(Histroy vs. Hollywood) Pearl Harbor (Histroy vs. Hollywood) Presented by: Ivory Stauner & Rebecca Dupree

How is it interesting to students? Pearl Harbor/the movie attracts high school students and older to watch it. It came out about 9 years ago and has a great love story worked into it. It also attracts the girls because there are the handsome boys playing the main roles. It attracts the boys with the war scenes and attractive female lead.

Plot of the movie The main characters are Rafe McCawley and Danny Walker, & Evelyn Johnson. Rafe and Danny have known each other since they were kids, they go into the United States Army Air Corps. There they meet Evelyn, a nurse. Rafe and Evelyn fall in love and are as happy as can be. But Rafe was sent to England to help with the war more directly.

Soon after Danny learns that Rafe’s plane was shot down, thinking he was dead and tells Evelyn. About 3 months later Danny and Evelyn fall in love with each other. Rafe returns alive. He learns that Evelyn and Danny are in love and is deeply hurt about it. He gets into a fight with Danny at a hula bar. The next day is December 7, 1941. Pearl Harbor is bombarded by Japan.

The 3 main characters survive The 3 main characters survive. Danny and Rafe are asked to be a part of Doolittle’s top secret mission. Before they leave, Eveyln tells Rafe that she is pregnant with Danny’s child. Rafe is still in love with Evelyn but understands that he can no longer have her because of the child. Evelyn tells Rafe to protect Danny. On the mission, Rafe and Danny bomb part of Japan. It goes horribly wrong when they run out of gas. The planes are forced to have a crash landing. Japanese soldiers surround the hurt American soldiers. In a scuffle, Danny jumps in front of a soldier, who was trying to shoot Rafe. Danny learns that he is going to be a father before he dies in Rafe’s arms. He tells Rafe that no, he is going to be a father. The end shows Rafe walking with Evelyn and a little boy named Danny.

Accurate? The Stearman biplane was produced during the mid-1930s while the opening scene of the film is set in 1923, a Curtiss JN-4 Jenny would have been more appropriate, but no flyable aircraft of that type was sourced for filming. The roles that the two male leads played by Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett have in the attack sequence are analogous to the real historical deeds of U.S. Army Air Corps Second Lieutenants George Welch and Kenneth M. Taylor, who took to the skies during the Japanese attack and, together, claimed six Japanese aircraft and a few probables; however, the film itself makes no mention of or allusion to Welch's and Taylor's existence in history, and the movie's plot involving the leads, aside from their roles in the attack sequence, does not match any other historical account of Welch or Taylor. Some critics consider the presence of the two fictional main characters in their steads a blatant usurpation of the true historical figures' roles. This point, when coupled with what many critics feel is an arbitrary and ill-conceived love triangle plot involving the fictional replacements, led to the accusation that Pearl Harbor was an abuse of artistic license

Not So Accurate. Japanese A6M Zeroes at the attack were painted light green, not dark green. At the time of the attack, the battleships in Battleship Row were moored in pairs side-by-side, without gaps through which aircraft could fly. In the attack, two 'Val' dive bombers attack two battleships with 2x2, 2x3 gun mounts and tripod masts, after which a sailor is shown jumping clear of a falling battleship tripod main mast. No battleship lost a tripod mast in such a manner. Not even in the sinking of the USS Oklahoma, which capsized, did a mast fall in such a way as shown in the film. Also, the only two battleships with tripod masts and such a gun configuration were Nevada and Oklahoma, which were moored in different spots. In the attack, four decommissioned Spruance-class destroyers nested together are shown being bombed and on fire several times during the sequence. The first Spruance-class ship was not commissioned until 1975.

No U. S. Navy nurses would assess whether pilot candidates in the U. S No U.S. Navy nurses would assess whether pilot candidates in the U.S. Army Air Corps were fit to fly. Roosevelt claims Stalin begged him to join in World War II. Stalin did no such thing (in fact, at the time depicted, very early 1941, Stalin himself was not yet in the war); however, in the 1943 Tehran Conference, he did press both Roosevelt and Churchill to open a second front. Roosevelt's famous Infamy Speech was severely truncated and otherwise altered. FDR is shown dramatically struggling to his feet during a Cabinet meeting. In reality, FDR only wore his leg-braces, which were very uncomfortable, to public events. In end of the film, Rafe, already home after the raid, is seen receiving a medal from FDR. The raid members were freed in August 1945. However, FDR died in April that year.

Overall Accuracy Although the accuracy of the film was not the greatest, it still nonetheless was a great movie. The accuracy was probably about a 4 or 5 on a 1 to 10 scale.