The Historical Film as Real History

In the past three decades, due to the work of some distinguished historians, the discussion of film is being slowly integrated into Western historiography. However, while relatively few academic historians would deny today film’s ability to instigate awareness to and enrich the understanding of historical experiences, many fewer are willing – and able – to incorporate film analysis in their own research and teaching. This impasse is particularly apparent in the case of “historical films,” in which past events and experiences are reconstructed, invented and framed in varying degrees of sophistication. The convincing arguments that established film as a “legitimate” narrator of historical reality often fell short of explicating how film should be integrated into academic history discourse. This article reads Rosenstone and Parvulescu’s recent collection of essays A Companion to Historical Film as a demonstration of different approaches taken by contemporary historians in an attempt to meet this challenge. Within this context, it identifies four paradigms, each involves different premises about the nature of film’s realism, its role as an agent of social change, and its dialog with “conventional” (national, institutional, etc.) narration of the past. The analysis of these paradigms – and the ways they have been implemented by the contributors to A Companion to Historical Film – shows their potential contribution to the study of historical realities, as well as their weaknesses and limitations. Insightfully presenting and discussing these approaches, I argue, Rosenstone and Parvulescu’s volume is an important step forward in the ongoing endeavor to methodologically incorporate film analysis in the academic research of history.

Rethinking History, 2007

This article consists of an extended review of Robert Rosenstone's book, History on Film/Film on History (Pearson, 2006). The review evaluates three key contributions: first, the description of the development of a field of study dedicated to examining the relationship between film and history; second, Rosenstone's demand that history on film be judged not in relation to written history but as a valid and productive form of representation in its own right; and, third, the book's presentation of a taxonomy of the history film.

Course Description: Memory, history and time work through the cinematic narrative in ways that make the medium significantly different from all the other art forms. Film in a variety of ways lends itself to the possibility of organizing not just historical knowledge but also comments on the nature of historical narration. As an archive of sensations, of emotions, of images and of sounds, film works as a powerful recorder of life and its events, and as a form of witnessing and testimony. Ideas of the past as they permeate the present through cinema will be analyzed in this course by looking at the different ways in which films make connections between history and evidence, between history and the present, between historical narration and the historical event, and between memory and representation. If the history of cinema is a history of the 20th century, it contains within its archive a history of modern subjectivity (Geoffrey Nowell-Smith). Moving through popular genres, documentaries, art cinema and avant-garde film practice, the course will explore the intricate relationship between film and history as it unfolds in the terrain of World Cinema.

Res Historica , 2020

Abstract The article deals with the issue of strategy of historicizing film narrative and the world presented on a screen in historical cinema. It shows with what elements the film narrative and the world presented on a screen are historicized. In the introduction of the article, the most important analytical categories such as historical film and strategies of historicizing film narrative and the world presented on a screen are conceptualized. Historical film is defined as an operational category requiring conceptualization relativized to a cultural context of its use. A historical film is described as a screening work covering various genological structures, the subject of which relates to the past. The strategies of historicizing the film narrative and the film world presented on a screen are understood as numerous ways of equipping the film with various signs of historicity that allow the viewer/researcher to get an impression of the screen effect of a time shift towards the past. In the following parts of the article, the signs of historicity that have the function of historicizing the film narrative and the world presented on a screen are analyzed on the examples of various films covering a wide spectrum of history from ancient times to the present day. The Signs of historicity include the following elements: (1) scenery, stage design, costumes; (2) language; (3) music; (4) characterization; (5) events and characters. Strategies of historicizing the world presented on a screen and film narrative, which have been analyzed in the article, play a particularly important role in the so-called classic films made in the aesthetics of zero style cinema. Key words: visual history, historical film, film narrative, depicted world, staging, historicizing, set design, costumes, language, music, events, characters, makeup, mise-enscène.

On its surface, the historical film genre appears easy to define as a film that depicts historical events. However, after many decades of research into the film and history discourse, a concrete definition of what constitutes a historical film continues to elude film scholars. There is no singular answer as to what defines a film as 'historical', as nearly every notable film and history theorist, such as Robert Rosenstone, Natalie Davis and Robert Burgoyne, have their own proposition as to what defines a historical film. Elements such as the amount of accurate history contained in a narrative, how many years in the past a film has to be set, and whether the term 'historical' should be used in the genre's description, have fluctuated between theorist to theorist. While the function of the historical film is understandably contended, the lack of definition regarding what a historical film actually constitutes is a major deficit in the film and history discourse. Yet in order to find this singular definition, it must first be known why this definition has not yet been found. Using South Korean historical cinema as key examples, this paper seeks to not only answer why a singular definition has not yet been determined, but also, through the examination of the works of notable film and history theorists, aims to propose an alternative way of classifying films as historical.

Cultural Studies Review, 2011

The article focuses on the use of film as a medium of historical research. It discusses the film "Shoah," directed by Claude Lanzmann, which is considered as a model for filmic history. It also looks into Robert Rosenstone's claim that people may consider filmmakers as historians and that people should derive theory from practice through analyzing how the past has been portrayed in films.

Film, History and Memory, 2015

Custen (1992) argues that our understanding of the world is shaped by the filmic representation of history and important historical figures. This essay explores the arguments around the (mis)representation of history in film.

Seminar, 2022

This short essay seeks to understand the historical film genre in Hindi/Hindustani cinema, taking example from the studio period of the 1930s, and the contemporary focus on topics such as Maratha and Rajput relations with the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empire.

, quondam scholar, teacher, and university president said, seeing the didactic usefulness of 'The Birth of A Nation', which first came to the screen in 1915. Famous propagandists were equally quick to perceive the importance of the new medium. Lenin and Trotsky saw its value for their political message. 'Of all the arts,' Lenin said, 'cinema is the most important instrument.' Reichminister for Propaganda, Dr. Paul Joseph Goebbels, took control of the German film industry early on and turned feature films and the German Weekly Newsreels into masterpieces of the art of deception.' Scholar-president and political leaders who sought to move the great mass of their peoples-these men quickly saw the radically different uses of film for recalling the past. Since the early twentieth century, when amazing new devices for locomotion, communication and for increasing production and comfort suddenly broke through to the public consciousness, thinkers and users alike have tried to grapple with their long-term, often unintended effects. One of these new devices was, of course, the moving picture. Like the still camera earlier, it revolutionized the possibilities of representation and consequently deeply affected patterns of thought. The cinematograph was first used for public entertainment, but soon showed its potential as an information-providing device. Today, historians, like their students and the public, sit before cinema and television screens watching, being entertained by, and learning from filmed history in romanticized 'features' and seemingly objective documentaries. Seeing something on film often becomes 'being there', as Roland Barthes has said.2 Everywhere, history reported in film has been influential and there is firm evidence of its pedagogical effects.3