I haven't yet seen it, but from what I gather it's more of a lyrical,
poetical interpretation of the Smith/Pocahontas story and the founding of
Jamestown than it is intended to be hard historical truth.

I find myself wondering if the same folks that are upset at Malick's "The
New World" hold Longfellow's poem "Paul Revere's Ride" or Benjamin West's
painting "The Death of Lord Nelson" in the same disregard for their
historical inaccuracies.

It's interesting to me that film, for whatever reason, seems to evoke more
distress or contempt among historians than other artistic media (poetry,
painting, even fiction) when it comes to portraying historical subject
matter--anybody have a sense for why this may be?

Cheers,

--Eric

Eric D. M. Johnson
Proprietor
The Village Factsmith Historical Research & Consulting
http://www.factsmith.com/
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Henry Wiencek" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 9:14 AM
Subject: NYT praises "The New World," new version


>I think a lot of people expected "The New World" to be an adventure story.
> I had that idea too, but I had also seen Malick's earlier films so I had
> learned to "expect the unexpected."  I would agree with the New Yorker
> critic, who wrote: "Whole passages of non-event stream by, and you half
> want to scream, and yet-damn it all-by the end of "The New World" the
> spell of the images, plus the enigma of Kilcher's [Pocahontas] expression
> . . . somehow breaks you down."  It IS slow, but I didn't really mind (a
> Bach sonata is slow too), and when the story reached England I felt the
> whole thing ascend into something wonderful and extremely powerful and
> moving.
>
> Henry Wiencek
>
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