i recently watched a show on National Geographic that condensed WWII in one hour and was severely disappointed in the inaccurate information given. They had the battle of Midway as taking place from Jun 4-7, with the sinking of the Japanese carriers taking place on Jun 7th. I've noticed similar errors, at least as far as I know them on other shows and wonder is it a lack of research on the part of the shows or perhaps the shows present what info is out there at the time of release and then more accurate information becomes available? One other battle that I feel gets screwed up is the Marianas turkey Shoot, I've heard anywhere from 320-430 Japanese planes were lost in the battle. Are the discrepancies due to the numbers including aircraft destroyed on the ground and air thus larger numbers and when they report 320-350 lost is that just the number of planes shot down? Are there any shows or series that are more accurate in their information than others?
Very few modern TV shows/documentaries get all the facts correct or give a complete picture of the event. Historical accuracy has given way to entertainment value. You really need to get your history the old fasioned way. Read/research it. Even when you see an interview with a veteran be sure to remember it has probably been edited and you can't be sure the actual question he is answering, because that part is seldom shown.
In the UK, cable/satellite TV channels seem to be more inaccurate than the old-established 'terrestrial' TV channels. Having said that, in these days of restricted budgets, various 'howlers' and sloppy archival research seems to creep in everywhere. There'll never be another 'World At War'......
I could see mistakes being made in movies, as facts may not work in the overall theme of the picture,but when you have a show that wants to center on just one aspect of a war or battle it seems foolish to put together a documentary and not get your facts right. I'll agree about the "World at War" comment, but even there I'm sure some mistakes were made, but probably more due to some information still not being available when the show was produced. By this point in time I would suspect that any documents that are going to ever be released have been in regards to matters of national security.
We should cut these a little slack in our criticism by remembering a few things. First they are limited in time, most set to rum in a hour time slot, but in reality some 45 to 48 minutes long. This brevity must lead the producer's to limit details. Secondly this forum is a perfect demonstration that some elements of the war are hotly debated and in many areas there is much dispute. This would naturally lead them to take the road of least controversy, unless they are trying to promote some new re-interpretation of the war (which opens its own can of worms). Lastly, they do serve a purpose in that they are a gateway for new people into this area who is going pass on opening up The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich as a first step into this subject. Hopefully they will start there, then go to their library, or better yet here.
I will agree to an extent, but the problem with many recent programs is that they screw up in areas that are not controversial or where there is limited information. They just don't do their homework. An earlier poster mentioned "World at War". I'd add "Victory at Sea". They did it right. Any failings they have is in new information discovered since they were created. Those producers were more interested in getting it correct as possible and did extensive research.
But what distinguishes World at War & Victory at Sea was that they went into the project intending to make a mini-series and could devote the time to go into detail. They also probably had a considerably larger production staff. Certainly modern productions could have done better, but for a "general" audience they are aimed at they are not going to sweat the details we would wish of them.
I wouldn't put Victory at Sea in the same league as World at War. I would call Victory at Sea 'Historical Melodrama', to coin a phrase. I always loved it and still do, but they used a lot of literary licence when selecting and editiong film clips to illustrate the narrative. I agree that the facts in the audio were dead on and of course the music from the NBC Symphony was fantastic
Without specific titles of recent documentaries this conversation lacks coherence. Its all well and good to fault National Geographic for sloppy research in doing a 60 minute show on the whole of the war, but I think the degree of rigor and discipline will vary according to individual teams and the scope of the subject matter discussed. If you compare "World at War" to, say "Love, Hate and Propaganda", how do the two stack up? ... Or 'Victory at Sea" to "Canada's War in Color" or "Apocalypse The Second World War"... Or 'He Has Seen War" or "The War" or "Shooting War". Its like comparing apples and oranges. (sorry if two of my examples are Canadian, they're just among the ones I've seen lately) I have trouble believing that Ken Burns didn't do his homework right on "The War" (2007) Granted a lot of these are not overview movies or series. Many have a specific bias they are trying to get across. ("Shooting War" is about War Correspondants and cameramen and "He Has Seen War" is about post traumatic stress). Any thoughts?
You reminded me of a posting I made to the BBC WW2 site back in Jan 2004 about a goof in the film "Tea with Mussolini" This is the very item: Posted Jan 29, 2004 by Ron Goldstein - WW2 Site Helper Last year my wife and I had a week in Florence. Amongst the local trips we made was one to nearby San Gimignano, a town immortalised in the film “Tea with Mussolini”. When we returned home I thought I would have another look at the film, which I have on video. As I watched the re-run, I came to the scene near the end, where the Germans tanks re-enter the town, with orders to blow up the beautiful Collegiata church. It was all very dramatic, but what completely spoilt it for me this time round, was the fact that the tank that they used was clearly a Sherman M4, albeit with a German Cross painted on the turret side. Trust me chaps …..I’m ex 4th Hussars, and it WAS a Sherman and I’ve got comparative photos to prove my point. The question, is did the director honestly think there was no one left alive who could tell the difference? No prizes for the right answer but does anybody out there know of other films where they’ve not done their homework? Ron
Was on ITV at the weekend. The Sherman could have been captured Ron. plenty of pics of captured Shermans with black crosses. Bit that annoyed me was Scots Guards Major with Crowns on epaulettes AND shirt collar. argh! Also Scots Guards didnt wear bonnets with a bobble on top .
At least you guys don't have to suffer through horrible translations to boot. In Scandinavia, all foreign movies, documentaries, etc are subtitled. Seriously, sometimes I wonder if there isn't some deaf Charlie specifically assigned to translate numbers in historical documentaries to Swedish. It's so frustrating to see the amount of incorrect translations of numbers, dates, etc. Some mistranslations, I can see why, but numbers and dates?!?
On the topic of documentaries, my wife recently taped a 2 part series, the Third Reich. Rise and Fall. Bless her heart for DVRing it for me because she spotted it on the guide and she's good like that. Unfortunately, I have watched the first hour, The Rise, and it is awful. They over edit it to give the sense of doom and it has an odd adult comic book feel. The information is sparse and the narration atrocious. Has anyone caught this?
Wasn't Tea With Mussolini a fiction film? Gotta look it up... There is a whole slew of recent documentaries that seem more preoccupied with putting out cool newly restored or new found footage of the war rather than doing the documentation that goes with it. Canada's War In Color Apocalypse World War Two Another category is the Ken Burns doc series that had a major fixation with getting a visual record of living witnesses of the war before they disapear from history.
