Great/heroic losses/retreats (and movies)

[Delvo]

Movies are usually made from the POV of the winners in any major battle or war. Even the stories set in a place and time of dire loss still focus on a bright glimmer of success in that mess, like the Russian sniper Vasili Zaitsev while the Russians were getting wiped out in German seiges during WWII, in "Enemy at the Gates". "Apocalypto" was said to be about a civilization's downfall, but turned out to be about one family's endurance.

I can only think of three exceptions to this pattern. "Kingdom of Heaven" was about European Christians in Jerusalem who ended up evacuating it, ending that Crusade. "Letters from Iwo Jima" was made by Americans but from the Japanese perspective, although it should be noted that it's one of a pair of movies that were made together as one big project and the other is from the American perspective. And at Thermopylae in 480 BCE, although the mission succeeded, all of the Spartans died and all of the survivors from the other Greek cities retreated, and that has yielded two modern movies from the Greek perspective and none from the Persian one.

What other historical examples are particularly compelling from the "losing" side's POV, such that they make good stories to tell and could be good movies even if they haven't yet?

I was surprised to find that there doesn't seem to have ever been a Dunkirk movie, even though that's a fairly famous and recent one during a war that's had more movies made abut it than most others combined. I've also thought Chief Joseph's story could be interesting, but I might be unduly influenced on that one by just the fact that it ends with one of history's most poignant quotes ever; if I were to write that biography/novel/screenplay, I'd want to call it "...No More Forever". (There was apparently a movie in 1975 but it's rather obscure.) The downfall of Rome seems to be another case of something everyone's heard of getting neglected... People appear to prefer to consider major conflicts from the winning side...

 

[Wiglaf]

If the "good guys" lose the battle, the story is always about a moral victory, a set up to win the coming war, or perserverance in the face of overwhelming odds. The Alamo and the Spartans were about sacrifice to allow others to succeed in the future. In Kingdom of Heaven, though Jerusalem was lost, the residents were spared being masacred by their heorics. People usually don't want to identify with characters just to watch them die unless the death serves a greater good.

 

[MG1962]

Dunkirk was made in 1958

Dunkirk (1958) It is an exceptional film

A Bridge Too Far - Allied failure in Operation Market Gardener

Das Boot - The life of a German U boat crew in the last Days of WW2

Al Quiet On The Western Front. Has been remade. Although the orginal won an acedemy award. I prefer the later remake. Tells the story of WW1 from the German point of view

Pearl Harbor - no explaination needed

Letters To Our Fathers - made alongside Flags Of Fathers. It tells the horrible story of what the Japanese went through on Iowa JIma

Tora Tora Tora and Midway- Both shot with a strong elements of what the loosers where going through

Enemey At the Gate - another duel pov as German soliders try to hang on to their sanity amid the carnage of Stalingrad

Gallipoli - Events of the campaign from a purely Australian perspective - suffers accuracy issues though

The Alamo - Texans are wipped out to a man by advancing Mexican forces



I am sure I have missed some obvious examples, but this should get you started

 

[nj1]

How about Sparticus? The slave that almost toppled Rome. Was untimately defeated and crucified.
I think there's a show on British TV tonight that chronicles the life of Sparticus, not the time and channle though, (possibly a BBC production).

 

[The Ace]

There was a miniseries made about Dunkirk, I remember it being shown on UKTV History. It pulled no punches and particularly upset the Germans over the murder of POWs by the Waffen SS.

 

[Vladd67]

They died with their boots on not exactly a historically accurate film but its not from the winners p.o.v.

Gallipoli - Events of the campaign from a purely Australian perspective - suffers accuracy issues though

Yes just what is the root of Gibsons Anglophobia?

 

[The Ace]

I didn't think anyone liked the English.

 

[Pyan]

Apart from the English, anyway....

Revenge of the Sith is told from the loser's POV, for what it's worth...

 

[MG1962]

They died with their boots on not exactly a historically accurate film but its not from the winners p.o.v.

Yes just what is the root of Gibsons Anglophobia?

It wasn't Gibson, but the writers who chose to draw on popular myth about the battle of the Nek. Australian troops didn't enjoy the stiff upper lip and discipline of British officers. So there was no way an Australian would be stupid enough to order the attack to go in even after knowing the New Zealand flank attack had failed.

All this was re-inforced by the fact that the ANZAC troops where better friends with the Turks they were trying to kill than their own officers. Then add the fact that ANZAC officers organised the retreat from Gallipoli and managed to get the whole contigent away without a single casualty from under the Turkish guns - And you have a myth in the making.

Remember that Australia had a very big cultural chip on it's shoulders, so we had to prove at every turn we were smarter, braver, faster, brighter than Englishman who could have possibly have walked the Earth. Today we have done a lot of growing up. Britian is now firmly a member of the EU and our paths have diversed over time. But, every time the Ashes come up for grabs - both sides leaving nothing on the field. We still need to show up the English, they need to put the colonial ragtags in their place