Tove watch it for me. Thank you for the suggestions.
You are of course quite welcome!
Oh no, Anders is not much of a grown-up when it comes to entertainment. He often watches slaughter-TV together with a teenager.
I want to watch Covered Wagon because it is old. I try to watch all films that are old or from more exotic places and not totally unbearable.
Really? In that case have the two of you ever seen Forever Knight? The historical flashbacks are what make seasons 1 and 2 so great. Rome, the Roaring 20's, WW2, and quite a lot of medieval France in Forever Knight.
I will have to pass the question to Anders when he is un-busy enough to reply. My attention span is almost always too short for TV series. For me, "watching a film" very often means watching the first 20 minutes, concluding that I probably have got the charachters and then reading the plot on Wikipedia. No wonder that Anders wants to discuss films with internet people. I'm not of much help there.
Do you read books?
In opposition to the instructions of the blog post above, I intend to make a recommendation of a historic book and an anti-recommendation of a historic film. The book in question is The Last Duel: A True Story of Crime, Scandal, and Trial by Combat in Medieval France, by Eric Jager. The film is The Last Duel (2021), which was inspired by Jager's book.
Unfortunately, I "watched the film" (that is, watched half of it) before I read the book. Admittedly, I wouldn't have known about the book if I didn't see the film first, so I can't exactly complain that someone made a film of it. Still, I think it is better to read the book first, for two very simple reasons:
1. In the film, Count Pierre d'Alençon, played by Ben Affleck, has ridiculous hair. I don't know why, but he dyed it yellow-ish for the role. I guess it is supposed to look blond, but people with really light-blond hair never have such dark eyebrows. No late medieval count can possibly have looked like that.
2. The heroine, Marguerite de Carrouges, wears mascara. As far as I have understood, that product was invented in the 19th century.
I know, I am being nitpicky. But why should I watch a historical film if I can imagine the charachters better without seeing the film? I already know what is considered a beautiful woman today. A good historical film should make a serious attempt to recreate the looks of a 14th century beauty, I think.
At least reading the book first is a good idea, in order to avoid being haunted by a yellow-headed Ben Affleck through the pages.
As many as possible! Right now I'm reading one about pygmies. But I seldom read novels. Same faulty attention span there, I guess.
Poof, you're just as much a grown-up as Anders. Your poor children!
you've got a typo in your description of film #2. You wrote 2018 instead of 1918. !
Thank you. Corrected. (Proofreaders these days...)
Sorry!