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Date | Original Topic | 9th April 2003 | how authentic is the film By darren i am doing a project and wanted to know if any one could tell me how true to life the film zulu is does it potray a realistic version of event or does dipict a romantic ideal of the british impeariel fighting machine | Date | Replies | 9th April 2003 | Diana Blackwell Darren,
That's an ongoing source of controversy, both in this very forum and elsewhere. It's generally agreed that "Zulu" contains a lot of inaccuracies. An article called "Observations on the film "Zulu"" by John MacAdam, from the Journal of the Anglo-Zulu War Research Society, goes into these in detail. The film's politics are discussed in a couple of other articles. "Zulu: The Limits of Liberalism" by Christopher Sharrett (Cineast, Vol. XXV, #4) finds imperialist biases in the film, while "Monkey Feathers: Defending Zulu" by Sheldon Hall (British Historical Cinema, Mark & Sargent, Rutledge, 2002) convincingly argues to the contrary.
( I think "Zulu" does quite a good job of balancing romanticism and realism. The scenery, music, costumes, etc., are made as beautiful as humanly possible, but war is still shown to be a horrible carnage of which even the victors feel "ashamed.") | 10th April 2003 | Clive Dickens Darren
If you join us on this site you will soon realise even we argue over the what are considered to be the actual facts of the Anglo/Zulu war so what hope did the film makers have, one thing I think we all agree on it roused one hell of an interest in events of that war.
Clive | 10th April 2003 | John Young Diana,
Just to pick you up on your above comment, we've never published anything by John McAdam, in our society's Journal - you're actually confusing us with the Anglo Zulu War Historical Society, which did publish the piece. However, most of the factual detail did come from me for the article.
John Y. | 10th April 2003 | Diana Blackwell John,
My apologies for the mistake. | 12th April 2003 | james hi diana thanks for the informaton but where would i go about getting some reading material and what would you best suggest. and how did you become so informed about the subject and why? | 13th April 2003 | darren many thanks to you all you have been so helpful. i would also like to ask where i could best find the politcal journal's Diana was talking about. | 13th April 2003 | Diana Blackwell Darren,
Have you tried a library?
| 14th April 2003 | darren Diana
no never thought of that! |
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