Welcome to History Lesson, where we take a closer look at the movies that dare to tackle real-life events with varying levels of accuracy, drama, and WTF casting choices. These films promise to educate and entertain, but more often than not, they rewrite history with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. We’ll be your guide through the land of miscast biopics, dramatic embellishments, and historical “inspired-by” liberties, breaking down whether these flicks are Golden Reel Award-worthy masterpieces or just a big-budget Wikipedia summary. Either way, it’s more fun than your high school history class—and there’s popcorn.
This time around we will take a look at Season 9's fact-based slate....
HISTORY LESSON: OUTLAW COUNTRY
Director David Michôd takes on the legend of Jesse James in Outlaw Country, a Western where history checks its facts at the saloon door. Garrett Hedlund and Taylor Kitsch star as Jesse and Frank James, a pair of Confederate sharpshooters turned bank-robbing folk heroes who shoot first and let their charm do the rest. Dakota Johnson plays Zee, Jesse’s love interest with a rifle as sharp as her wit, while Jude Law’s Allan Pinkerton and Sean Bridgers’ railroad tycoon Gabriel Raines chew scenery as the villains trying to tame the James-Younger Gang’s wild streak. From the first train heist to the gang’s dramatic split, the movie gallops through a stylized version of history with all the subtlety of a runaway horse.
Speaking of history, Outlaw Country doesn’t just take liberties.... it commandeers them like a stagecoach. The James-Younger Gang did pull off daring robberies, but the whole “first daylight bank robbery in history” bit? Let’s just say history books might politely disagree. And while Pinkerton probably wasn’t thrilled with Jesse James, the film’s version of events - complete with naked tree-tying and cannonballs stopping trains - feels more like a fever dream than a fact-check. Still, with shootouts, sibling rivalries, and just enough historical grounding to justify the cowboy hats, Outlaw Country delivers exactly what it promises: a rip-roaring, highly fictionalized outlaw adventure that’s as entertaining as it is historically questionable.
HISTORY LESSON: ONE FOR THE AGES
One for the Ages is a gentle, tear-streaked salute to one of the greatest athletes of all time that seems determined to go down easy - even if its subject, Babe Didrikson Zaharias, never did anything the easy way. Natalie Portman gives a measured, awards-season-calibrated performance as Babe, radiating dignity, humility, and just enough grit to keep the movie’s Hallmarky sheen from drowning the drama. The film covers the final years of Zaharias’s life, centering on her comeback from terminal cancer to win the 1954 U.S. Women's Open with a colostomy bag strapped to her side - a real and jaw-droppingly badass historical fact that director Lasse Hallström handles with tasteful restraint and perhaps a little too much soft lighting.
The film’s biggest asset is its quiet emotional maturity; its biggest liability is its resistance to fully engage with the more complicated and radical elements of Babe’s life. The possible romantic relationship between Babe and Betty Dodd (Saoirse Ronan) is hinted at with just enough plausible deniability to keep studio PR teams happy, while Vince Vaughn’s George Zaharias gets a few too many warm-husband-redemption beats for someone who mostly exists to complain about optics. Florence Pugh as Mickey Wright adds charm but is relegated to the stock role of respectful rival. Still, the film's heart is in the right place - even if it plays more like a respectfully sanitized eulogy than a gutsy portrait of a trailblazing icon who would’ve scoffed at all this restraint.
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