Everything The Movie 'Pearl Harbor' Got Historically Wrong

On December 7, 1941, a military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service hit the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. In 2001, the film 'Pearl Harbor' by Michael Bay was released. The drama follows American friends Rafe McCawley (played by Ben Affleck) and Danny Walker (played by Josh Hartnett) as they enter World War II as pilots.Though roughly based on real events, the movie is full of historical inaccuracies. Issues like segregation, "the surprise" attack, and many other glaring errors have caused many historians to dismiss the film as wildly off base.

The majority of today's public gets their information from the media or movies. What's more, people watch movies they believe are real since they are depicted from real events; however, some directors and producers take the liberty to create an action film rather than a film that has no storyline. Most movie producers find that to be what is called a documentary. However, the director of Pearl Harbor wanted to make a romantic action film.

The risk that you take when developing a movie based on historical events such as Pearl Harbor, is that you run into the displeased audience due to non factual information. Therefore the movie received less-than-stellar reviews simply because of the inaccuracies.

One of the inaccuracies is the fact that the movie portrays Pearl Harbor to be a sneak attack when actually intentions of both sides were well-known. The movie also illustrates racial aspects portraying nurses looking after soldiers. This is a bit misleading because back during Pearl Harbor, hospitals were segregated.

The most misleading thing in the movie is the fact that the main character can be seen in the opening scene how it goes to fight against another country. Back during Pearl Harbor there were no wars or animosity going on where an American would have gone off to fight against another country. As a matter of fact it was illegal to begin or be in a war with another country at that time and you could lose your citizenship if you did that.

Another inaccuracy is that the main characters of the movie are portrayed as fighter pilots but by the end of the movie they are dropping bombs over the Japanese. This isn't accurate simply because those two jobs are completely different in the military then and now.

Another noticeable glitch throughout the movie is that where the main characters jumps around the military with no explanation and this type of action would not occur in the military then or now as well.

The movie deals with women's rights as well. In the movie, women are given lots of different types of jobs such as mechanics, radio personnel, and nurses. Unfortunately, back during Pearl Harbor women were only known for being nurses.

Technological advances such as speaking to other fighter pilots or simply other planes did not exist either. Another technological advance can be found in the opening scene, crop dusters were not commercially available during Pearl Harbor, as a result, the boys in the opening scene could not have been playing with one.

The cigarettes that are found in the movie, Marlboro Lights, we're not available until 1972. The vehicles and planes used in the movie we're also not around until much later after Pearl Harbor happened. The movie also shows an aerial view of an entire fleet of ships but those things did not exist until the 1970s. The boats, ships, and planes that the military used, didn’t have bright colors.

Another inaccuracy is the leather jackets that the main characters wear. The jackets, if properly used during the war, would have come with Chinese writings on them so as to let the Chinese know not to kill the soldiers.

The portrayal of the president was also inaccurate as he did have polio, however he did not use his condition to make a political statement. One glaring question exists, would the movie have been more successful if it had been more accurate?