You Want the Truth?! You Can't Handle the Truth!

            For those who don’t know, Blade Runner is easily one of my top 5 favorite films of all-time, and it’s certainly Ridley Scott’s magnum opus. I mean don’t get me wrong, Alien is a masterpiece in and of itself and the fact that a sequel was never made is just as much of a tragedy as the lack of a follow-up Matrix film and the fact that Coppola never made a third Godfather. Oh well, perhaps such things are for the best.

As far as I'm concerned they don't exist.

             Recently, however, Scott has been working on a new project which I believe has the potential to be one of the best pieces of media of this decade. No, I’m not talking about his upcoming adaptation of Haldeman’s The Forever War, which is set to star Channing Tatum in the technological wonder that is 3D. In fact, I’m not even talking about a film to begin with. Instead, what I’m referring to is the recently released Amazon Prime original series entitled “The Man in the High Castle,” a 10-episode adaptation of the Philip K. Dick novel by the same name.

On a superficial level the plot is hardly anything new: the year is 1962, the Axis powers have won World War II, and the world – along with those left in it – are ruled by the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere on one side and the Greater German Reich on the other. Meanwhile, the former United States, in a historical analogy which goes right over my head and for which I see no real-world comparison, is split down the middle, with the German Empire controlling the territory from the Eastern seaboard to the Rocky Mountains, and the Japanese controlling the West. Between the two is a no-man’s-land called “The Neutral Zone” in which those who have been termed dissidents and undesirables scrape out what little they can, free from the reach of the two superpowers. With the Germans possessing a clear technological advantage thanks to their sole understanding of nuclear technology, conflict between the two seems inevitable and who the victor will be is apparent to most.

That's not even factoring in their far superior dinosaur technology!

“But this is alternative history and the series is as relevant to the field of Public History as Jurassic World!” I can already hear you begin to type out. However, there’s one major plot point which I’ve missed. Since this is alternative history told by Philip K. Dick and Ridley Scott, the series wouldn’t be complete without philosophical conundrums along the lines of “what is reality”, “do we even exist”, and “how does that creepy guy with the bionic eye know I dream about unicorns?” Central to the plot are a series of film reels supposedly produced by the eponymous “Man in the High Castle” which depict our own reality in which the Allied powers were victorious. Those in the series who actively oppose the German and Japanese governments believe that these films, even more so than guns and other weapons, are their best chance at doing so. And on the other side, the Axis powers believe that these films pose one of, if not the greatest, threat to their rule.

Ridley, that is very clearly a horse with a carrot glued to its head. You're not fooling anybody.

Aside from their use as a plot device, though, these films serve as a useful vehicle for exploring the intersection between historical cinema, especially so-called “revisionist” films, and history proper. As noted film historian Robert A. Rosenstone once wrote, filmmakers who produce historical films are “cinematic historians,” despite how often the mainstream academic community may object. In his mind, the world of cinematic history and the kind of serious, capital H “History” taught in classrooms have far more in common with each other than one might initially expect. For instance, although they each “refer to actual events, moments, and movements from the past,” according to Rosenstone the two disciplines both “partake of the unreal and the fictional, since both are made out of sets of conventions we have developed for talking about where we human beings have come from.”[1]

By choosing to use history as subject matter, portraying it in a way that runs counter to traditional modes of understanding, directors open themselves up to a wide variety of criticism ranging from a lack of objectivity to accusations of blurring “almost beyond distinction fact and fiction, historian and subject.” For many professionals, the merging of artist and scholar that a director represents compromises the depiction of “actual persons and events” in favor of “colourful imagery, concocted dialogue, and imaginary people.”[2] But can academic historians really say that they aren’t prone to making these very same “mistakes” themselves?

I very much doubt that there has ever been a historian who has not carefully chosen the words they use and the information they choose to include in order to improve their final product. And even if we assume that they don’t, do we, as consumers of popular media and scholarly work alike, really want the former to be as dry and monotonous as these critics seemingly desire? There are certain elements of history that movies are simply better at conveying than text, not just in spite of their artistry but because of it. Can a book so vividly depict the mentality of American soldiers in Vietnam à la Platoon or Full Metal Jacket? Furthermore, would our society’s understanding of the reality of war, and the atrocities committed on both sides, be as complete if it wasn’t for these films?[3] I don’t know about the rest of the country, but I’d much rather watch a movie than read a Pentagon report and I’d probably take more out of it as well.  

me irl

Now mind you, this isn’t to say that fanciful turns of phrases and the admission/omission of certain information in books due to narrative concerns are anywhere near the same thing as depicting an entirely different outcome to World War II. Nor am I trying to convey the message that works of capital-H History take anywhere close to as many artistic liberties with the subject matter as do films, or that we should completely disregard scholarly works and fully switch to the visual image as a medium for learning.

Actually on second thought...

However, it’s my belief that the story of “The Man in the High Castle” offers a few interesting lessons for its audience. The first is that the written word is just as much a product of editing as are films, and that there can be as many different depictions of the past as there are individual works. The second and more important point, though, is that this discrepancy in what is depicted isn’t something to be avoided but welcomed. By juxtaposing these different interpretations, amateur enthusiasts and professionals alike are afforded valuable insight into history and its formative process. Chances are you (hopefully) won’t be hunted down by the secret police for your dutiful investigation into the nature of truth and fact, but who knows? It might prove to be a worthwhile use of your time.  

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[1] Rosenstone, Robert A. History on Film/Film on History. Harlow, England: Longman/Pearson, 2006. 2.

[2] Rosenstone. History on Film. 127.

[3] Rosenstone. History on Film. 134.