Making History Move: Five Principles of the Historical Film by Kim Nelson

The latest book by Canadian scholar Kim Nelson, Making History Move: Five Principles of the Historical Film, proposes a novel and systematic approach to the study of the relationships between cinema and history. This field of study, which should not be confused with the history of cinema, has grown considerably since it first emerged as a subject of academic research in the 1970s, with the pioneering work of the French scholars Marc Ferro and Pierre Sorlin. In the English-speaking world, a growing number of scholars have been interested in this field, with American Robert Rosenstone as the most prominent one, with numerous publications since the 1980s, the most comprehensive being his book History on Film/Film on History (2006).1 The common thread of these works lays on the defense of the film as a medium to research into the past and filmmakers as historians, a rather controversial position for most of “professional historians” working in written history.

Nelson has been very active in this field, from organizing several international symposia at the University of Windsor to recently co-editing The Routledge Companion to History and the Moving Image.2 In Making History Move, Nelson now proposes a methodology for analyzing what is commonly referred to as “historical film” and what she prefers to call “moving histories.” This term encompasses for the author both fiction and documentary films dealing with historical events. In the case of fiction cinema, Nelson specifies that they must be “realist works that historicize, meaning they speak to historicity: real events and people from the past,” while excluding “mainstream fictional renderings set in the past as a backdrop” (p. 16).

The Vindication of Historiophoty

In the introduction, Nelson vindicates the concept of “historiophoty,” coined by Haden White in 1988, as the most appropriate term for studies on history and cinema, a claim that I also made in the introduction to my book Filming History from Below: Microhistorical Documentaries.3 White defined historiophoty as “the representation of history and our thought about it in visual images and filmic discourse.”4 The author considers historiophoty to be the moving image’s answer to historiography, which deals with the study of history in the written form. Despite White’s notoriety in historiographical debates, his proposed term did not take hold, likely due to the resistance of most professional historians to accept cinema as a legitimate instrument of historical research. Nelson adopts White’s proposal and updates it by clearly delineating its meaning and setting it upon a solid analytical foundation.

Nelson emphasizes that moving histories have a different “contract” with their audience than fictional films, as they make claims to truth that carry additional responsibilities. Cinema, in fact, engages emotions and senses in such a way that we remember historical films almost as if we had witnessed the events ourselves. Nelson argues that if “writing is the bias through which we read history,” as John Durham Peters suggest,5 we may surmise that “filmmaking is the bias through which we experience it” (p. 2).

Methodology: Categories and Modes of Moving Histories

Kim Nelson establishes a methodology that seeks to encompass the diverse ways cinema is used to reconstruct the past. She proposes three fundamental categories of “moving histories”: documentary, performance, and hybrid. The first is self-defined, the second is roughly equivalent to what is usually described as historical fiction, and the third category is reserved for cases that combine the previous two. The rationale for analyzing fiction and documentary traditions together is that both share the same underlying epistemological concerns regarding historicization.

The most reliable point of distinction between these modes resides in the nature of the on-screen performance. In the documentary mode, characters act in their own identities, in a “presentational” mode, whereas performance works (historical fiction) involve people taking on other identities, in a “representational” mode. Performance works utilize “mimesis, subsuming the identities of the author, spectator, and historical agent alike into the actor as an avatar” (p. 22), presenting the past in the active present tense. Documentaries resort to diegesis, exploring the past as passed, in retrospect. Hybrid works, combining both strategies, often mix representational performances with presentational interviews.

The Five Principles of Historiophoty

These categories of moving histories are analyzed through five principles that structure the book: narration, evidence, reflexivity, foreignness, and plurality. For each principle, Nelson synthesizes contributions from a wealth of cross-disciplinary scholarship in film and history, to move on to a detailed and comprehensive analytical methodology to apply them to case studies. As primary case studies, the author selects three works that are easily accessible on streaming platforms: Free State of Jones (Gary Ross, 2016) for the performance mode; *Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982–1992 *(John Ridley, 2017) for the documentary mode; and the series Rise of Empires: Ottoman (Emre Şahin, 2020-2022) for the hybrid category. Besides, she also frequently mentions other widely circulated films, such as Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, 2006), The Last Duel (Ridley Scott, 2021), or the documentary The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer, Christine Cynn and an anonymous Indonesian, 2012). In this way, she shows in a concrete manner how her analytical categories are useful for analyzing recent cases with different styles and approaches.

Narration

Narration “articulates the authorial perspective of history through formal modes, genres, and aesthetics, expressing ideology and meaning” (p. 37). Nelson starts from the foundational premise that “all moving histories transmit a perspective, and as such, they are narrated” (p. 44). The narration unveils the historical argument through its structure, poetics, and perspective.

To analyze this narrative dimension, the author employs the classic Aristotelian categories of poetics: story, plot, theme, character, visuals, and music; the plot (muthos) being the most legitimate and powerful way to craft meaning without intentionally altering evidence. She combines these categories with Hayden White’s modes of emplotment and types of ideology. Among his modes of emplotment – romance, tragedy, comedy, and satire – the first two are the most common. Romance is characterized by the “triumph of good over evil,” as seen in Free State of Jones, which despite adversity, ends with a sense that “righteousness will prevail” (p. 58). On the other hand, tragedy dramatizes the downfall of the protagonist, offering a lesson in learning. Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982–1992 falls into this category, arguing that sustained prejudice and state violence inevitably lead to revolt. Regarding White’s categories of ideology – liberal, conservative, anarchic, and radical – most moving histories lean toward liberalism, seeking reforms and critiquing systemic oppression, as seen in Free State of Jones and Let It Fall.

Evidence

Evidence is the key feature that distinguishes history from fiction. Moving histories must adhere to historical rigor because “historical data brings prescribed characters, events, and a range of potential meanings. Evidence imposes creative limitations” (p. 73). The general contract suggests that creative additions will take the form of connections between the data points of evidence rather than overriding or altering the data itself.

Evidence is modulated differently across the three categories. Documentaries often present evidence directly, similar to a museum display. Performance works paraphrase evidence through scripted action and dialogue. Hybrid works blend performance sequences with expert interviews, reminding the audience of the skeletal sources underpinning the vivid scenes.

These evidences are presented both in the text and in paratextual or extratextual elements. Among the extratextual ones, it is worth noting how the author explores different channels, especially the companion websites, as valuable tools for documenting the historical evidence supporting moving histories. The Free State of Jones website, for example, presents itself as a model of academic rigor, providing an annotated citation index that viewers can consult to see the primary sources that informed the script.6 The site also highlights creative departures, such as the creation of the character Daniel, Knight’s nephew, or the character Moses, an amalgamation based on research into cooperation between African Americans and White deserters.

Reflexivity

Reflexivity analyzes how the filmmaker interrupts the spectator’s affective immersion. It functions as a “breaker switch,” crucial to acknowledging our distance from the past, a critical stance for historical awareness. It serves to remind us that the past is mediated by human perspective, the medium, and time.

Nelson sets up the tools for reflexivity in two categories: diegetic (breaks that occur within the mise-en-scène, such as anachronism, casting, or “screen within a screen”) and non-diegetic (elements that break the narrative flow, such as voice-over, titles, or discontinuity editing). A striking example of reflexivity in casting is found in the historical fiction *Da 5 Bloods *(Spike Lee, 2020), where the same elderly actors play their characters in the present and in flashbacks. This choice creates a powerful cinepoetic metaphor about memory and historical reconstruction, emphasizing that memories are reconstructions always anchored and altered by the present. In Free State of Jones, reflexivity operates through the liberal insertion of titles and archival photographs, marking a commitment to historical facts and an awareness of mediation.

Foreignness

Foreignness examines the ability of moving histories to present the past properly contextualized, avoiding “presentism”, which oversimplifies the past to suit the modern mindset. Nelson draws on Natalie Z. Davis’s call to “let the past be the past”7 as “a route to believability and in service of history’s function” (p. 152). This is achieved by creating an atmosphere that incorporates the complexity of each historical period and its protagonists, with fidelity to the material and social reality of each period and place. This turns out crucial because by exposing what is alien (material, cultural, and psychological) in the past, we can understand where our cultures come from, and what has or has not changed over time.

When this is not done rightly, anachronisms result, hindering our ability to understand historical context, grafting contemporary concerns directly into the past, which results in distortion. This often leads filmmakers to hide the actual, sometimes primal, motivations for historical events (e.g., the specific terrifying exchange that sparked the revolt in Amistad (Steven Spielberg, 1997)), replacing them with generic principles to make heroes more palatable. This tendency to essentialize the past into archetypal conflicts of good versus evil denies complexity and undermines history’s function as a tool to better understand the past.

Plurality

The last principle demands a plural perspective to understand every historical epoch. Inspired by Bakhtinian polyphony,8 this principle aims to ensure visibility for previously underrepresented groups. However, this plurality must extend beyond mere visibility to act as a methodology for truth, to counter the “monologic epic” which treats most characters as instruments to a single hero’s success. Expressed through the range of characters given voice and visibility, it counters the burden experienced by those groups who are constantly viewing themselves through the lens of dominant narratives.

The documentary mode lends itself particularly well to plurality. Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982–1992 masterfully exemplifies this, presenting a chorus of diverse experiences, from police officers, victims, perpetrators, and rescuers, resisting judgment and the hero/villain binary. A plurality of interpretation is also a powerful metahistorical tool. The film The Last Duel achieves this brilliantly by employing three screenwriters to tell the same story from the perspectives of three different characters – Jean de Carrouges, Jacques Le Gris, and Marguerite – in direct homage to Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa, 1950). Though each account is subjective and biased, together they offer a complex view of the nature of perception and historical truth.

*

These five principles undoubtedly address key issues for understanding moving histories and how cinema explores and helps us understand history in a deeper, more complex way. However, the book presents them as equal categories, prompting the question of whether establishing a hierarchy among them would have been more appropriate. Clearly, both narration and evidence are structuring elements of any moving history, and their detailed analysis acknowledges their relevance. Foreignness is presented as an important element that ensures moving histories do not fall into superficial anachronisms and stray from the historical rigor claimed to be characteristic of this type of cinema. However, reflexivity does not seem to be essential for a film to be considered a moving history, an issue that is unclear given the prominence given to it in the overall structure of the book. The fifth principle, plurality, also refers to a feature that enriches the complexity of the historical narrative, but which does not seem essential either, as it is possible to think of moving histories that focus on a specific character, group, or place without losing complexity or rigor. Therefore, it would be advisable to assess the internal relationships of these five principles to better discern which ones are fundamental to its historical character and which ones can enhance its historicity without being essential.

Another aspect that one could notice missing in the book is more representativeness in the case studies, which usually refer to mainstream American productions. The exception could be the series Rise of Empires, presented as a Turkish-American production filmed in Turkey, though it is an original Netflix series produced primarily with American funding. However, Nelson justifies this type of film choice in part because of its accessibility, an advantage for readers wanting to get the most out of the book’s analytical approach. That said, perhaps some films from other geographical contexts or less mainstream modes of production could have been considered as secondary cases.

Overall, there is no doubt that Making History Move: Five Principles of the Historical Film is a book that offers a rigorous conceptual and analytical framework, which can be very useful for researchers interested in the relationship between cinema and history, while also offering a new vindication of cinema’s ability to investigate history, creating insightful echoes with the aforementioned pioneering works of authors such as Sorlin and Rosenstone.

Kim Nelson, Making History Move: Five Principles of the Historical Film (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2024).

Endnotes

1. Robert Rosenstone, History on Film/Film on History (Harlow: Pearson Longman, 2006) ↩
2. Marnie Hughes-Warrington, Kim Nelson, Mia E. M. Treacey (eds.), The Routledge Companion to History and the Moving Image (London: Routledge, 2024). ↩
3. Efrén Cuevas, Filming History from Below: Microhistorical Documentaries (New York: Columbia University Press/Wallflower, 2022), p. 5 ↩
4. Hayden White, “Historiography and Historiophoty,” The American Historical Review, Issue 93, Number 5 (December 1988): p. 1193. ↩
5. John Durham Peters, The Marvelous Clouds: Toward a Philosophy of Elemental Media (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015), p. 279. ↩
6. See http://freestateofjones.info/ ↩
7. Natalie Z. Davis, Slaves on Screen (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000), p. 136. ↩
8. M. M. Bakhtin, Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics (Ann Arbor, MI: Ardis, 1973). ↩