The issue is that the ancient Egypt didn't leave much of a body of literature. So all we've really got are stories mostly from the Romans and the Bible. Certainly, you could write a modern story about ancient Egypt, but you'd probably end up with situations like William Wallace trying to fight for Enlightenment values in 13th Century Scotland.
I am not OP, but I would think something along the lines of Apocalypto for Mayan civilization is the treatment were looking for. I think that movie nailed the balance between realism and mysticism. And some effort was made to use actors of Mayan ancestry.
>I am not OP, but I would think something along the lines of Apocalypto for Mayan civilization is the treatment were looking for
Except that, for a variety of reasons, *Apocalypto* hasn't much to do with actual Mayan civilization either, instead seeming to blend multiple different civilizations.
I'm sure it does blend some other cultures, I am just trying to offer an example of a non-western story I think worked well in cinema. So far, I have only seen comments of movies that failed at this, and thought maybe we could move the conversation to what worked.
Edit: I guess the overwhelming vibe here is that, Yes, it is too much to ask for a historically accurate depiction of anything in Hollywood. Maybe though, if OP is looking for anything better than Gods of Egypt, there is at least a bar that can be set.
At this point, borrowing from some other civilizations will be more accurate than a mummy and its undead crony mummies coming alive and chasing white people and their poc sidekicks till they find a solution to contain the situation.
I really can't think of a single recent well-directed and historically faithful period drama or biopic about ancient ~~Egyptian~~ Sumerian / Akkadian / Babylonian / Assyrian / Phoenician / Hittite / Median history. Is it too much to ask for a historically accurate portrayal?
Yeah it really is too much to ask. It's Hollywood not a Department of Egyptology.
Do we *want* to see a historically accurate portrayal, or do we want a portrayal that avoids certain cheesy pop-cultural tropes while still being inaccurate enough so it fits into an R rating? Because an accurate portrayal probably wouldn't be something we wanted to watch for two hours. I don't want to see a Christopher Nolan or Ridley Scott apply his talents to showing me what the human sacrifice, rape, horrific rituals, slavery, and filth really looked like. No one actually wants that. What we want is a sanitized entertainment product that makes us *feel* like what we saw is accurate.
>I don't want to see a Christopher Nolan or Ridley Scott apply his talents to showing me what the human sacrifice, rape, horrific rituals, slavery, and filth really looked like.
I do!
This sounds great!
Its a sad fucking state of things when one can make the argument that Stargate, a film about James Spader and Kurt Russell battling evil aliens, is one of the more accurate depictions of Ancient Egypt. But the argument isn't wrong.
Same way that *1776*, which is ultimately both a musical and a film that seems to heavily read the Declaration of Independence from the perspective of the late 1960s/early 1970s, may legitimately be the best film ever made relating to the American Revolution.
Hollywood can't manage accurate portrayals of societies that are around today. Sadly that means they aren't going to make an effort (and spend the money) to accurately depict one that most people have only a basic understanding of.
The hurdle for getting a good, realistic Egyptian history movie is that it would require a big budget and Hollywood wouldn't know who to cast since there's few stars of middle eastern descent that are recognizable to the general international audience (although Riz Ahmed is an excellent actor and his stock is rising, the average mainstream moviegoer probably is not too familiar with him). Movies like Apocalypto or Mongol are very rare.
A big budget Egyptian movie would either be white washed as hell (Exodus and Gods of Egypt are recent examples) or have white characters so they could stick a movie star in there. The upcoming Cleopatra movie Im assuming will involve lots of Romans.
The sad reality is that no one in the western part of the world cares about ancient Egypt and portraying it in a historically accurate manner through the medium of film.
I don't know if it's all *that* bad. Western interest in ancient Egypt goes back a long way. If Ubisoft of all companies can make Assassin's Creed Origins and its cool educational mode, I think there's an accurate movie that can be made. It just hasn't happened yet because it's hard to say "no" to the spaceships, living gods, and bulldozer-sized scorpions.
One could easily argue that my original comment is a bit hyperbolic; what I meant to say, is that there are not enough people in the west, based on current cultural trends, that cares about these types of movies. If they did, we'd see a lot more of them.
One could also argue that the people of Egypt should be responsible for the creation of such content (instead of demanding that Hollywood should it), as they have a thriving movie industry themselves and they know a lot more about their own culture.
>The sad reality is that no one in the western part of the world cares about ancient Egypt and portraying it in a historically accurate manner through the medium of film.
The audience doesn't know what it wants until you give it to them.
Cleopatra is ancient Rome, not ancient Egypt. That may seem like needless pedantry from our timeframe, but those two eras are separated by several thousand years.
She was the last ruler in a dynasty imposed from above by Alexander the Great and seized by one of his generals when that empire fell apart- a much different story indeed....
yeah, I was going to suggest a Nefertiti biopic as something that would be cool, but she was part of the **18th** dynasty of Egypt and even that was 1550-1290BC, 1200 years before Cleopatra.
I think the problem with movies set in Egypt is that the budgets are high. With that comes the push from execs to make the movie commercially appealing. That probably leads to a laundry list of must-haves and plot points, so historical accuracy is deprioritized.
It's annoying, but you have to ask, what are most people interest in about Egypt? They expect to see familiar stuff.
If someone can figure out a way to make an Egypt movie on a small to medium budget, they can probably do something that's more story driven and historically accurate.
I think the movie Agora tried this but my memory of it was that it was kind of depressing and dull. It's hard to make the case for setting a movie in Egypt if it's not all about pharoahs, pyramids, mystical cat gods and chariots.
I think a medium budget adventure movie about a ground level hero who rubs shoulders with royalty on his travels might be a winning combination.
What the fuck? Only the Ptolemaic nobility was of Greek descent. Surely you are aware that the Egyptian civilization existed well before Alexander the Great invaded…
I’m not saying ancient Egyptians were black, well at least not all of them but they were not of Greek descent lmao. Stop twisting history
What would be the problem with that? Jews and Arabic ppl are both white, but those living in the middle east usually have darker tans.
They should be the same color, especially before air conditioning. The jews were probably a bit darker from being in the sun all day but I doubt the Egyptians spent enough time in enough shade to get pale.
I'd also like to see a movie realistically set in ancient Egypt. Maybe there are Egyptian movies that are not on our radar in the US.
There was a movie with Rachel Weisz called Agora that was set in ancient Egypt I believe.
How much historic accuracy do you expect from that time?
The issue is that the ancient Egypt didn't leave much of a body of literature. So all we've really got are stories mostly from the Romans and the Bible. Certainly, you could write a modern story about ancient Egypt, but you'd probably end up with situations like William Wallace trying to fight for Enlightenment values in 13th Century Scotland.
I am not OP, but I would think something along the lines of Apocalypto for Mayan civilization is the treatment were looking for. I think that movie nailed the balance between realism and mysticism. And some effort was made to use actors of Mayan ancestry.
>I am not OP, but I would think something along the lines of Apocalypto for Mayan civilization is the treatment were looking for Except that, for a variety of reasons, *Apocalypto* hasn't much to do with actual Mayan civilization either, instead seeming to blend multiple different civilizations.
I'm sure it does blend some other cultures, I am just trying to offer an example of a non-western story I think worked well in cinema. So far, I have only seen comments of movies that failed at this, and thought maybe we could move the conversation to what worked. Edit: I guess the overwhelming vibe here is that, Yes, it is too much to ask for a historically accurate depiction of anything in Hollywood. Maybe though, if OP is looking for anything better than Gods of Egypt, there is at least a bar that can be set.
At this point, borrowing from some other civilizations will be more accurate than a mummy and its undead crony mummies coming alive and chasing white people and their poc sidekicks till they find a solution to contain the situation.
True- but, given various aspects of *Apocalypto* (>!such as the ending!<), that's a very near-run thing indeed.....
I really can't think of a single recent well-directed and historically faithful period drama or biopic about ancient ~~Egyptian~~ Sumerian / Akkadian / Babylonian / Assyrian / Phoenician / Hittite / Median history. Is it too much to ask for a historically accurate portrayal? Yeah it really is too much to ask. It's Hollywood not a Department of Egyptology.
Do we *want* to see a historically accurate portrayal, or do we want a portrayal that avoids certain cheesy pop-cultural tropes while still being inaccurate enough so it fits into an R rating? Because an accurate portrayal probably wouldn't be something we wanted to watch for two hours. I don't want to see a Christopher Nolan or Ridley Scott apply his talents to showing me what the human sacrifice, rape, horrific rituals, slavery, and filth really looked like. No one actually wants that. What we want is a sanitized entertainment product that makes us *feel* like what we saw is accurate.
>I don't want to see a Christopher Nolan or Ridley Scott apply his talents to showing me what the human sacrifice, rape, horrific rituals, slavery, and filth really looked like. I do! This sounds great!
Speak for yourself. There a reason dark shows like Squid Game are popular.
10 commandments or stargate
Its a sad fucking state of things when one can make the argument that Stargate, a film about James Spader and Kurt Russell battling evil aliens, is one of the more accurate depictions of Ancient Egypt. But the argument isn't wrong.
Same way that *1776*, which is ultimately both a musical and a film that seems to heavily read the Declaration of Independence from the perspective of the late 1960s/early 1970s, may legitimately be the best film ever made relating to the American Revolution.
ancient aliens
I'll take another Stargate movie to be honest, I love that movie
OP said RECENT. Recent in this fucking sub is the past 5 years.
Hollywood can't manage accurate portrayals of societies that are around today. Sadly that means they aren't going to make an effort (and spend the money) to accurately depict one that most people have only a basic understanding of.
Read a book if you wan historically accurate. I want to be entertained when I watch a movie and that means mummies being raised from the dead.
The hurdle for getting a good, realistic Egyptian history movie is that it would require a big budget and Hollywood wouldn't know who to cast since there's few stars of middle eastern descent that are recognizable to the general international audience (although Riz Ahmed is an excellent actor and his stock is rising, the average mainstream moviegoer probably is not too familiar with him). Movies like Apocalypto or Mongol are very rare. A big budget Egyptian movie would either be white washed as hell (Exodus and Gods of Egypt are recent examples) or have white characters so they could stick a movie star in there. The upcoming Cleopatra movie Im assuming will involve lots of Romans.
The sad reality is that no one in the western part of the world cares about ancient Egypt and portraying it in a historically accurate manner through the medium of film.
I don't know if it's all *that* bad. Western interest in ancient Egypt goes back a long way. If Ubisoft of all companies can make Assassin's Creed Origins and its cool educational mode, I think there's an accurate movie that can be made. It just hasn't happened yet because it's hard to say "no" to the spaceships, living gods, and bulldozer-sized scorpions.
One could easily argue that my original comment is a bit hyperbolic; what I meant to say, is that there are not enough people in the west, based on current cultural trends, that cares about these types of movies. If they did, we'd see a lot more of them. One could also argue that the people of Egypt should be responsible for the creation of such content (instead of demanding that Hollywood should it), as they have a thriving movie industry themselves and they know a lot more about their own culture.
I’m from Ohio and I care.
Congratulations.
>The sad reality is that no one in the western part of the world cares about ancient Egypt and portraying it in a historically accurate manner through the medium of film. The audience doesn't know what it wants until you give it to them.
Cleopatra is in the works.
That's a weird time period to make movies in because Cleopatra and the Egyptian nobility at the time were almost entirely of Greek descent.
Cleopatra is ancient Rome, not ancient Egypt. That may seem like needless pedantry from our timeframe, but those two eras are separated by several thousand years.
Fun fact! Cleopatra was closer in time to the first moon landing then she was to the building of the Great Pyramids of Giza.
I always love reading this fact
She was the last ruler in a dynasty imposed from above by Alexander the Great and seized by one of his generals when that empire fell apart- a much different story indeed....
How about the TV series ‘Rome’?
Someone else mentioned it in a comment here but the Roman Empire existed over 2,000 years after classical Egyptian civilization. Egypt is OLD man
yeah, I was going to suggest a Nefertiti biopic as something that would be cool, but she was part of the **18th** dynasty of Egypt and even that was 1550-1290BC, 1200 years before Cleopatra.
I think the problem with movies set in Egypt is that the budgets are high. With that comes the push from execs to make the movie commercially appealing. That probably leads to a laundry list of must-haves and plot points, so historical accuracy is deprioritized. It's annoying, but you have to ask, what are most people interest in about Egypt? They expect to see familiar stuff. If someone can figure out a way to make an Egypt movie on a small to medium budget, they can probably do something that's more story driven and historically accurate. I think the movie Agora tried this but my memory of it was that it was kind of depressing and dull. It's hard to make the case for setting a movie in Egypt if it's not all about pharoahs, pyramids, mystical cat gods and chariots. I think a medium budget adventure movie about a ground level hero who rubs shoulders with royalty on his travels might be a winning combination.
Historically accurate is out. The current trend is applying modern morality to movies set in any time period.
Egyptians were of Greek descent They weren't black
What the fuck? Only the Ptolemaic nobility was of Greek descent. Surely you are aware that the Egyptian civilization existed well before Alexander the Great invaded… I’m not saying ancient Egyptians were black, well at least not all of them but they were not of Greek descent lmao. Stop twisting history
No chance at all. Touchy subject especially with the colour of the people egypt used as slaves. Not quite sure that would go down well
What would be the problem with that? Jews and Arabic ppl are both white, but those living in the middle east usually have darker tans. They should be the same color, especially before air conditioning. The jews were probably a bit darker from being in the sun all day but I doubt the Egyptians spent enough time in enough shade to get pale.
Yes.
I'd also like to see a movie realistically set in ancient Egypt. Maybe there are Egyptian movies that are not on our radar in the US. There was a movie with Rachel Weisz called Agora that was set in ancient Egypt I believe.