Cinema and authenticity: anxieties in the making of historical film

Lees, D. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3787-3740 (2016) Cinema and authenticity: anxieties in the making of historical film. Journal of Media Practice, 17 (2-3). pp. 199-212. ISSN 2574-1144 doi: 10.1080/14682753.2016.1248190

Abstract/Summary

The practice of representing history on film brings the filmmaker into collision with a cluster of concerns around the authentic. While recent articles have considered the historical documentary and historical dramatisation, I seek to extend the debate into narrative fiction film set in historical periods. In this article, I discuss conflicting conceptions of authenticity. Through my own practice-as-research, I examine the decision-making within the preproduction of a historical drama (my short film, The Burning,2016) in order to demonstrate the ways in which contradictory concepts of authenticity can coexist within a historical film project.