Accuracy

When Kurosawa made Red Beard*, he took his obsession with accuracy to an extreme. The cabinet filled with actual, period, Chinese medicines, even though they were never shown.

All of the material used for the town was about as old as it is supposed to look. The tiled roofs were taken from buildings more than a century old; all of the lumber was from the oldest available farmhouses; costumes and props were all “aged” for months before their appearance; the bedding (made in Tokugawa-period patterns) was really slept in for up to half a year before shooting.

One of the very few shows dealing with the medical world I could find no fault with, which is where my assumptions start with historical medicine, but in this case, it was probably as accurate as possible. I don't necessarily think this is the best way to present a movie. The illusion of reality is no doubt sufficient. Still, that kind of attention to telling a real story with as much reality as possible, has to show in performances, in the patina.

Bulitt has a scene in surgery, with actual surgical staff, and wow, it looks familiar to me. Return To Me shows a hospital from the patient's family's POV, and they get nothing wrong, which works as well. Bringing Out the Dead shows bad, night, EMTs, and although what they are doing is wrong, it's the characters doing it wrong, not the movie. Well, and when John Goodman does CPR, he bends his elbows, but that's so John Goodman doesn't kill the extra, not because the character doesn't know how to do chest compressions properly.

D struggles with historical drama that misses the point, or simplifies to the point of inaccuracy.†

And don't get him started with guitar gear that is completely wrong. I tend to throw things at the screen when they get the medical stuff wrong, which really can matter when people assume it's somehow right. Our legal system is struggling with people who assume the CSI tech is perfect and unassailable, and it really isn't.

Movies don't have to present the technical details of these worlds perfectly, no need to let a fact get in the way of a good story. But they can elide, instead of showing the laughably wrong, without poo-poohing it as "Only a few people will know, or even notice!" Put it in the shadows, slide over it in a blur, don't show if you don't bloody know!

I worked with a woman who had twins, who were used as newborns in a tv show here, covered in strawberry jam. She told them the surgical paraphernalia was completely wrong, but they didn't care. She put the checks into her daughters' college fund, and shrugged.

Telling stories isn't about facts, it's about truth, which facts can obscure. So, sometimes, they need to be nudged aside - this is what fantasy is for, magic and science fiction. Clearing away clutter, to see the skeleton. Replacing that with the wrong facts is not a good answer, though. Leads to greater confusion, and frustrates those who do know the accurate facts. The lies that aren't necessary, the ignorance, only erodes trust in whatever truth the story might hold.





*A really amazing and wonderful movie, although long, that is well worth watching. If only for seeing Toshiro Mifune, in a beard, dislocating a guy's jaw, then putting it back in.

†See An Historian Goes to the Movies.