Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Historical deviations in Gladiator (2000 film)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) — neuro^(talk) 18:39, 13 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Historical deviations in Gladiator (2000 film)[edit]

All films have errors, there is nothing to indicate Gladiator is unique in this. Article is an indiscriminate, uncategorized unreferenced list. I recommend deleting this because nothing Scott has never said he intended to make a documentary. Alientraveller (talk) 13:40, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Looks like a referenced, detailed article. Yes, all films have errata, but the sources bear out some sort of significance. The errata need not be unique. And whatever Scott said or did not say, the lead can be rewritten to be less jarring. Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia, and this helps make coverage of the film more complete. Dloh cierekim 14:50, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Well-referenced and surprisingly encyclopedic. See Biological_issues_in_Jurassic_Park for other precedents. Shrumster (talk) 15:25, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as per above. Also a nice accompaniment to the main article. It might be a good idea to turn from a list into a more prosaic article however. --.:Alex :. 15:40, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - The topic appears to have enough suitable references to merit an article. Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 15:58, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions. -- Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 15:59, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Merge only content backed by reliable sources that comment on the film through a historical lens to Gladiator (2000 film). Hard to believe that those who are voting "keep" do not see that the article is mostly synthesis because most of the sources in the article are not even related to the film. It's basically akin to picking up a history textbook and investigating the fallacies of a creative work on your own, so the claim that the article is "well-referenced" is flawed. For such a high-profile film like this, there will be commentary by historians on the film itself, as evidenced by the smaller number of sources in the current article. There are also similar sources at the film article's historical section... when proper clean-up is done to purge synthesis, all useful information can be kept in that particular historical section. There is also the concern that this article is a WP:POVFORK since it focuses on how this film (remember, it is a creative work) does not match up to actual history and does not say what, if anything, Ridley Scott got right about depicting the time period. —Erik (talk • contrib) 16:16, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Did Scott really plug the film as accurate then? Ryan4314 (talk) 16:58, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Right well I've had a read through the article as well as the comments here. I think the "smaller number of sources" that feature "commentary by historians" makes it sufficient for inclusion. But I do agree about the POVFORK. Ryan4314 (talk) 16:58, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why not merge it to Gladiator (2000 film)#Historical, then? The film article is only 49 KB so this one does not qualify as a true spin-off. The film article's "Historical" section needs to be purged of synthesis, too, and when all reliable sources so far are combined, they can fit in that particular section. Under "Historical", it can both be identified what was accurate and what was not, avoiding the POV fork nature of this article. —Erik (talk • contrib) 17:03, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like a good idea, but I'd rather have a merge done after AFD on the talk page or something. Merges forced by AFD can be a bit slap-dash if you know what I mean ;) Ryan4314 (talk) 17:20, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strong keep referenced, detailed article. travb (talk) 22:30, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Merge the article appears to be chock full of unreferenced information which is likely original research by synthesis. Instances of deviations should only be included when a reliable source has explicitly mentioned them, not from: X happened in film, Y happened in textbook equals Z historical deviation. Some of the references currently being used look a bit shaky (this seems to be user submitted) and I imagine when everything which is unreferenced and unreferencable is removed the remaining content would easily fit into the appropriate section of the main Gladiator (2000 film) article - making the information easier to find for interested readers. Guest9999 (talk) 22:59, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep this nice addition to Wikipedia. Tag for inline citations per WP:CLEANUP. Schmidt, ^{MICHAEL Q.} 09:50, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep A large number of movie reviews comment on the historical accuracy and deviations, it is a popular topic of movie discussion boards. This review is typical of those who accept it as accurate and sums it up nicely with the phrase "Not True, But It Is Authentic", ie:a fictional story but historically accurate. If I recall correctly there have been more than 20 university papers submitted on the historical deviations. The most relevant mentions are that the historical accuracy of the movie have been critisized in print by the historians Scott hired as advisors. Also, all but three entries are mentioned by a RS in relation to the film itself and can be properly referenced if needed. Even though those three may be synth they are relevant due to Scotts claims of accuracy. David Franzoni who wrote all of the movies original drafts relied on ancient sources for historical accuracy but Scott believed it to be TOO accurate so employed John Logan for a rewrite to make it more sympathetic to the audiences view of history. William Nicholson then rewrote Logan to bring it closer to Franzoni's version as it was no longer historically accurate enough, then Franzoni was brought back to do the final draft because Nicholson was still not accurate enough. The movie was never presented as a normal hollywood drama, Ridley Scott is known for accuracy and promoted the movie as an epic historical drama and Scott even discusses the historical accuracy of the movie in the DVD extras and specifically mentions the accuracy of the fights which are, in reality, not close to accurate. The article itself I feel compliments the movie page and is informative as an encyclopedic entry for readers who want to know how accurate the movie they were told is, was. Wayne (talk) 12:34, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: With the outcome likely to be keep, I suggest purging all synthesis from this article and pursuing a request to merge all reliable sources pertinent to the film to Gladiator (2000 film)#Historical. (The film article's section will also need purging of synthesis as well.) This is very much a topic of the film, and with the film article being under 50 KB in size, having this spin-off is completely unwarranted. —Erik (talk • contrib) 13:50, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Following the purging of synthesis from this article and the film article's "Historical" section (the latter receiving a greater purge), it is even clearer that there is room for any reliably sourced content about the film's historical accuracy to be merged to the main article. —Erik (talk • contrib) 14:16, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Nice job on the "purge", at first I was worried you'd just removed all the unsourced content, but I can see from reading the edit that you haven't. Ryan4314 (talk) 16:26, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, it was material that wouldn't belong in the first place anyway. There is still uncited content about Ridley doing this or that or a historian saying this or that, but searching for the keywords should (hopefully) pull up the reliable sources to back the information. —Erik (talk • contrib) 16:50, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.