Hollywood’s distortion of truth Essay

When it comes to film’s interpretation of history and reality, such as the recent film’s â€Å"Argo† and â€Å"Zero Dark Thirty†, Hollywood has long had a habit of altering facts, creating illusions and fabrications, and even distorting final outcomes. Hollywood is an industry, and for a long time now, has understandably aimed at creating the best possible plot line with regard to its films. In some ways, it could be considered a â€Å"dream factory,† with regard to how removed from reality many of the Hollywood plot lines are. After all, Hollywood film makers are motivated by an economic imperative and as such their bottom line is profit, and aim to satisfy their target audience as greatly as possible. However, in too many films supposedly based on fact, reality and truth has been sacrificed all together, in the pursuit of pure, generic entertainment. The phrase, â€Å"don’t let truth get in the way of a good story† is worryingly, far too applicable to modern Hollywood. With regard to films that claim to be based on a TRUE story, there is a line that should be drawn when Hollywood creates its version of history. To put it simply, how untrue, is just true enough? It seems at present, the answer is somewhat flexible. On February 23rd this year, â€Å"Argo† a significantly dramatized, exaggerated and almost ahistorical interpretation of true story, took out the Academy award for â€Å"Best Picture†, the most prestigious of the Oscars. â€Å"Argo†, directed, produced by and starring Ben Affleck, portrays six helpless, and importantly, innocent Americans thrilling escape, notably orchestrated by the CIA, from the hostile and draconian revolutionary Iran, which is depicted to have been overrun by hoards of bearded savages. The story concludes with celebration, surrounding American, heroism, courage and innovation, leaving the Iranians with frustration in their defeat. Now this approach to film making is not unusual, take James Cameron’s â€Å"Avatar†, the highest grossing film of all time. â€Å"Avatar†, unlike â€Å"Argo†, does not imply that it represents history, and reality, and in this respect tells a fantastic story without misleading the audience. Hollywood blockbusters have always traditionally depicted one party as glorious and triumphant, and the other defeated. â€Å"Avatar†, depicts the peaceful, nomadic tribes of the planet Pandora and their experiences with Humans, who have recently landed on Pandora. The audience is positioned to sympathise with the tribes, before the natives are subject to ruthless invasion and onslaught by the armies of ‘future earth’, and with an enormous struggle, eventually emerge victorious over the violent and materialistic invaders. However, this is fantasy, and illusion, in resplendent, eye popping 3D. â€Å"Argo† on the other hand, and other films such as zero dark thirty, take dramatization and illusion a step further, by distorting the truth of the stories intended to be â€Å"based† on history. In this respect, Hollywood alters reality and history for the audience, and leads them to believe fabricated tales and false facts. Argo’s portrayal of the American civilian escape from Iran as danger ridden, with capture and horror always just around the corner was a plot construction by Hollywood. One of the diplomats involved in the actual escape said of it; â€Å"Noone ever asked, the truth is the immigration officers barely looked at us and we were processed out the regular way†¦It was that straight forward†. The Hollywood interpretation of the true story was so far removed from reality that it prompted Ken Taylor, a Canadian Diplomat to say; â€Å"the amusing side is the script writer in Hollywood, had no idea what he was talking about†. According to Ben Affleck, â€Å"It’s okay to embellish, it’s okay to compress, as long as you don’t fundamentally change the nature of the story and what happened†. Yes, to a small extent it is. However, the reality in â€Å"Argo† was drastically manipulated. It portrayed the Iranian’s as immoral, ignored their docile side and failed to depict the fact that they too had a cause, and wanted justice. It made out as though it was almost entirely the American’s who had skilfully crafted and executed the escape plan, but in reality, according to Jimmy Carter, it was more than 90% a Canadian effort. The transformation of the truth and history, into â€Å"Argo†, somewhat resembled that of Griffin Mill’s ‘winning’ marketing elements for films in â€Å"The Player†, a satirical film on Hollywood, directed by Robert Altman. Mill talks of the factors in film needed to market it successfully; â€Å"Suspense, laughter, violence. Hope, heart, nudity, sex. Happy endings. Mainly happy endings. † His statement is then followed by the question asked by June; â€Å"What about reality? †. Hollywood applies Mill’s theory of â€Å"up, everything up†, too satisfy the profit motive by which Hollywood works, and in many cases glorify the American culture; as seen in the fictional conclusion of â€Å"Argo†. It should be acknowledged that this approach to interpretations of history by writers and directors is not new, and was evident in Shakespeare’s late 16th century in which he slanders Richard the 3rd in support of Tudor dynasty. When Hollywood advertises its intention to base a film around history and reality, its ahistorical interpretations of the truth should be curbed, as it is through story telling that we learn about ourselves, and our cultures as the human race. Recent research has shown that film, far more than previously thought is an incredibly powerful tool for teaching ; children in particular. When films distort the truth, and include incorrect facts, the audience too interprets history, and the reality falsely, even the falsity is outlined pre and post screening of the film. In this respect, when claiming to represent truth, Hollywood should defeat the powerful temptation to apply to the film many of Griffin Mill’s ‘successful marketing elements’, and rather than fabricate to produce pure entertainment, represent truth so that society may understand history, truth, and reality.