MovieChat Forums > The Story of Film: An Odyssey (2011) Discussion > Inaccuracies?

Inaccuracies?

posted 13 years ago by casio_balboa
25 replies | jump to latest

And I quote, "The influence of films like 'Primary' was immediate. In his film 'Shadows', New York director John Cassavetes followed three fictional African-American siblings just as Drew had followed Kennedy."

I'm not necessarily suggesting that Mark Cousins made a mistake here and suggested that 'Primary' (1960) influenced 'Shadows' (1959), which would be impossible as the latter was released the year before the former and Cousins said "like 'Primary'..." I'll give him more credit than that.

However, I am stating that this struck me as a poorly structured segue due to the aforementioned possibility of misinterpretation, as well as arguably inaccurate, since the shaky camera, 'Use any light that's available' aesthetic of 'Shadows' seems to have been more dominated by restraints and legitimised by neo-realism rather than the influence of this novel fly-on-the-wall documentary style.

But most of all and the real reason I'm posting this new topic: I'm interested in any outright inaccuracies anyone's spotted in the series.

[–] 11 years ago

[deleted]

[–] LadyJaneGrey 11 years ago

I am enjoying this series, but am finding his inaccuracies, like the Scarlett and her father mistake among others, to be grating.

Stanley Donen seemed a bit taken aback by Cousins's questions, like, "Did you feel you had nothing left to say?" or whatever, and Donen barks out, "No! If I had nothing left to say, I would be stupid." or some similar comment. He seemed hugely irritated by Cousins altogether.

[–] lisajohn-4 11 years ago

My thanks to all the contributors to this thread! I love film and documentaries about film. But factual inaccuracies on top of unsubstantiated opinions coupled with the most annoying, sing-song, valley-girl-with-an-Irish-accent narration in the history of film means that there is absolutely no reason to torture myself by watching another second of this series!

[–] hka-3 11 years ago

The unsubstantiated opinions were why I turned it off. In many cases it only takes a few seconds to provide information which would back up his claims. It was too distracting thinking, "What proof does he have of that claim?" I don't expect him to always be right, but he could at least give me enough information so I can see where he's coming from on those subjects.

That said, it's a shame this documentary was presented poorly, because it seems like it could've been something great for a wider audience.

[–] TrevorAclea 11 years ago

The unsubstantiated opinions were why I turned it off. In many cases it only takes a few seconds to provide information which would back up his claims. It was too distracting thinking, "What proof does he have of that claim?"

The entirely gratuitous and unsubstantiated throwaway claim that Howard Hawks was a bisexual is a classic example, and one which seems to have more to do with Cousins' obsessions (in his Scene by Scene series he was always pushing directors to admit there were 'hummersaxyewal uvvertoenes' in their work no matter how much they insisted there weren't) than something as mundane as facts or research.

"Security - release the badgers."

[–] moilane 10 years ago

How can we trust the judgement of a grown man about complex aesthetic issues, when he can't even add or subtract?

Maybe because he's better at aesthetic issues than years and numbers?

[–] russalex86 10 years ago

A lot of these inaccuracies are pretty bad although I haven't bothered to check whether all the statements here are true. There should be more fact checking. But, are they enough to dismiss the whole series? It's good to point inaccuracies.
I remember somewhere on this site a user dismissing the writings of Roger Ebert because he had made mistakes in his reviews over the years. Isn't that to be expected if he writes thousands of reviews? What critic doesn't make mistakes? I mean if I was to check all the reviews of the users here would I find mistakes? You're not making a series with them, but still.

[–] TrevorAclea 10 years ago

When you're basing your entire thesis on a genre around a fallacy or trying to insist straight directors were gay or bisexual to further some personal agenda it's a major issue.

"Security - release the badgers."