history_spork ([info]history_spork) wrote,
@ 2005-05-20 14:45:00
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Current mood: creative

Two historians & their little sandbox
We blame Ridley Scott. "Kingdom of Heaven" was just begging to be sporked, and so we did, here and here. We had the time of our lives doing it, and it turned out that fellow geeks other people liked it, so we were quickly resolved to do it again.

Since this is very much a joint-venture undertaking by [info]cutecoati and [info]fourth_rose, this journal was created to serve as our common sandbox to play in. Our next victim will be "Gladiator" which will be posted sometime next week. After that, everything's game - classics from the 40ies as well as brand-new blockbusters and all that's in between.

For clarification: we don't spork these movies because we hate them. Quite the contrary. We both have a perverse liking for butchered history, Hollywood-style - all we ask for is that it's fun to watch!

So, we hope you'll enjoy the ride and join into the mocking! And if you've got a favourite history movie that you'd like to see sporked, please leave a suggestion in the comments to this entry. We'll do our best - unless it's Oliver Stone's "Alexander". This one is to be worshipped, not ridiculed ;-)

[info]cutecoati & [info]fourth_rose




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[info]zoepaleologa
2005-05-20 02:16 pm UTC (link)
Here via lj of [info]cordelia_v. What a brilliant idea for an lj. Go to! I have friended, hope you do not mind.

Request?

BRAVEHEART.

*cries at the thought of the historical canon rape that is Braveheart*

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]cutecoati
2005-05-20 06:36 pm UTC (link)
Welcome!!

OMG Braveheart!!! There would've been no escape for us, anyway...

*off to whet knives*

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]shocolate, 2005-05-21 02:49 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]zoepaleologa, 2005-05-21 07:19 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]casfic, 2005-05-22 07:45 am UTC
(no subject) - (Anonymous), 2005-05-24 10:03 am UTC
(no subject) - (Anonymous), 2005-06-30 03:27 pm UTC

[info]sophierom
2005-05-20 02:29 pm UTC (link)
Hi! Here via [info]cordelia_v. Loved your spork of "Kingdom of Heaven."

As an Americanist, I'd love to see a sporking of Mel Gibson's "The Patriot," but I'm sure I'll enjoy whatever you choose as your next project. :-D

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]faramir_boromir
2005-05-20 06:10 pm UTC (link)
Will grit my teeth and watch Patriot, sporks at the ready, if someone promises me lots of chocolate therapy afterwards. *spoken like the early Americanist I am*

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]balfrog, 2005-05-20 10:48 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]i_like_soap, 2005-05-21 01:05 am UTC

[info]cordelia_v
2005-05-20 02:35 pm UTC (link)
OK, I have two ideas. Alas, I'm too lazy and busy (I need to close this and start RL writing) to go look up the actual film names, but I'm hoping one of you (or a reader) knows the films I'm referring to.

My main peeve (since I'm a women's historian) is the abuse of gender in historical films. And I struggle endlessly with students who got their ideas about gender roles in the past from watching these pieces of butchery. So, two of the films I often have to contend with are:

1. "Dangerous Beauty"?? (think that's the name) a film about Italian courtesans during the Renaissance, which makes prostitution look like a glamorous, fun profession (always provokes me, that) and also as if gender hierarchy simply didn't exist.

2. A movie about Elizabeth I of England (I think simply entitled "Elizabeth") which really puts the "costume" in the phrase "costume drama." Vogue meets the 16th century.

Also, I completely second June's request for a send-up of "Braveheart."

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]angevin2
2005-05-20 06:30 pm UTC (link)
YES YES YES. I found this while surfing around LJ, and would like to second the request for a sporking of Elizabeth, which oh so richly deserves it.

(One of my profs, incidentally, occasionally shows the movie in his "Age of Elizabeth" seminar, and once asked "What's wrong with this movie?" as a final exam question. Fortunately he didn't do so the year I took the course, though it would have been fun, probably.)

Also, I third the request for Braveheart, on the grounds that a) it sucked and b) it made my recent course in Middle Scots poetry unnecessarily painful. ;)

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - (Anonymous), 2005-05-21 09:41 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]mrs_muggle, 2005-05-22 11:44 am UTC

[info]cordelia_v
2005-05-20 02:36 pm UTC (link)
ps--Oh, and perhaps a spork of one of the many, awful movies about Joan of Arc?

(Reply to this) (Thread)


(Anonymous)
2005-05-21 09:44 pm UTC (link)
Interesting question - which Joan of Arc movie is the least inaccurate?

I like Jacques Rivette's version and Dreyer's is a classic that could be most terribly inaccurate and still rule over all the others.

(Reply to this) (Parent)


[info]anneline
2005-05-20 02:38 pm UTC (link)
I'm here via [info]cordelia_v to read anything you choose spork.

(Reply to this)


[info]lucindalovegood
2005-05-20 02:49 pm UTC (link)
Troy, please. :D

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]lucindalovegood
2005-05-20 03:05 pm UTC (link)
(Well, okay, yes... Troy might be a LITTLE bit difficult to spork. Due to a dearth of verifiable fact about the time period. But it'd be so very funny.)

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) - [info]cloudlessnights, 2005-05-20 05:17 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]shocolate, 2005-05-21 02:51 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]zoepaleologa, 2005-05-20 06:47 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]crikkita, 2005-05-20 11:22 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]lucindalovegood, 2005-05-21 08:08 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]isilmekementari, 2005-05-21 10:34 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]zoepaleologa, 2005-05-21 07:20 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]pufftmg, 2005-05-21 07:46 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]crikkita, 2005-05-21 08:13 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]pufftmg, 2005-05-21 08:32 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]sookail, 2005-05-21 08:23 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]loveisloud89, 2005-05-26 11:34 pm UTC

[info]lareinenoire
2005-05-20 02:56 pm UTC (link)
Ah, Dangerous Beauty. I actually quite enjoyed that film, in spite of the aforementioned flaws. But I've always had a weakness for Italian Renaissance anything, and it was spectacularly pretty (I suspect that's also a flaw, really, given sanitation standards). Anyway.

Definitely Braveheart. I remember first seeing it, and then reading through a history of the period, and doing a sheltered-thirteen-year-old-bookworm version of 'WTF'?

Now, I haven't *seen* King Arthur, but I've been told it's fabulously sporkworthy. Oh yes! Pearl Harbour (another one I made a point of avoiding, but again, one hears many things).

I'll end by saying that I'm apparently a fan of--and writing my dissertation on--an author who has been described literally, and in a work of literary criticism as a man who has raped French history, but produced beautiful children. ::facepalm:: I can only say that fandom has infected me, because the first thought I had when I read that was OMGCanon Rape! and the vague desire to write an essay comparing modern fanfiction criticism and that of historical novels in 19th-century France...I scare myself sometimes.

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]balfrog
2005-05-20 10:51 pm UTC (link)
Dumas? or Hugo?

(Reply to this) (Parent)


[info]mizbean
2005-05-20 03:46 pm UTC (link)
I going to second whoever suggested the Patriot. Really hated that movie. And don't you know, it's one of my brother-in-law's favorites. I'm not sure how much expertise you have in American history, but yikes, revisionist much? If there's nothing else, it has the yummy Jason Isaacs getting all Lucius Malfoy on Heath Ledger's arse.

There's also The Last Samurai, which my friend, the Japanese History professor, got worked into a lather over. I actually haven't brought myself to watch that one because I avoid Tom Cruise's movies on principle.

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]fungus_files
2005-05-20 10:51 pm UTC (link)
I 2nd The Last Samurai - I avoided it for a long, long time but saw it a few months ago. not as traumatic as I'd imagined (politically) but still v Cruisey, v Hollywood history.

Wld love to see it a-spork. :)

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]pufftmg, 2005-05-21 07:53 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]fungus_files, 2005-05-22 11:44 pm UTC

[info]dragonlady7
2005-05-20 04:10 pm UTC (link)
Here via pimpage of [info]faramir_boromir.

I was raised in a household where my parents, both history majors, would spork television shows as they were ongoing. I thought this was normal behavior. I went with my friends and we sporked Pearl Harbor on opening night (we were there for the FotR trailer)-- my favorite bit was the donating blood into coke bottles, at which point no less than two of my friends yelled out the slogans from old Coke commercials at the same time. "Just for the taste of it!" "The real thing!" (A third yelled out a Pepsi slogan."You got the right one baby!" We forgave him.)

I'd de-recommend King Arthur because there really isn't any history in it, and the dialogue is all non-sequiturs anyway. It was shiny but not so much anti-historical as utterly irrelevant to history. But yes, the concept of Freedom is pretty damn ridiculous in all of these movies and it bugs me that it's become so widespread. There are other rallying cries, you know. Bah!

My dad has fun listening to others discuss pseudo-historical movies they've seen and then quietly deflating the whole thing with a well-aimed spork. Someone saw the Mel Gibson Vietnam one and was talking about how great it was, and I think Dad managed to kill that one with a single eyebrow. (See, he's a Vietnam vet who saw combat in Kontum and Pleiku from 1968-69, and the speaker knew that, and...)

But yes. Yes! I am wholeheartedly behind this concept.

(Reply to this)


[info]dphearson
2005-05-20 07:48 pm UTC (link)
Dangerous Liasons- the one with the lovely Glenn Close and john Malkovich.

Also, Pride and Prejudice- the Lawrence Olivier version.

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]shezan
2005-05-21 01:10 am UTC (link)
Dangerous Liaisons wasn't bad, except for the shooting expedition and the poor.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) - [info]pepperjackcandy, 2005-05-21 08:56 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]ciara_belle, 2005-05-21 10:34 pm UTC

[info]tracy_loo_who
2005-05-20 08:04 pm UTC (link)
*dead*

Can't wait for Gladiator and Braveheart. :D:D

And it's technically not a movie, but I'd be vastly amused if you guys did a couple of Smallville episodes or something, hahha.

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]tracy_loo_who
2005-05-20 08:07 pm UTC (link)
NOT that it has anything to do with actual history, but meh. >.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]pepperjackcandy, 2005-05-21 08:59 pm UTC

[info]valis2
2005-05-20 09:23 pm UTC (link)
Great idea for a community! Glad to see that Braveheart will get a tromping...it really takes liberties with history, that's for certain.

I'd love to see someone trounce Kevin Costner's Robin Hood movie...oh yes.

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]keight_2001
2005-05-20 10:27 pm UTC (link)
I second the Robin Hood Prince of Thieves suggestion. There is no end of the fun to be had with that one - the Marion as Ninja stuff, the fact that they walked from Dover to Nottingham in a day (which, OK, is actually geography but still desperately needs sporking).
Love this idea for a community - I came here via Cordelia_v and I have friended.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) - [info]valis2, 2005-05-20 10:35 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]fernwithy, 2005-05-21 05:46 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]valis2, 2005-05-21 05:49 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]fernwithy, 2005-05-21 07:25 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]valis2, 2005-05-21 07:32 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]zoepaleologa, 2005-05-21 07:22 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]valis2, 2005-05-21 07:25 pm UTC

[info]balfrog
2005-05-20 11:22 pm UTC (link)
Will watch avidly. Such fun!

Am Victorianist myself, but am foolishly addicted to costume drama so really can't pick anything to spork off the top of my head.

I did like those PBS Wishbone series though. Hee hee.

(okay, will go and hide now)

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]niteofdreams
2005-05-23 12:26 am UTC (link)
:squeels: Wishbone was my introduction to "fine literature" :P Ok, not really, but I did love the series.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) - [info]balfrog, 2005-05-23 04:18 am UTC

[info]whimbley
2005-05-20 11:30 pm UTC (link)
Hi! Found you through cloudlessnights and have friended. Hope that's ok.

I have to go along with the several other suggestions for "King Arthur". This should be fun!

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[info]moonanddogstar
2005-05-20 11:50 pm UTC (link)
I don't have a particular preference for what you spork next but I intend to watch the films as you spork them! I'm sure I'll enjoy them twice as much!
Oh and I actually liked King Arthur *ducks objects being thrown* :D

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[info]nosinabook
2005-05-20 11:51 pm UTC (link)
You're brilliant!!! This stuff is hilarious...I had to friend you!

Braveheart, The Patriot...kill them. They've earned it.

(Reply to this)


[info]tesseract_5
2005-05-21 12:18 am UTC (link)
TROY, needs a poke in the nose, poor thing. all those godly muscled boys.

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[info]sorcressgrey
2005-05-21 01:02 am UTC (link)
Here via [info]cloudlessnights, and as someone who just completed an undergrad honors thesis on history and film, I say HURRAH!

My little suggestion (which I have already academically!sporked in said thesis) is Hidalgo, which not only deals with a man who was a chronic liar, it also treats Arabs like shite. Go wild.

Oh, and ditto on the Alexander comment. When will that beauty ever come out on DVD? WHEN?!

(Reply to this)


[info]i_like_soap
2005-05-21 01:03 am UTC (link)
Hi! I fiended you, because you sound like me. I believe my friends wanted to kick me out of Troy...

There are so many! And yes, I love them all, but still it's so much fun. And I can see why Alexander should be worshipped, there woul dbe too much too spork. Gladiator wanted to be done.
TROY is a history killer.
Braveheart.
King Arthur.
First Knight.
So many more.

(Reply to this)


[info]shezan
2005-05-21 01:06 am UTC (link)
Have joined! have joined! *grabs Duby* *glomps*

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[info]shezan
2005-05-21 01:08 am UTC (link)
How about sporking The Man In The Iron Mask? As both a French historian & a happy Alexandre Dumas reader, I volunteer for the next sporking detail. (With other, because, hey, more fun that way?)

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]chocolatepot
2005-05-22 01:07 am UTC (link)
YES! YES! Man in the Iron Mask!

And what makes it even worse for me is that I saw a fic once where the author described Remus Lupin as looking like a young Louis the Which, and I had just been looking at pictures of him online--so I recalled the lack of beauty with which he was endowed, and then recalled the screenshot of Leo. I was very distraught over that.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]lied_ohne_worte, 2006-08-27 08:57 pm UTC

[info]shezan
2005-05-21 01:10 am UTC (link)
... and Casablanca!

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[info]absurdwords
2005-05-21 08:33 am UTC (link)
I can only second Braveheart, The Patriot, and King Arthur.

(Reply to this)


[info]a_belladonna
2005-05-21 09:48 am UTC (link)
Here from [info]scribbulus_ink. Loved your sporkings of Kingdom of Heaven! :)

What about:

"Shakespeare in Love"
"Titanic" (You can even do this twice, there's a mini-series with Catherine Zeta-Jones too.)
"The Three Musketeers" (The Disney version from 1993!)
"Elizabeth" (by Shekhar Kapur, 1998)
"Rob Roy"
"Ned Kelly"
"Dances with Wolves"
"Wyatt Earp"

And I second the other suggestions for spork-worthy movies. :)

(Reply to this) (Thread)


[info]cake_horse
2005-05-21 08:06 pm UTC (link)
Please do Shakespeare in Love. I detest that movie.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(no subject) - [info]foudebassan, 2005-05-22 09:31 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]a_belladonna, 2005-05-22 02:37 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]la_fono, 2005-05-25 09:51 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]a_belladonna, 2005-05-26 08:55 am UTC

[info]isilmekementari
2005-05-21 10:38 am UTC (link)
Found through cloudlessnights and friended, hope thats alright! I LOVE this whole idea, its fantastic! I'd love to see all the movies mentioned so far sporked, especially Titanic :D

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