Реферат: Mel Essay Research Paper Dear MelHaving read

PATRIOT GAMES TAKE LIBERTIES WITH HISTORY (Sunday Express)

MEL TAKES A LIBERTY – TRUTH’S CASUALTY OF FREEDOM-FIGHT EPIC (News of The World)

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE PATRIOT BUTCHER (Daily Mail, Saturday 29th July)

Some extracts from the Daily Mail article: -

“The portrayal of a British Army officer as a mass murderer in Mel Gibson’s new film The Patriot has enraged Mail readers. Here we examine what really happened…

The film is based on historical events and it features many real characters who fought in the 1770’s war, including the British commander, General Cornwallis. So when Colonel Tavington orders the entire population of a village – women, children and old people – into a church, padlocks the doors, shutters the windows and burns them all to death, it goes without saying that most audiences who know nothing about the American Revolution save what they learn from this film, will believe this atrocity to be based on fact.

It never happened. Scriptwriter, Robert Rodat based the scene upon a hideous atrocity in World War II when in 1944, the Nazis, in retribution for the killing of an SS officer, herded all the woman and children of the French village of Oradour-sur-Glane into the church and burned it – and the rest of the village – to the ground.

It is true Tarleton was vicious, arrogant and ruthless but, unlike Colonel Tavington in The Patriot, he was neither a coward nor a monster. He did not shoot people in the back as Jason Isaacs’s character does; nor did he burn people alive.

Does any of this matter? To expect authentic history from any Hollywood film is like expecting a barrel-organ to produce Mozart.

But psychologically, too, demonising the British makes sense, because it gives Americans the comforting feeling that all the bad things that happened in the past – wholesale slavery and the genocide of native Americans – were done by the British in America before their Country came of age”.

If any visitors to the site would like me to publish the full text of the various articles, or if you have anything you wish to comment on, please feel free to send me an email at [email protected]. If I receive sufficient demand, I will happily add the full articles to the site and any further reports that may be published.

Here is some correspondence with various individuals who have taken the trouble to comment on my Open Letter To Mel. As a simple courtesy I have not published their email addresses. The correspondence file will be enlarged at my discretion as and when further comments are received. I obviously reserve the right not to publish any comments or information that I deem inappropriate.

Letter from Mike Cerny

Letter from Kendall M.

Letter from Sarah LaRee

Letter from Jyak

Letter from Steven Kohlscheen

Letter from Susie Schurtz

Letter from Tammy Marcellino

Letter from Juan Francisco Ortiz

Letter from Kevin Holmes

Letter from Ore-Oluwa Odulana

Letter from Alana

Letter from Marie Robinson

Letter from Sunni Friello

Letter from Kae333