As a visual source, movies play an important role in historical research by providing a different dimension of information and sensation than traditional written sources. Through its fictionalized elements, it reflects the conditions of the time and contributes to understanding history from different perspectives.
Since the past has passed, it is impossible for a historian to directly encounter the facts of the past. Historians encounter the past through sources. Sources are incomplete because they do not reproduce the past exactly as it was. The incompleteness of sources limits the scope of historical research, but it is that incompleteness that makes history a discipline, and history is endlessly rewritten. If we could encounter the past unmediated and untouched, there would be no place for historiography.
Historians have traditionally relied on written sources, but artifacts, paintings, oral histories, and other traces of the past can all be used as sources. Historians strive to uncover new sources. Sometimes they find unknown sources, but other times they find new uses for materials that were once considered unimportant, or they look at existing sources in new ways. The shift from microhistory, which focuses on the lives of ordinary people, to the study of so-called “narrative” sources, such as trial records, diaries, letters, petitions, and collections of tales, is a result of this effort.
The expansion of visual media has further diversified the types of sources. This has led to an interest in narrating history through film in historiography and a tendency to identify films as sources. The language of written sources, which historians usually use, is usually abstracted symbolic symbols that have no physical or logical connection to the object being described. Movies, on the other hand, have a materiality of their own, as they image the physical reality in front of the camera. In other words, the images of movies become iconic symbols that refer to things by resemblance. By optical mechanism, a movie image that originates from a subject is also an indicator of the presence of that subject. For example, documentary films, because of their close association with the subject, are seen as a more compelling narrative than verbal narratives because they reinforce belief in the subject’s authenticity.
Visual sources are playing an increasingly important role in historical research because they provide a different dimension of information and sensation than traditional written sources. These new types of sources offer historians the opportunity to shed light on different aspects of the past. This allows the interpretation of history to move beyond the mere recitation of facts to reflect a richer, more multifaceted perspective. This trend is an important factor that is pushing historiography to take an interdisciplinary approach, crossing the boundaries between the social sciences and humanities.
So how does cinema relate to history? Filmic readings of history and historical readings of film form two pillars of the relationship between film and history. Cinematic readings of history involve the interpretation and evaluation of history through the medium of film. Filmmakers can critique history by incorporating their own perspectives into narrative and representational techniques. Historical films based on history can take a straightforward historical narrative approach that is faithful to historical evidence, or they can take an imaginative historical narrative approach that uses historical facts as a resource but relies on imagination to add fictional characters and events. However, historical films are not the only ones that recreate history. All films bear witness to history, either overtly or subtly. A historical reading of film involves examining the historical traces and contexts of a film. Historians can extend the history of a movie by looking at the customs, lifestyles, and other aspects of the movie. They can also draw on the collective unconscious – the desires, compulsions, beliefs, and frustrations shared by the public at the time of the film’s production – as well as unrecognized and obscured histories, such as ideals and dominant ideologies.
Some may argue that movies are not historical narratives because they deal primarily with fiction. This is because historians primarily base their research on documented sources, and historians are not above suspecting that the facts they document may be fictionalized, and they seek to confirm them. However, fiction is not excluded from historical narratives based on written sources. Historians often try to use fictional stories as sources to discover the conditions of the time reflected in them. Fictional stories are not records of actual events, but they do reflect various aspects of mentality, language, material culture, and customs, and they can convey contemporary reality, whether or not the author intended to do so. Some historians go beyond verifying the facts reflected in fictional stories and use fictional narratives to supplement source-based historical narratives in order to recreate a past that is not directly represented in the sources. Historians’ use of fiction is a result of their desire to access the past as it actually existed.
This relationship between history and cinema is not just about its value as a source, but also plays an important role in the interpretation and representation of history. By embedding historical facts in fictional narratives, films not only provide a new source of evidence, but also the possibility of alternative historical narratives. Films contribute to the formation of “history from below,” bringing back to society the history that official institutions have excluded. Films are frequently made based on unofficial sources, such as memoirs, testimonies, and oral histories of ordinary people. In this way, cinema gives voice to the buried voices of groups that have been marginalized in history, such as the lower classes and subjugated peoples. In this way, cinema becomes an agent of historical narrative in that it operates at the opposite end of the spectrum from official history and participates in the formation of historical consciousness.
In conclusion, films are valuable as another form of historical documentation that recreates the past, allowing historians to interpret and reconstruct history in multiple ways. The interaction between film and history enriches our understanding of the past and opens up new horizons for historical narratives. Therefore, the importance of film in historical research will continue to be emphasized in the future, allowing us to understand history from different perspectives.
