Fetih 1453 (2012)

Date: 1451-53

Cinematic Quality: 3 ½ stars

Historical Accuracy: 3 ½ stars

This Turkish-produced film depicts the 1453 conquest of Constantinople by Mehmet II. It is a unique cinematic gem that tells the story from the Ottoman perspective. Designed in the historical epic genre, it has a good score and reasonably captures the high drama of spring 1453. For a Turkish production, the CGI and quality is not too distracting, but make sure you watch the longer, foreign language version with subtitles. The dubbed version is intolerable.

Despite a handful of absurd fictionalizations, I rated the film fairly high for accuracy for several reasons. First of all, a lot of the details, particularly of the battles scenes and technologies used are straight out of the sources. The strategic, operational, and tactical challenges are fairly portrayed. Second, it does what all good historical movies do and highlights the actions and personalities of some of the minor players like Giustiniani, Notaras, Halil Pasha, and Zaganos Pasha. Third, I enjoyed observing a foreign film’s similar pitfalls in making historical movies: an invented and unnecessary love triangle, bias in favor of a political hero (in this case, Mehmet), the necessity of altering the already dramatic plot for a silly moment of hand to hand combat, and playing up the enemy’s atrocities while downplaying your own (as if Mehmet actually kissed Christian children in Hagia Sophia!). If you know the inaccuracies, however, it provides a nice insight into modern Turkish propaganda. So, the rigorous mind can get a double dose of history, then and now.

Some war carnage might make this movie unsuitable for children.

For context, read the beyond excellent treatment by Roger Crowley, 1453. For an illustrated weekend read, see Nicolle’s Constantinople 1453. As for primary sources, see Doukas Historia Turco-Byzantina or Jones’ translation of Barbaro’s Diary of the Siege of Constantinople.

IMDb Synopsis: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1783232/

Available to watch on Youtube.