Sunday, November 26, 2006
..and speaking of Emma Thompson.
Stranger than Fiction is a smart, funny and moving philosophical fable. Emma Thompson gives a fine performance alongside Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Will Ferrell and Queen Lafifah. The last two play their roles with surprising but effective restraint.
Saturday, November 25, 2006
Henry V x II
When young Kenneth Branagh directed himself as Hal in Henry V, he invited comparison with young Laurence Olivier’s 1944 film. Let’s compare.
The play explicitly breaks the fourth wall with the prologue’s apology for the gap between the stage performance and the historical reality. Olivier uses this as springboard both for a loving recreation of the original Globe theatre and a chance to comment on how actors create and inhabit the roles they portray on the stage. We see Olivier first as an Elizabethan actor clearing his throat surrounded by a flurry of backstage chaos, next as the same actor portraying Henry V before an Elizabethan audience, and then as Henry V himself.
This is a tough act to follow, and Branagh wisely chooses a different tack. Derek Jacobi, always in a long dark 20th century coat and scarf, reappears as prologue and chorus to provide narration when required.
Olivier’s version edits out many of the darker elements in Shakespeare’s text. Branagh retains much more of the dark side of Henry and his play, although he too omits some of the grimmest elements, in particular the slaughter of the French prisoners.
Although Oliver had some respectable actors, Branagh assembled a stronger cast overall, with Ian Holm splendid as Fluellen, a radiant Emma Thompson as Princess Katherine, Paul Scofield as Charles VI, Brian Blessed as Exeter, Judi Dench as Mistress Quickly and Robbie Coltrane as Falstaff.
Both Branagh and Olivier owe a noticeable debt to better directors. Olivier features a mounted duel between the constable and Henry that owes a visible debt to a similar scene in Alexander Nevsky, and Branagh’s vision of Agincourt owes much to Seven Samurai.
Olivier repeatedly frames scenes and uses stylized backdrops to recreate the look of images from illuminations in the Tres Riches Heures de Duc de Berry. There’s a clear homage to the February page, although without exposed genitalia.
Branagh clearly ended up with a lower budget for armor. His English men-at-arms are grossly underarmored, and the Exeter, the Englishman with the most complete harness, wears an anachronistic and misshapen monstrosity. Even the French show the usual film reluctance to wear helmets. Olivier does better, but many of his are clearly not wearing a hard cuirass or breastplate beneath their jupons, or showing the characteristic pouter pigeon profile of the era. Recreating medieval armor is expensive, especially when you need to convey a reasonable impression of an army, and given a finite budget I don’t see a lot of places where Branagh could have found savings to do better without sacrificing other elements of the production. This isn’t Braveheart, where resources were lavished on a gratuitous and ahistorical assault on York. The charge of the French cavalry, which was a splendid and expensive tracking shot in the Olivier version, is dealt with quite economically in the Branagh version: a series of reaction shots of wide-eyed English looking offscreen as hoofbeats drum louder and louder on the soundtrack.
Branagh does portray the English heraldry accurately and effectively. The similar heraldic designs repeated on coat armor convey to the educated viewer how many of the English commanders were blood relatives to the king.
Both films err in showing the English men-at-arms fighting on horseback: dismounting all the men-at-arms to fight on foot was a key English tactic at this and most other battles of the war. Both films show men at arms wearing a separate plate neck defense that wrapped around the bottom edge of the helmet and allowed it to freely rotate within it. This is a misunderstanding of what frontal depictions in contemporary brasses were showing: a plate or plates attached directly to the helmet.
Olivier’s other historical lapses include the infamously wrong hoisting of French knights onto their horses with derricks and English bowmen leaping out of trees in the grand tradition of Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood. He also shows a number of round shields on the field. This may not be entirely wrong: this image from the period seems to show round shields born by two of the foreground men at arms. It is, however, unusual and atypical. It’s difficult to shake the impression that whoever was responsible for the costumes discovered he had several dozen round targes available and found it expedient to decorate them with Agincourt era heraldry. Mail coifs that close at the base of the throat and gap widely below are another annoyance to the purist.
Olivier includes a brief shot of the advancing French reflected in standing water, and after the first encounter pans to show muddy carnage behind the front line, but much of the other combat happens on a green, pastoral and unmuddy battlefield.
Branagh errs in the other direction, showing the battle as total chaos. The different accounts of Agincourt agree that the English men-at-arms kept good order thoughout the battle: this was a key ingredient in their victory.
Branagh only lightly evokes the bowl haircuts of the early 15th c. Olivier is more faithful to the look of the era in this and other ways. In general, Branagh often settled for a rough approximation of the dress, hairstyles and equipment of the period while Olivier came a lot closer to getting the same details right.
Branagh brings wonderful immediacy to Henry V. Courting Katherine, he asks if she can love him. Neither speaks the language of the other well, and when Katherine responds for the third time in the conversation with a baffled “I cannot tell” Branagh’s Hal snaps back with: “Can any of your neighbors tell, Kate? I’ll ask them” When I first heard this, I took for a sarcastic ad-lib added by Branagh, but no, it’s the way Shakespeare wrote it. Branagh’s delivery makes it work as natural dialog.
“..Notwithstanding the poor and untempered effect of my visage. Now beshrew my father’s ambition! He was thinking of civil wars when he got me…” complains Hal to Katherine. Branagh, who does not have a conventionally pretty mug, makes the line work well. Young Olivier, who was not in any sense an ugly man, couldn’t, and didn’t try.
Olivier plays the English clerics for low comedy. Branagh portrays them as deadly serious political players.
Olivier portrays the French nobility as ineffectual and foppish twits. In Branagh’s version they are, with the exception of the Dauphin, more dangerous opponents, but disunited. This is better drama and closer to Shakespeare’s text: a victory is enhanced when it is won over strong opponents rather than weak ones. Charles VI in Olivier’s version is a twitching mental defective. Historically he was, on and off, but Shakespeare chose to show him in a lucid phase, and Scofield’s portrayal is less distracting and closer to the text.
The play explicitly breaks the fourth wall with the prologue’s apology for the gap between the stage performance and the historical reality. Olivier uses this as springboard both for a loving recreation of the original Globe theatre and a chance to comment on how actors create and inhabit the roles they portray on the stage. We see Olivier first as an Elizabethan actor clearing his throat surrounded by a flurry of backstage chaos, next as the same actor portraying Henry V before an Elizabethan audience, and then as Henry V himself.
This is a tough act to follow, and Branagh wisely chooses a different tack. Derek Jacobi, always in a long dark 20th century coat and scarf, reappears as prologue and chorus to provide narration when required.
Olivier’s version edits out many of the darker elements in Shakespeare’s text. Branagh retains much more of the dark side of Henry and his play, although he too omits some of the grimmest elements, in particular the slaughter of the French prisoners.
Although Oliver had some respectable actors, Branagh assembled a stronger cast overall, with Ian Holm splendid as Fluellen, a radiant Emma Thompson as Princess Katherine, Paul Scofield as Charles VI, Brian Blessed as Exeter, Judi Dench as Mistress Quickly and Robbie Coltrane as Falstaff.
Both Branagh and Olivier owe a noticeable debt to better directors. Olivier features a mounted duel between the constable and Henry that owes a visible debt to a similar scene in Alexander Nevsky, and Branagh’s vision of Agincourt owes much to Seven Samurai.
Olivier repeatedly frames scenes and uses stylized backdrops to recreate the look of images from illuminations in the Tres Riches Heures de Duc de Berry. There’s a clear homage to the February page, although without exposed genitalia.
Branagh clearly ended up with a lower budget for armor. His English men-at-arms are grossly underarmored, and the Exeter, the Englishman with the most complete harness, wears an anachronistic and misshapen monstrosity. Even the French show the usual film reluctance to wear helmets. Olivier does better, but many of his are clearly not wearing a hard cuirass or breastplate beneath their jupons, or showing the characteristic pouter pigeon profile of the era. Recreating medieval armor is expensive, especially when you need to convey a reasonable impression of an army, and given a finite budget I don’t see a lot of places where Branagh could have found savings to do better without sacrificing other elements of the production. This isn’t Braveheart, where resources were lavished on a gratuitous and ahistorical assault on York. The charge of the French cavalry, which was a splendid and expensive tracking shot in the Olivier version, is dealt with quite economically in the Branagh version: a series of reaction shots of wide-eyed English looking offscreen as hoofbeats drum louder and louder on the soundtrack.
Branagh does portray the English heraldry accurately and effectively. The similar heraldic designs repeated on coat armor convey to the educated viewer how many of the English commanders were blood relatives to the king.
Both films err in showing the English men-at-arms fighting on horseback: dismounting all the men-at-arms to fight on foot was a key English tactic at this and most other battles of the war. Both films show men at arms wearing a separate plate neck defense that wrapped around the bottom edge of the helmet and allowed it to freely rotate within it. This is a misunderstanding of what frontal depictions in contemporary brasses were showing: a plate or plates attached directly to the helmet.
Olivier’s other historical lapses include the infamously wrong hoisting of French knights onto their horses with derricks and English bowmen leaping out of trees in the grand tradition of Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood. He also shows a number of round shields on the field. This may not be entirely wrong: this image from the period seems to show round shields born by two of the foreground men at arms. It is, however, unusual and atypical. It’s difficult to shake the impression that whoever was responsible for the costumes discovered he had several dozen round targes available and found it expedient to decorate them with Agincourt era heraldry. Mail coifs that close at the base of the throat and gap widely below are another annoyance to the purist.
Olivier includes a brief shot of the advancing French reflected in standing water, and after the first encounter pans to show muddy carnage behind the front line, but much of the other combat happens on a green, pastoral and unmuddy battlefield.
Branagh errs in the other direction, showing the battle as total chaos. The different accounts of Agincourt agree that the English men-at-arms kept good order thoughout the battle: this was a key ingredient in their victory.
Branagh only lightly evokes the bowl haircuts of the early 15th c. Olivier is more faithful to the look of the era in this and other ways. In general, Branagh often settled for a rough approximation of the dress, hairstyles and equipment of the period while Olivier came a lot closer to getting the same details right.
Branagh brings wonderful immediacy to Henry V. Courting Katherine, he asks if she can love him. Neither speaks the language of the other well, and when Katherine responds for the third time in the conversation with a baffled “I cannot tell” Branagh’s Hal snaps back with: “Can any of your neighbors tell, Kate? I’ll ask them” When I first heard this, I took for a sarcastic ad-lib added by Branagh, but no, it’s the way Shakespeare wrote it. Branagh’s delivery makes it work as natural dialog.
“..Notwithstanding the poor and untempered effect of my visage. Now beshrew my father’s ambition! He was thinking of civil wars when he got me…” complains Hal to Katherine. Branagh, who does not have a conventionally pretty mug, makes the line work well. Young Olivier, who was not in any sense an ugly man, couldn’t, and didn’t try.
Olivier plays the English clerics for low comedy. Branagh portrays them as deadly serious political players.
Olivier portrays the French nobility as ineffectual and foppish twits. In Branagh’s version they are, with the exception of the Dauphin, more dangerous opponents, but disunited. This is better drama and closer to Shakespeare’s text: a victory is enhanced when it is won over strong opponents rather than weak ones. Charles VI in Olivier’s version is a twitching mental defective. Historically he was, on and off, but Shakespeare chose to show him in a lucid phase, and Scofield’s portrayal is less distracting and closer to the text.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Judicial Duels in 13th-14th c. Guyenne
Steve Muhlberger's Early History blog has a link to an interesting document on the subject on the rich Gallica site.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Monday, November 13, 2006
Spurs or Swords?
Steve Muhlberger’s Early History blog has an interesting quote from Geoffrey de Charny’s questions on war, concerning a combat between two otherwise equal groups of mounted men at arms:
“One of the parties does not have any weapons except for their hands, but they have good spurs on their feet; those in the other party each have a good sword in their hands but no other weapons, but they have no spurs and can’t get any. Which of these would you rather be?”
A hundred years later it was still regarded as an open question. In Tirant lo Blanc, the following exchange occurs:
“….replied the hermit. “Let us see what you, who are young and versed in arms, have to say. Which would you rather be: strong but not skillful, or skillful but not strong?”
There were many opinions among the knights. Then the hermit asked which they would prefer: “To enter battle with sword but no spurs, or with spurs but no sword, for I can tell you I have witnessed such combats. I even saw one, fought before the Duke of Milan, in which two knights chose to joust in equal armor, but one was on horseback with only a sword, while the other was on foot with a lance and dagger. Who do you think had the advantage?”
The obvious implication is that this is a question without an obvious right answer from the 14th or 15th century point of view. I think the initial modern reaction is that being swordless is a crushing disadvantage and however bad being without spurs was, surely being without a sword was worse. But our modern reaction is unlikely to be informed by actual experience of how effective a sword is against an armored opponent fighting in earnest, or how easy it is to get a medieval warhorse to approach other warhorses garnished with men yelling and waving implements of destruction, either with or without spurs as tools of persuasion.
Surviving medieval fighting manuals suggest that even if two armored men start out with swords, the fight is quite likely to come down to wresting in the end: even on horseback. And accounts of mounted deeds of arms suggest that even with spurs getting a warhorse to override its instincts for self preservation is no easy task.
“One of the parties does not have any weapons except for their hands, but they have good spurs on their feet; those in the other party each have a good sword in their hands but no other weapons, but they have no spurs and can’t get any. Which of these would you rather be?”
A hundred years later it was still regarded as an open question. In Tirant lo Blanc, the following exchange occurs:
“….replied the hermit. “Let us see what you, who are young and versed in arms, have to say. Which would you rather be: strong but not skillful, or skillful but not strong?”
There were many opinions among the knights. Then the hermit asked which they would prefer: “To enter battle with sword but no spurs, or with spurs but no sword, for I can tell you I have witnessed such combats. I even saw one, fought before the Duke of Milan, in which two knights chose to joust in equal armor, but one was on horseback with only a sword, while the other was on foot with a lance and dagger. Who do you think had the advantage?”
The obvious implication is that this is a question without an obvious right answer from the 14th or 15th century point of view. I think the initial modern reaction is that being swordless is a crushing disadvantage and however bad being without spurs was, surely being without a sword was worse. But our modern reaction is unlikely to be informed by actual experience of how effective a sword is against an armored opponent fighting in earnest, or how easy it is to get a medieval warhorse to approach other warhorses garnished with men yelling and waving implements of destruction, either with or without spurs as tools of persuasion.
Surviving medieval fighting manuals suggest that even if two armored men start out with swords, the fight is quite likely to come down to wresting in the end: even on horseback. And accounts of mounted deeds of arms suggest that even with spurs getting a warhorse to override its instincts for self preservation is no easy task.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
The Rovers
Let's give three cheers for NASA, our robots are on Mars
Because we are American they look like shiny cars
They're brave and uncomplaining as they trundle here and there
They take a lot of pictures and they have no need for air
As we go forth into the void our robots lead the way
Put on your 3-d glasses and behold the Martian day!
Read their LiveJournals here and here.
But even robots have their limits...
Because we are American they look like shiny cars
They're brave and uncomplaining as they trundle here and there
They take a lot of pictures and they have no need for air
As we go forth into the void our robots lead the way
Put on your 3-d glasses and behold the Martian day!
Read their LiveJournals here and here.
But even robots have their limits...
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
2006 Study on Iraqi Deaths Contradicts 2004 Conclusions by Same Authors
The controversial Johns Hopkins study recently published in the Lancet follows up on a 2004 study by many of the same authors. The 2004 study was criticized because the limited sample size meant that the death estimates had a broad range of uncertainty. Nonetheless, the authors concluded that:
In the period of the study, about 60,00 Iraqis died from violence that wouldn't have happened if the prewar status quo had continued.
Most of them were killed by the invading coalition, and most of the victims were women and children.
In addition, another 40,000 Iraqis died from nonviolent causes that would have lived if the prewar status quo had continued, because of post invasion economic disruption, dislocation of the health care system, and so on.
In 2006, the team published a new study with a much larger sample size. The new study suggests that during the period measured by the 2004 study:
About 110,00 Iraqis died by violence. Most were killed either by insurgents or unidentified gunmen. Of the remainder killed by the coalition, most were males of military age.
Nonviolent deaths did not increase in the period immediately following the invasion. On the contrary, they decreased.
In a kinder, gentler universe, we might expect Les Roberts to explain:
"Wow. We really got the 2004 study wrong. In retrospect we should have understood that we didn't have enough data to know if most of the dead Iraqis were killed by the coalition or by local talent. We thought it was obvious that the coalition was using excessive force. In retrospect, we should have asked the coalition to be more agressive than it was. We were wrong and we're sorry"
I don't think we live in such a universe.
Will McLean
In the period of the study, about 60,00 Iraqis died from violence that wouldn't have happened if the prewar status quo had continued.
Most of them were killed by the invading coalition, and most of the victims were women and children.
In addition, another 40,000 Iraqis died from nonviolent causes that would have lived if the prewar status quo had continued, because of post invasion economic disruption, dislocation of the health care system, and so on.
In 2006, the team published a new study with a much larger sample size. The new study suggests that during the period measured by the 2004 study:
About 110,00 Iraqis died by violence. Most were killed either by insurgents or unidentified gunmen. Of the remainder killed by the coalition, most were males of military age.
Nonviolent deaths did not increase in the period immediately following the invasion. On the contrary, they decreased.
In a kinder, gentler universe, we might expect Les Roberts to explain:
"Wow. We really got the 2004 study wrong. In retrospect we should have understood that we didn't have enough data to know if most of the dead Iraqis were killed by the coalition or by local talent. We thought it was obvious that the coalition was using excessive force. In retrospect, we should have asked the coalition to be more agressive than it was. We were wrong and we're sorry"
I don't think we live in such a universe.
Will McLean
Saturday, October 14, 2006
More than 600,000 killed in Iraq?
So says a recent Johns Hopkins study published in the Lancet. Is it true? That's a huge number: somewhat more, as a share of population than the American Civil War, which took longer, and was fought with mass conscripted armies and 19th c. medicine and sanitation.
It's important to point out that this isn't an estimate of civilian dead. The study makes clear that there was no effort to exclude combatants from the death toll, and the study indicates that military age males account for a majority of violent deaths. The New York Times incorrectly described it as an estimate of civilian deaths, and I have not yet seen them publish a correction.
The Lancet's editor does seem to be to be a strong advocate for a particular political point of view with an interest in seeing the invasion of Iraq proved to have been a Very Bad Thing. That may have affected the timing of the study's release, and how vigorously it was reviewed before publication. Ultimately, however, the conclusions will rise and fall on the quality of the study itself.
The vast discrepancy between the estimate and the official figures raises concern, but not necessarily a fatal one. It is possible that local tallies of violent deaths at hospitals and mortuaries are either not making it in to the central government or being suppressed. That they are not being recorded at all seems an insufficient explanation: about 90% of the households in the survey that reported a death were able to provide a death certificate when asked.
More troubling is the discrepancy between the mid 2004 UNDP survey and this one. It used similar cluster sampling methodology to the Johns Hopkins study, but estimated 25,000 killed in the year following the invasion, compared to about 90,000 estimated by the Johns Hopkins study in the same period. It would appear that the UNDP figure was not intended to capture ordinary criminal murders, but that's hardly enough to explain the discrepancy: Insurgency, counter insurgency and sectarian violence seems to account for the lion's share of violent deaths.
Why might the John Hopkins study be wrong? To start with, it relies on dividing the country into equal size clusters, and sampling a group of households in each cluster. Accuracy depends on reasonably accurate estimates of population by region. One challenge is that accurate population estimates are hard to find in Iraq. The last nationwide census was 1993. Further, there's reason to question the accuracy of the Saddam era censuses: the ruling party had strong motives for inflating the number of Sunnis at the expense of other groups. The problem is compounded by the study's use of a two year old estimate.
If the population is overestimated in the more dangerous parts of Iraq, and underestimated in the less, then the more dangerous parts will be overrepresented in the sample. There's good reason to think that this was the case. The Sunni triangle would have benefited from any Saddam era selective distortion, and is generally considered to be one of the more violent parts of Iraq, and indeed this reflected is in the Johns Hopkins study. Further, you would expect the more violent regions to lose population share relative to the rest of Iraq since 2004, both because of flight and higher death rates.
Another problem might be nonrandom sampling of households. As I understand the protocol, the first household in the cluster was randomly chosen, and then the team would go to the nearest neighboring household, and so on. But in a lot of communities, a household will have two neighbors that are equally close. Ideally, the team should flip a coin, but that might not be what happens. "Asking about people killed in the fighting, are you? Then you should visit Widow Tikriti. She's right next door".
How can one confirm or refute the study? I have two suggestions. The first would involve asking local hospitals and mortuaries about the ratio of violent to nonviolent deaths. The other would be looking at demographics. If the study is correct, the violent death rate among adolescent and adult males has been very high since the invasion: 5% among 15-29 year olds, 9.5% among 30-44 year olds, and 7% among 45-59 year olds. Female violent death in the same cohort has been a very small fraction of that. The impact should be very visible in the male-female ratios in the relevant age groups. In doing such a study, one should keep in mind that sex ratios in the 44-59 age groups were already unbalanced by about that amount because of the deaths from Saddam's wars and massacres.
Update: More commentary at Asymmetrical Information, with more elsewhere on the site. And more here and here.
It's important to point out that this isn't an estimate of civilian dead. The study makes clear that there was no effort to exclude combatants from the death toll, and the study indicates that military age males account for a majority of violent deaths. The New York Times incorrectly described it as an estimate of civilian deaths, and I have not yet seen them publish a correction.
The Lancet's editor does seem to be to be a strong advocate for a particular political point of view with an interest in seeing the invasion of Iraq proved to have been a Very Bad Thing. That may have affected the timing of the study's release, and how vigorously it was reviewed before publication. Ultimately, however, the conclusions will rise and fall on the quality of the study itself.
The vast discrepancy between the estimate and the official figures raises concern, but not necessarily a fatal one. It is possible that local tallies of violent deaths at hospitals and mortuaries are either not making it in to the central government or being suppressed. That they are not being recorded at all seems an insufficient explanation: about 90% of the households in the survey that reported a death were able to provide a death certificate when asked.
More troubling is the discrepancy between the mid 2004 UNDP survey and this one. It used similar cluster sampling methodology to the Johns Hopkins study, but estimated 25,000 killed in the year following the invasion, compared to about 90,000 estimated by the Johns Hopkins study in the same period. It would appear that the UNDP figure was not intended to capture ordinary criminal murders, but that's hardly enough to explain the discrepancy: Insurgency, counter insurgency and sectarian violence seems to account for the lion's share of violent deaths.
Why might the John Hopkins study be wrong? To start with, it relies on dividing the country into equal size clusters, and sampling a group of households in each cluster. Accuracy depends on reasonably accurate estimates of population by region. One challenge is that accurate population estimates are hard to find in Iraq. The last nationwide census was 1993. Further, there's reason to question the accuracy of the Saddam era censuses: the ruling party had strong motives for inflating the number of Sunnis at the expense of other groups. The problem is compounded by the study's use of a two year old estimate.
If the population is overestimated in the more dangerous parts of Iraq, and underestimated in the less, then the more dangerous parts will be overrepresented in the sample. There's good reason to think that this was the case. The Sunni triangle would have benefited from any Saddam era selective distortion, and is generally considered to be one of the more violent parts of Iraq, and indeed this reflected is in the Johns Hopkins study. Further, you would expect the more violent regions to lose population share relative to the rest of Iraq since 2004, both because of flight and higher death rates.
Another problem might be nonrandom sampling of households. As I understand the protocol, the first household in the cluster was randomly chosen, and then the team would go to the nearest neighboring household, and so on. But in a lot of communities, a household will have two neighbors that are equally close. Ideally, the team should flip a coin, but that might not be what happens. "Asking about people killed in the fighting, are you? Then you should visit Widow Tikriti. She's right next door".
How can one confirm or refute the study? I have two suggestions. The first would involve asking local hospitals and mortuaries about the ratio of violent to nonviolent deaths. The other would be looking at demographics. If the study is correct, the violent death rate among adolescent and adult males has been very high since the invasion: 5% among 15-29 year olds, 9.5% among 30-44 year olds, and 7% among 45-59 year olds. Female violent death in the same cohort has been a very small fraction of that. The impact should be very visible in the male-female ratios in the relevant age groups. In doing such a study, one should keep in mind that sex ratios in the 44-59 age groups were already unbalanced by about that amount because of the deaths from Saddam's wars and massacres.
Update: More commentary at Asymmetrical Information, with more elsewhere on the site. And more here and here.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
Social Cues in Historical Movies
In the 1954 film Sabrina, Humphrey Bogart and William Holden portray two brothers from a wealthy family. One is a nose-to-the-grindstone businessman, the other a feckless playboy. A few subtle details, such as the angle of Bogart's hat brim, help convey their relative roles and character to the audience. These cues were clear enough to the film's original viewers, and still reasonably understandable.
For a film set 600 years ago, how practical is it to convey similar cues to a modern audience? A few medievalists might know that one style of sleeve denotes a respectable lady, and another that the wearer is a prostitute, but only a tiny minority of a modern audience could be expected to know this sort of detail.
If this information isn't conveyed then the modern audience is missing some important information about the relationship between the characters. What to do?
Ian McKellen's 1995 Richard III represents one solution. Setting the medieval story in a 1930s alternate reality transposes it into a society more comprehensible to modern viewers. The Woodvilles are portrayed as Americans, capturing their status as isolated outsiders in a way that the Olivier version missed. The interfamilial horror of Richard's coup is also underlined and the social relationship between Richard and his henchmen made more accessible.
But transposing a story to another era also has a downside. Shakespeare's Richard III may have manipulated popular opinion to gain power, but he wasn't a fascist. Fitting him into a fascist template is false to the actual Richard III, who belonged to a different era and thought differently.
The director of Knight's Tale followed a related strategy. One of the key plot elements is a romance between a rising commoner who is passing himself off as a knight and Jocelyn, an aristocratic lady. How can the director make the social gulf between them as clear to the audience as it would be to the hero? How can the director convey, not merely "she has expensive clothes" but "one of her dresses costs enough to support an ordinary family for a year?" In the film, Jocelyn wears clothes that evoke a modern couture wearing jetsetter. In one scene she wears a hat that might remind the viewer of one worn by Audrey Hepburn. In another she wears a strategically sheer dress that has more in common with modern high fashion than the Middle Ages. Her hair is the sort of expensive confection that can only be achieved with professional help, and perhaps not at all before the invention of styling mousse.
What she wears isn't necessarily much like what a woman of her rank would actually have worn in the 14th century. But it does convey a sense of expensively conspicuous consumption to the typical modern audience, and probably does a better job of doing so than literally correct costume and hairstyles would.
For a film set 600 years ago, how practical is it to convey similar cues to a modern audience? A few medievalists might know that one style of sleeve denotes a respectable lady, and another that the wearer is a prostitute, but only a tiny minority of a modern audience could be expected to know this sort of detail.
If this information isn't conveyed then the modern audience is missing some important information about the relationship between the characters. What to do?
Ian McKellen's 1995 Richard III represents one solution. Setting the medieval story in a 1930s alternate reality transposes it into a society more comprehensible to modern viewers. The Woodvilles are portrayed as Americans, capturing their status as isolated outsiders in a way that the Olivier version missed. The interfamilial horror of Richard's coup is also underlined and the social relationship between Richard and his henchmen made more accessible.
But transposing a story to another era also has a downside. Shakespeare's Richard III may have manipulated popular opinion to gain power, but he wasn't a fascist. Fitting him into a fascist template is false to the actual Richard III, who belonged to a different era and thought differently.
The director of Knight's Tale followed a related strategy. One of the key plot elements is a romance between a rising commoner who is passing himself off as a knight and Jocelyn, an aristocratic lady. How can the director make the social gulf between them as clear to the audience as it would be to the hero? How can the director convey, not merely "she has expensive clothes" but "one of her dresses costs enough to support an ordinary family for a year?" In the film, Jocelyn wears clothes that evoke a modern couture wearing jetsetter. In one scene she wears a hat that might remind the viewer of one worn by Audrey Hepburn. In another she wears a strategically sheer dress that has more in common with modern high fashion than the Middle Ages. Her hair is the sort of expensive confection that can only be achieved with professional help, and perhaps not at all before the invention of styling mousse.
What she wears isn't necessarily much like what a woman of her rank would actually have worn in the 14th century. But it does convey a sense of expensively conspicuous consumption to the typical modern audience, and probably does a better job of doing so than literally correct costume and hairstyles would.
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