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THE HERALD Wednesday February 8 1989 Page Hollywood History By ALEX BARKIS It has long been widely accepted as true that no Hollywood film producer would ever let a mere fact stand in the way of a good story Hence we have had more than half a century of historical movies that were about as reliable as the campaign promises of politicians That a refutation of such a belief should come along now is something of a surprise That it should come from a respected English writer and a good one is an even greater surprise The book is The Hollywood History Of The World by George MacDonald Penguin Books Canada pages il lustrated 95 Mr has previously written ficiilon the Flashman novels and such screenplays as The Three Musketeers The Four Musketeers The Prince and the Pauper and Casanova He is not of course blind to Hollywoods shortcomings in deal ing with history Indeed much of the fun of the book is the wit with which he points up some of the more outrageous distortions of fact in numerous historical movies He is also fair enough to use Hollywood as a generic term referring to the film industries of the Englishspeaking world Fraser takes great delight in reminding us of some of the bits of deathless dialogue that Hollywood scnpters have put into the mouths of historical figures from War Thats all you think about Dick Plantagenet to Take a let ter Mark Antony the Senate Rome But he also argues fairly per suasively that while Hollywood has the reputation for always get ting it wrong what is overlooked is the astonishing amount of history Hollywood has got right He sticks to this position although films have sometimes blundered and distorted and falsified have botched great themes and belittled great men and women have and caricatured and cheapened have piled anachronism on solecism on downright lie still at their best they have given a picture of the ages more vivid and memorable than anything in Tacitus or Gibbon or and to an infinitely wider audience WRONG BROTHER writing is so graceful that one is inclined to forgive him his very few errors such as the reference to Buddy Baer playing a gladiator in Quo Vadis as so meone who in his boxing days once knocked down Joe Louis Fraser is thinking of Buddys brother Max Baer Buddy was once a wrestler Fraser presents his case in seven sections which he defines as ages The first is The Ancient World which plunges us promptly into the world of sumptuous biblical epics including the work of Cecil B The second section deals with Knights and Barbarians ranging from Richard the to the Hun with sidelong glances at El Cid Robin Hood and Joan of Arc Succeeding ages are headed and Sea Dogs Romance and Royalty Rule Britannia New World Old West and The Violent Century by which he means the current one is a selfconfessed movie enthusiast He even admits to a lifelong addiction to films that deal one way or another with history Who else but such an ad dict would go to the trouble of listing the various actors who have portrayed Nero or Billy the Kid or Catherine the Great But is a clever enough writer to have his cakeeven as he it While delightedly calling up of some of the more udlcrous Hollywood blunders he holds to his overall view that despite the excesses he so enjoys describing to us the record of historical films is probably no worse than that of many published historians At tunes Frasers British blood shows In discussing some movies that dealt with the time of the American revolution for instance he says that Hollywood was not concerned with examining the difference between political In dependence the fine emotional blanket word freedom which seems a curious almost insulting term to use about the aspirations of the colonial Americans who en joyed a greater measure of real freedom before than their British cousins or indeed any other people the world before or since Alex Barrifl is a Torontoarea author and film and music com mentator 8776702 DELIGHT to 95000 In City Chatham Ontario 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