Hollywood Vs. History: Pearl Harbor?

Question

What is incorrect about the movie Pearl harbor? Correct? Websites?

Answer 1

The movie is actually full of historical inaccuracies. Most of them are fairly trivial; and many are completely understandable given the difficulty of obtaining or recreating warplanes, ships, etc., from 60 years ago. The Wikipedia article (see source below) includes a huge list of these mostly-minor and forgiveable inaccuracies.

Where Hollywood went seriously astray, in my opinion at least, was to assign roles to the male leads (Affleck and Hartnett) that seem to be clearly based - but only during the attack sequence itself - on the heroics of two real-life US Army pilots, George Welch and Kenneth Taylor, but studiously failing to acknowledge that. Welch and Taylor managed to take off during the attack and to shoot down numbers (at least 6, possibly 10) Japanese aircraft between them.

But, apart from that one action, the lives of the pilots played by Affleck and Hartnett are utter fiction: and mostly stupid fiction too.

Real-life pilot Kenneth Taylor saw the movie before dying last year. His verdict? "A piece of trash...over-sensationalized and distorted."

I think I'll go with his opinion. After all, he was there when it really happened!

Answer 2

The Wikipedia article is wrong on some particulars, like the identity of class of the Hornet and Lexington. At the end of the War there were indeed two Essex-class carriers by that name, and ten years later they had been significantly modified. Neither, however, was the Lexington (same class as Saratoga) or Hornet (Yorktown class) afloat at the beginning. The original Lexington was sunk in the Coral Sea, and the Hornet in the Battle of the Eastern Solomons.

This foul film, however, quite beside its B-movie plot and characters, has too many historical errors to be counted; Though I am tempted to try, this site does not have sufficient computer memory to do it.

One may begin with Jimmy Doolittle's handing the Affleck person permission to join the RAF -- at a time when the Neutrality Act prohibited any US citizen, much less a military officer -- from taking part in either side of the War, continuing with his train trip from New York to London, through to his appearance at an RAF base in a full-dress US Army uniform.

It only goes downhill from there.

There are some naval anachronisms in Tora! Tora! Tora!, but really there is no comparison in terms of accuracy.

Answer 3

The movie Pearl Harbour is pretty much 90 per cent accurate.

I saw a documentary comparing the movie with what actually happened - historical fact, and the movie pretty much got it right.

I doubted alot in the movie - such as the U.S airplanes taking off to chase after the Japanese zeros - I had assumed that the Americans were taken totally off guard at Pearl Harbour. But that was actually true - Some American planes did take off and chase the Japanese Zeros.

Of course, the actors in it tended to overdue it - but thats hollywood..

Answer 4

Pearl Harbor: Intelligence failure? approximately 2,500 deaths. Adm. Husband Kimmel and Lt.-Gen. Walter short named as scapegoats. September eleventh: Intelligence failure? approximately 3,000 deaths. Osama bin encumbered and Al Qaeda named as scapegoats. it rather is not in basic terms in the regards to the foreign places coverage held on the time that they are comparable, yet additionally the perception that people who knew it would ensue allowed it to ensue.

Answer 5

Assume it's all inaccurate and start afresh. You'll be in a better place.

Tora! Tora! Tora! may not have the graphics, but it has fewer gross errors.

Answer 6

Check this website out.