25 Underrated Historical Films You Missed but Shouldn't Have
One of the main sources of inspiration for creators is the events of the past, and the way the movie directors retell them is quite fascinating.
The genre of historical drama is pretty niche, so it's no wonder that these movies didn't get much attention. You can change that, though.
There's a very prominent line between believability and realism. For a movie to be entertaining, sometimes being too realistic is bad: there should be a certain amount of things that the viewer can see and go "Yup, that's how it would be'' before it starts hitting way too close to home, up to the point of disgust, and somehow that became extremely crucial for historical movies.
The ability to expertly navigate that line of truthful portrayal of the historical events without falling into the documentary level of realism but still capturing the vibe of this specific era in a believable way is what makes the best of the movies of this genre stand out. It's a perfect application of artistic freedom as it is used to enhance the true events, to highlight the moments that seemed crucial to a specific filmmaker.
That's what art is: a modification of real life.
Here are all the films mentioned here: Exodus (1960), Zulu (1964), The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964), Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970), Waterloo (1970), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Glory (1989), Curse of the Golden Flower (2006), Arn: The Knight Templar (2007), Agora (2009), Pope Joan (2009), Black Death (2010), Centurion (2010), The Eagle (2011), The Physician (2013), 42 (2013), Unbroken (2014), Trumbo (2015), Macbeth (2015), Furious (2017), The Post (2017), Outlaw King (2018), Kesari (2019), The King (2019), The Last Duel (2021).