Hollywood is Rewriting World War II

Two new films are due for release this year from major Hollywood studios, both based around aspects of the Second World War. The first is U-571 and concerns the capture of the Enigma coding device from a German U-boat. The second deals with the infamous Colditz castle and the many escape attempts that were made by prisoners there.
The all American casts of these films will be headed by Ben Affleck and Tom Cruise, respectively.

The only problem with these films? Well, the Enigma device was captured by the British Royal Navy before the US even joined WWII; and whilst a very small number of American troops were actually incarcerated at Colditz, not one of them ever made a successful escape attempt - unlike 109 of their British counterparts.

Now I realise that the movie industry is all about entertainment, and that most of the stuff we see on the silver screen is completely made up, but using real life events and twisting the very fabric of them is a very dangerous thing to do. A lot of our younger generations will see this film not as a 'dramatised homage to all those involved in the war', but as a factual representation of what actually happened. This on the heels of Saving Private Ryan prophesises a distressing trend.

It's An Outrage!!

It's a well known fact that students who read Romeo & Juliet don't understand it as well as those who watch a play or film of it; we all find it easier to absorb visual information. As such, Hollywood should have a moral obligation to present accurate facts and not altered realities. In twenty years from now, when the last of our WWII veterans have died, it's highly likely that all teenagers will think that America won the war single handedly and that Britain played no part in it. The U-571 website even shows only German and US submarines!

Whilst no-one can deny that the involvement of the US played a vital part in bringing the war to an end, it was Britain and her allies who contributed - and lost - the most in that conflict.

Could it be that the only other wars the US have been involved with don't serve to paint the heroic national image they value so highly? John Wayne was the first to portray the US WWII effort in a very positive light, but at least his films concentrated solely on real, actual US conflicts. Additionally, they were balanced by a high British output celebrating our involvement.

Unfortunately, it now seems that only Hollywood has the money to make movies, and with money comes power; the power to alter the world's perception about our own past.

Something needs to be done about this, instead we sit idly by and let it happen. Can you imagine the American's outcry if the British film industry had made Apollo 13 with Hugh Grant in the lead role? Wouldn't have been allowed.

If we allow this to continue, can we look forward to copies of the Dambusters being outlawed as heresy within our lifetime?