What historical events or people would make a good film?

I agree. A good neutral series of films (for cinema or TV) on the French Revolution would be great. Honestly, the whole war was a live-action portrayal of the tragedy of human nature. The tragic hero being France as a whole. The Revolution was obviously started for extremely valid and just reasons. But the noble intentions were perverted by greed, lust for power, hatred, prejudice and paranoia. These turned what ought to have been a simple triumph against tyranny into the French bathing their nation in the blood of their own countrymen. It was a terrible method to use for such a noble endeavor.

Thank you for the book recommendation! I typically don't go in for biographies, but that one sounds too interesting to pass up.

"A historically accurate Richard III biopic? We could use one of those."

I dunno, it depends upon what we mean by "historically accurate". Personally it seems pretty obvious to me that Richard had his nephews murdered, so I wouldn't enjoy a movie that takes the Richard III Society's view and turns him into a saint.

I do agree with the basic idea, though. "Game of Thrones" steals gobs and gobs of material from The Wars Of The Roses—Robb Stark gets married for love just like Edward IV did, and it backfired on both of them—so that whole era would obviously be rich for cinematic potential.

Oh heck, who are we kidding, the only way a Richard III movie gets made is if Iron Man strikes him down at Bosworth.

I don't know what more you would want for Richard III then The White Queen.

Willem Arondeus: he was a Homosexual Dutch anti-Nazi fighter who bombed the Amsterdam Public Records Office to hinder the Nazi identification of Jews. He was arrested & executed. His last words were, "Let it be known that homosexuals are not cowards."

I thought historians were pretty sure he DIDN'T kill his nephews, or at least that had no proof of what did happen, let alone the Richard had anything to do with it.

I'm talking historically accurate Richard - not the fun deformed megalomaniac Shakespeare made famous (he had scoliosis, but it was visible accept for a saggy shoulder). One, he was quite young when he died and two, He wasn't terrible or evil.

Basically his nephews vanished and nobody knows what happened to them. And Richard III then went down swinging.

lol. You can't hate him for that.

Also, people seem to forget he was only 32 when he was killed. A very young man. He's always played by older fellows.

32 was already considered being late middle-aged during the time however.

That doesn't make any sense tho. Why would people in medieval Europe have had such short lifespans if before they tended to live as long as us - if I recall correctly there are a lot of recorded historical figures from antiquity who lived at least into their 70s

Actually, there were so many stillbirths and such a high infant mortality rate that the average age went down. Discounting those it's probably around 60-70.

Eh, the majority of people probably only lived to their late 40's to early 60's at best. It's likely only the pampered upper class (who in some ways live better then than most poor people now in the 21st century) got to see their 70's.

edited 15th Jul '15 8:21:00 AM by Ekuran

Richard III had motive, means, and opportunity. No, nobody can prove it, but Occam's Razor and such.

"Why would people in medieval Europe have had such short lifespans if before they tended to live as long as us - if I recall correctly there are a lot of recorded historical figures from antiquity who lived at least into their 70s"

• Infant mortality, as noted above.
• Death by childbirth.
• Diseases, lots and lots of diseases.

So yeah, it's true—the average life span was quite a bit younger, but if you lived to 32 back in the day you'd probably look reasonably similar to what a 32-year-old person would look like today, even more so if you lived your whole life (until your head got caved in at Bosworth) in the lap of luxury.

Re: the main point—I do agree that a Richard III miniseries would be a great idea. Hell, make one on the Wars of the Roses in general. You could have Richard Duke of York getting his head cut off and put on a tower, Edward IV marrying for love and getting overthrown, Henry VI the drooling idiot king, Towton, Tewksbury, Bosworth. TONS of great material.

edited 17th Jul '15 11:43:19 AM by gallium

One of Alexander the Great's generals that got a third of his empire after he died lived to be 75.

Thank you. So many people make the error of thinking that "median age of 40" means "most people died at age 40". Even today, in countries with a high mortality rate, it's mainly related to high infant mortality. There are tons of historical figures from the medieval period and before who lived into their 70s, or 80s, or older - so 32 is not old even for Richard III's time.

I was gonna suggest King Naresuan. Partly because he went from a hostage to one of the most famous kings in Southeast Asian history, but mainly because of his famous Elephant Battle, which is seriously one of the most over the top awesome events in all of history.◊ According to Wikipedia there's already exists a Thai movie series about him, though.

Seeing the success of Game of Thrones it might be a good idea to do a TV series about the Thirty Year's War, though that series would most likely be even more dark and cynical than Game of Thrones.

I think the life of Charles XIV would make a great movie; going from the son of a lawyer, to a soldier in the French Revolution, to one of Napoleon's Marshals, to the King of Sweden and Norway; especially following his gradual progression from a radical republican to a conservative monarchist.

edited 6th Aug '15 5:03:36 AM by Druplesnubb

There are already a couple of movies about him, they are just not from his perspective but from the perspective of his wife, Desiree, who is in a way an even more interesting person because she used to date Napoleon himself. Since she was nice enough to keep a diary, there is a very famous book based on her life.

edited 6th Aug '15 5:09:13 AM by Swanpride

The Thirty Years war idea would not be that complicated to pull off, because this era has already been shown on screen a thousand times thanks to The Three Musketeers.

Plus, for once, Tywin Richelieu may not be the bad guy of the story.

Eleanor, Duchess of Aquitaine. All I know of is The Lion In Winter. Something of her younger would be good.

The Battle of Leyte Gulf, and if they want to make it more specific, there's the Battle off Samar. They even have a reference from which they can borrow the title, The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors, or maybe just simply "Taffy 3". It has all the typical "movie tropes" that are considered unrealistic...but happened in Real Life because Reality Is Unrealistic:

• The enemy complete surprises them
• The enemy proceeds with a flawed plan
• Despite the nigh insurmountable odds, they meet the enemy head-on
• Because of the protagonists' ferocity in fighting back, the enemy falters and falls back
• They get their victory even if it meant their death (i.e. sinking of their ship, their actual death)

And bonus: biggest battleship ever fires its guns.

^ Yeah, but if they want an accurate depiction the SFX team will have to work overtime to simulate the massive titanium testes of the tin can sailors.

edited 13th Aug '15 8:29:08 PM by Nohbody

IIRC one of the captains (L Cmdr. Evans) also had Balls of Steel because he has shrapnel on his groin but was still standing (and able to salute the crew of the other USN ship that passed by his now sinking ship). His first wounds were due to shrapnel cutting off his fingers (and that was from the early salvos when his ship wasn't sinking yet).

edited 13th Aug '15 9:06:56 PM by entropy13

Andrew Jackson.

Who?

The U.S. president whose favorite pastime was gun duels.