17 thoughts on “SNARK WEEK: This Is How Your Audience Talks

  1. Oh hell yeah I snark. I also LOVE costume drama and hunt down every single one that I hear about. So it’s definitely coming from a place of love.

  2. Back in the day when I was a baby costumer I learned SO MUCH from the costume snark community on Livejournal where people who knew more than I did were busy pointing out errors.

    The one I will never forget was the poor bride who proudly wore her lovely custom white wedding corset upside down with the cups down at ovary level. I sincerely hope that no one who saw her or her wedding photos EVER pointed out her error to her, because she looked so happy.

  3. I kinda give Irene Pappas a pass in Anne of a Thousand Days simply bc she conveys KoA’s badassness so well. But I refuse to watch Spanish Princess bc it’s Philippa Fucking Gregory no matter if what’s her face the actress has strawberry blonde hair.
    What I wonder is why they get history so bloody wrong. It’s not hard. Pick up a book, scroll on line, visit a museum – LACMA and MMA come to mind -etc.
    And although my favourite March Sister is Amy, the recent movie was RUNNING FROM THE THEATRE SCREAMING.

  4. The flag most people associate with the Confederacy, the one carried at the White House incursion, is the Beauregard flag; the Stars and Bars has one red, one white, and another red bar with blue canton with 13 white stars in the field. There were a number of battle flags carried by Confederate troops, but no national flag was ever adopted.

  5. I am Scottish. I had the misfortune to see Braveheart in the cinema and I caused something of a scene when the one historically accurate episode of the entire film happened and two people in front of me tutted and complained it didn’t happen. I had a massive rant at them about how the nobles did, in fact, leave the Battle of Stirling Bridge after having been paid by the English, and that Burns wrote a poem about it. I swear my friends say ‘Braveheart’ to me for the fun of watching me fume!

    We’ve been around a long time, and we’re fed up with films and TV not getting basic things right. The costumes, the speech, the hair, the jewellery, the actual events involving real people that actually happened, all get messed around with for ‘artistic vision’ and I swear to god if I have to sit through another film where MQos and QE1 actually meet I will scream until I’m sedated.

    The problem is that too many people watch these films and think that’s history. They have always been with us so filmmakers should take a bit more responsibility instead of just bleating about ‘their art’ when mistakes are pointed out.

  6. I had first watched GWTW when I was 11,and I had zero idea of American history.Still I wondered why the servants had to be over the top giggly around their masters when people are so mean in real life.It doesn’t really take the combined genius of Newton and Einstein to point out problematic elements.The history of anti-semitism is often glossed over in Asian countries(to the point that folks cannot distinguish them from Christians),but everyone can notice the glaring bigotry in Merchant of Venice.The idea that audience can be taken for granted if they are not boring academics is stupid,as certain things are too hard to ignore.
    And honestly,costumes that are historically inadequate tend to look ugly,if not inaccurate.One might need to do some research to know about foundation garments,but a boned Elizabethan bodice will look ugly even to the untrained eye.Back lacing bodice for 18th century is stupid if it incorporates a split skirt-why will any sane person split the bodice and skirt on different sides?Jewellery supposed to accentuate the centre part will obviously look odd with side parts.Or fabrics like denim and polyester,which are too distinctly modern.It is just hard not to snark at the stark inaccuracies.

  7. Ah, “Elizabeth.” Saw it in a theater. Mistake. I was shouting at the screen at the historical inaccuracies, which didn’t go over well. (Why mess with the truth when it’s more interesting that what you’ve made up?!?!?)

  8. I don’t snark at costuming so much (just wonder WTF). However, I can get really going looking at movies and naming the earlier films they ripped off scenes and scripts from. One time 4 of us, with very different tastes in movies accidentally set off all of our neighbors in the cinema during “Meteor”. It’s a feast for steals.

  9. I’m currently reading Volume 2 of The Official Companion to The Crown, which discusses Seasons 2 and 3. In one chapter they quote a man who published criticiques of Queen’s speeches. Apparently, he received a lot of push back about his criticism and was often asked “why he hated the monarchy,” to which he replied “Does a literary critic hate books?” Like most devoted followers of this blog, I appreciate that your critiques and snark come from fondness not from bitterness. Keep up the good work!!

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