Historia: Braveheart

Braveheart is a film that needs little introduction. It won five Academy Awards and has been held in high regard by audiences. It has an 8.3 score on IMDB from 1.1 million users. It’s also the poster child for historical inaccuracies in movies.

William Wallace (Mel Gibson) was a humble farmer who suffered at the hands of the English and their occupation of Scotland. His father and brother died when they rebelled against the English, leading young William (James Robinson) to be taken away by his uncle (Brian Cox). When Wallace returns to his farmstead, Edward Longshanks (Patrick McGoohan) decrees the practice of Primae Noctis, where an English lord could bed a Scottish bride on her wedding day. When Wallace’s wife, Murron (Catherine McCormack), is murdered by the English, he ends up leading a rebellion against the English and uniting the common folk against their oppressors.

I am an Englishman, and my degree is in history, so I will admit my bias against the film. Whenever there is a historically inaccurate TV or film, like Vikings and The King, I usually compare it to Braveheart.

There’s no denying Braveheart’s cultural impact. Many people have declared Braveheart as one of their favourite movies; it increased interest in Scottish history and tourism to the country, and it has become a favourite amongst Scottish nationalists. When I visited Scotland, DVDs of the film were plentiful in Fopp in Glasgow and at The National Wallace Monument, although my Scottish friends and colleagues have said the reception to Braveheart has been more mixed in the nation. Some love it as a piece of Scottish pride; others dislike it for the Hollywoodization of a revered Scottish hero.

Braveheart came out at a time when there weren’t many historical epics being produced. Before the release of Braveheart, the only major medieval set film in the 1990s was Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, which was a swashbuckling adventure. Braveheart brought in a gritty realism and violence to the genre, and it influenced subsequent films like Saving Private Ryan, Gladiator, and the wave of historical epics in the noughties. I am even using Braveheart as an inspiration for a historical epic I’m writing, although not necessarily for positive reasons.

On a technical level, Braveheart was fantastic. There was location shooting with fantastic cinematography by John Toll, who won an Academy Award, terrific costumes, and James Horner provided one of his most memorable scores, the man who wrote the music for films like Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Titanic, and Avatar. From an action standpoint, Braveheart was well done, and even though the film was nearly three hours long, it didn’t feel like it. Braveheart was made to be a modernised version of Spartacus, since they were both epics about rebellion, but could be bloodier. Braveheart had a Shakespearean quality because of the drama, speeches, and soliloquies.

Most people know that Braveheart is historically inaccurate and probably know most of the inaccuracies, like the Battle of Stirling really being the Battle of Stirling Bridge, the kilt not being worn, or faces not being painted blue in the Medieval era. The screenwriter Randall Wallace (no relation) used Scottish stereotypes, but he was ignorant of important Scottish iconography because in an early draft of the screenplay, Murron gave Wallace a rose, and one of Randall Wallace’s friends had to point out that roses are a symbol of England. Wallace never bedded Queen Isabelle (Sophie Marceau) and fathered Edward III. It would have been awkward if Wallace had fathered Edward III since he went to war with Scotland even captured King David II.

The defences for Braveheart are that it’s not meant to be a documentary, and the film was based on The Wallace, an epic poem written by Blind Harry. The Wallace was written to be nationalistic propaganda and added details like Wallace having a wife. Any historical film about William Wallace would have had to use some artistic license, which would have been required since all that was known about him was that he was a member of the lower nobility. But the justification for historical inaccuracy can only go so far.

Randall Wallace reportedly said, “Don’t let the facts get in the way of the truth!” This justification doesn’t hold much water, considering Randall Wallace wanted to be accurate and respectful to history when he wrote and directed We Were Soldiers. I believe historical films need to be respectful to the period they are presenting. The YouTuber Andrew Rakich, AKA Atun-Shei Films, made a video about Braveheart and praised its impact on Scottish Nationalism. This was a man who also criticised Gods and Generals being neo-Confederate propaganda. It seemed to be a cast where historical inaccuracy is okay if it supports your ideology, but bad if it goes against it. To be fair to Rakich, he did acknowledge the importance of historical accuracy in films in a later video.

Braveheart does provoke. The opening of the film was “I shall tell you of William Wallace. Historians from England will say I am a liar, but history is written by those who have hanged heroes.” It seems like it was written to justify the historical inaccuracies. That quote could be taken to an extreme because Mussolini was hanged, so he could be seen as a hero. Braveheart felt inauthentic with its battles since it showed lightly armed peasants were able to go toe-to-toe with heavily armed English soldiers in massive brawls. There was no scene of strategy or cunning from the Scots.

Braveheart was one-dimensional with its scenario and characterisation. It was basically Scots good, English evil. It was a film that showed the English introduced government-sanctioned rape, were provoked into fighting at the Battle of Stirling, and most egregiously, Longshanks ordered his archers to shoot his own troops when fighting during the Battle of Falkirk. I’m no military strategist, but I know deliberately killing your own troops is bad for morale. I detest the moment when the Scottish and Irish charged at each other and teamed up so they could make Longshanks and the English look foolish.

Wallace was shown to do no wrong; he had no faults. When he sacked the city of York, he said he did not kill a civilian and any military or political failings were due to betrayal, not his own flaws or misjudgements. This was the antithesis of why people find history interesting, since it’s complex. There are rarely simple answers. Game of Thrones showed a detailed and nuanced look at medieval politics and society, and it was much more compelling. The Netflix film Outlaw King showed a more nuanced picture than Braveheart, and that film was a romanticised portrayal of Robert the Bruce.

Whilst the characters were one-dimensional, they were memorable. Gibson didn’t want to play William Wallace because he thought he was too old for the role, but agreed so he could get funding. His Scottish accent was questionable, but he did have charm when he was with Murron and delivered one of the great movie battle speeches. Wallace’s main lieutenants, Hamish (Brendan Gleeson) and Stephen (David O’Hara), were notable, especially Stephen, since he was a nutty Irishman. It’s humorous to think an Irish actor was cast to play a Scottish character, and a Scotsman played an Irishman. There’s a fun bit of trivia that James Cosmo played Brendan Gleeson’s father when in real life Cosmo was only seven years older. There’s no denying that Marceau and McCormack were beautiful women, and they played strong women, especially Marceau, who had to survive in a court she hated.

However, Patrick McGoohan’s Longshanks was one of the most overrated characters in film history. He was just a moustache-twirling villain and a raging psychopath who bullied and killed everyone who disagreed with him. He was a psychopath who had no cunning or strategy, who set out to do the evilest things possible, like ordering Primae Noctis and killing his own troops. It was cartoonish. Ironically, Gibson probably would have liked Longshanks, considering what he did to the Jewish population in medieval England.

Gibson and Randall Wallace are Catholics, and they emphasised the war to be a Christian endeavour. The opening quote said Longshanks was a Pagan, equating paganism with evil. This ignores that Longshanks fought in the Crusades and was a Catholic himself. Before the Battle of Stirling, the Scottish soldiers prayed with priests, showing their religious commitment. The final act showed Wallace’s execution, and the film portrayed him as a Christ-like figure. He rejected a painkiller from Isabelle, he was tied to a cross, and died a martyr since he did not concede to the English.

Braveheart was a piece of entertainment, and it has some value. Even critics can find some virtue in the film, but it was too simplistic to be a true masterpiece, and it plays too fast and loose with facts.