Movies – Fact or Fiction?

Whenever I hear about a movie being released, I would see if it is based on history or true events. If the movie is of that nature, I try to pick up the book that the movie is based on or any book that it relates to or any history book that talks about the event. I am not a movie buff and I watch movies very rarely. So the few I watch better be good ones, something that I can learn from. If the subject or the book is interesting enough, I would not even go to that movie as I know that movies never depict the history in its entirety.


I was seeing the ads for Public Enemies, which portrays the story and events of a bank robber, John Dillinger, (played by Jonny Depp) who is a gangster robbing banks in mid-‘30s in Midwest Indiana. Some of my friends who saw the movie this past weekend said that the movie was okay and that it had holes in the narration of John Dillinger's life. If it had to be a complete narration of his life, would that not become a documentary film? If a movie is based on true events or on history, the film producers try to capture the important facts and mix it with what I call 'masala' to make it passable for film watchers.


Any movie for that instance will not be a true depiction of the truth and will be made for the taste of the viewers and with the ultimate goal of making money at the box office. Take for instance, the movie 'Catch me if you can'. That movie depicted the life of Frank Abagnale Jr. (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) in 1940s, who was also robbing banks but not as a gangster but by working alone, forging checks and playing the banking routing rules. In the movie, it is shows that FBI agent, Carl Hanratty, played by Tom Hanks was a real person who ended up catching Frank. The movie also showed as Frank escaping from a VC10 jetliner by removing the toilet and climbing down beneath it. But if you read up on the history books than you would know that it is not true or that it is even impossible for it to happen. This is what I call 'adding masala' to pass the movie to the audience.


Even when the movies 'The DaVinci Code' or 'Angels and Demons' came out, the Christian group and the Roman Church protested against the movie being released because of some of the events that were shown. I am sure everyone knows that the author, Dan Brown (of both the movies) had mixed history and fiction; came out with a beautiful cocktail, that would make the readers (or watchers of the movies) to forget life for a while. Even after knowing this, why were their riots protesting the films? Movies’ ultimate goal is to provide a little bit of education on the subject but mostly to make money and entertain the viewers. If anyone is interested on the subject, read up more on it from the web or in the library. There is plethora of information out there and one should not depend just on the movies to get educated. That is like taking a ‘capsule’ and saying 'I know about the subject' without actually making a trip to your local library. If the library is closed, don’t pretend to be there, instead research on the web.