History on Film / Film on History

by Robert A. Rosenstone

History on Film/Film on History has established itself as a classic treatise on the historical film and its role in bringing the past to life. In the third edition of this widely acclaimed text, Robert A. Rosenstone argues that to leave history films out of the discussion of the meaning of the past is to ignore a major means of understanding historical events. This book examines what history films convey about the past and how they convey it, demonstrating the need to learn how to read and understand this new visual world and integrating detailed analysis of films such as Schindler’s List , Glory , October , and Reds . Advocating for the dramatic feature as a legitimate way of doing history, this edition includes a new introduction, a revised final chapter, a new epilogue that discusses recent history films such as Selma and The Imitation Game , and an extensive and updated guide to further reading. Examining the codes and conventions of how these films tell us about the past and providing guidance on how to effectively analyse films as historical interpretations, this book is an essential introduction to the field for students of history and film.

Genres: History, Film, Nonfiction, Research

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Robert A. Rosenstone, who was born in Montreal, Canada, but has lived most of his life in Los Angeles, is the author of a dozen books in various genres, including history, biography, criticism, and fiction. The latter has been his major focus in recent years. Among his fictional works are the novel, King of Odessa (2003), a book of stories, The Man Who Swam into History : The (Mostly) True Story of My Jewish Family ( 2005), and the recent novel Red Star, Crescent Moon: A Muslim Jewish Love Story (2010).

Rosenstone’s scholarly works include Romantic Revolutionary: A Biography of John Reed (1975), one of the sources for the Academy Award winning film, Reds, on which he served as historical consultant; Mirror in the Shrine: American Encounters in Meiji Japan (1988), an experimental, multi-voiced biography of three American sojourners in nineteenth century Japan; Crusade of the Left: The Lincoln Battalion in the Spanish Civil war (1969, reprinted 2009), and two works about historical film: Visions of the Past: The Challenge of Film to Our Idea of History (1995), and History on Film / Film on History (2006).

He has also been active in visual media projects, including time spent as consultant or writer for the following dramatic features and documentaries: Reds (1982), The Good Fight (1983), Darrow (1991), and Tango of Slaves (1999), and he has appeared on screen in several documentaries, including Screening Histories: The Filmmaker Strikes Back. (BBC, 1998), Rebels. (CBC, 1999), and Emma Goldman: A Troublesome Presence (PBS, 2004)

He is married to Nahid Massoud, a photographer, who is at once his best friend and his muse.

Reviews

[Martin Riexinger · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rosenstone is one of the few historians who addresses the issue . I had earlier read some of his chapters and articles before, and considered his argument that films of history can be considered as a contribution to the understanding of history equal to written historiography. So I gave the book a try, and was finally appalled. Because his argument is based on an anything goes approach to history, according to which it does not so much matter, whether events are correctly reconstructed and explained, but in how far the narrative is relevant to us. The book reaches its absolute low point where the conspirationist [four letter word] of Oliver Stone is praised for exactly this reason.
The basis of his equation of film and written historiography is a spectrum of genres from books written for a mixed audience (specialized academics and general public) to popularizations and historical fiction. What many historians actually do, searching sources, analyzing hitherto unused sources in order to understand events - at all or in a different light - does not matter much to him, although some of the documentaries on the Spanish Civil War he discusses do exactly that. Although he praises that written historiography tries to use other literary models than the 19th century novel, Rosenstone does not seem to be interested in avantgard approaches to history of film like the essayistic films of Alexander Kluge.

A handful of interesting analyses cannot save this volume, not least as it also contains many bad ones, the chapter on Holocaust film is for example an assemblage of plot summaries.

[Meredith Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for my film theory class. The author's philosophical foundation vastly differs from my own (and, thus, do some of his conclusions), but he raises a good point that film is more influential and valuable as a depiction of history than we currently appreciate.

[Anson Cassel Mills · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rosenstone is a respected post-modernist student of history and film whose short book argues that since the meaning of written history “lies in its larger symbolic expressions” (68), we should likewise accept the “metaphorical” truth of historical films regardless of their factual accuracy. Rosenstone even defends Sergei Eisenstein’s infamous “storming of the Winter Palace” scene in the propaganda film October (1928) on the grounds that it allows us to “share in the ecstasy of revolutionary change.”(67)

Rosenstone tends to focus on the sorts of films screened at arts festivals. He does much less with Hollywood and ignores upper-middle class history fare, such as the many films presented on the long-running PBS series American Experience (which does not even appear in the index). One doubts Rosenstone would be as sanguine about accepting the metaphorical truth of film if conservative Republicans, instead of an unending string of fellow leftists, had created all the best metaphors.

[Tlazeni Citlalli · Rating 4 out of 5]

"What do we want from the past?" "Why do we want to know it?" Robert Rosenstone it's a well known advocate of a new way of History that doesn't relies entirely on the written word and an advocate for the study of History through film.
In the current age we live in, it's with no purpose to disdain the analysis of history through visual images, since we are on a world that relies on them and in a post-literal age in which most people first contact with the past os through the memories recorded in mass media, to keep an attack in historical films on the basis that they false facts or rely in fiction is to ignore that so does "traditional" history for the purpose of a narrative and academic basis of historical methodology.
To encourage the study and making of History through different mediums outside the ones taught by academia is to accept the inevitable process of a new age of historiography that doesn't rely and doesn't need a paper.

[Scotch · Rating 2 out of 5]

I appreciate Rosenstone's defense of historical films as another kind of history worth discussing. However, I am a little troubled by his emphasis on metaphor or expression over historical fact and his conflation of representation with "living through" some of the horrific histories represented in film. His argument seems in opposition to Natalie Zemon Davis' "Slaves on Screen," which seemed to solely focus on the genre's problematic fictionalizations. Perhaps a more fleshed out investigation of the genre should take on both these arguments in relation to and not in opposition to one another. Something about the "truth" of these stories, however altered and cleaned up to fit a coherent narrative, seems to have a major role in my emotional and personal response. Yet, oddly, to learn that they were falsified feels more of a betrayal than entirely fictional films.

In the end, I was a bit disappointed that Rosenstone did not answer many of the questions he poses about historical film and ones of personal interest: as one way to understand the past, what do they do, how do they affect us or why do we desire to see them? Of course, they make us feel, but what else?

[Pedro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Livro altamente instigante, em que o autor aplica as teorias narrativistas de Hayden White para o cinema.
Rosenstone faz o que há algum tempo já deveria ter sido feito: se a escrita da história parte de metáforas para aproximar o real, se a imaginação histórica é a base do conhecimento histórico, por que não o cinema não faria o mesmo? Se força a barra de um lado, de outro, não há como negar que a estrutura dos filmes, aliada a elementos sensorias, propicia de fato um conhecimento específico do passado.
Rosenstone se propõe, portanto, ver o que os filmes podem dizer que os livros não conseguem. Mas poderia ir mais fundo neste aspecto.

[Eddie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a useful guide to how to view movies for their historical accuracy. Indeed, all movies are inaccurate historically. The essence of the book is that film history is a new, and often, better lens to view history. In the future, film may become more important than looking at written history. The author devotes an entire chapter to Oliver Stone whose Vietnam trilogy shows a history of involvement in Vietnam that is more important than written histories. This is a great book for anyone who loves movies.

[Jo]

Very interesting argument about how we "do" history in different genres. Lots to think about here in relation to how F & I talk about history films (which she likes).

[Courtney · Rating 2 out of 5]

Repeated the same information just rearranged the sentences. Really annoying.

[Vannessa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rosenstone argues that visual images and films are other ways of "doing history", with their own conventions, rules of engagement and concepts of how they engage with the past. One of the films and historical episodes Rosenstone discusses is the Russian Revolution and Sergei Eisenstein's "October". A fascinating read.

[Matthew Olgin · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is incredibly dry. I was put off by the author's reliance on artistic freedom as opposed to actual facts. He kept bragging about his previous works and role as a historical consultant on films. this put me off. it seemed most of the time that this is just a review of movies instead of trying to place film as an important aspect of looking at history.