Recently, my brother e-mailed me a link to a story in the
London Sunday Telegraph about a new movie Kingdom of
Heaven now under production. The movie, directed by Ridley
Scott of Gladiator and Blackhawk Down fame, tells
the story of the events leading up to the battle of Hattin in 1187
where Saladin defeated the Christian forces under King Baldwin IV
of Jerusalem — resulting in the eventual loss of the Holy Land to
the forces of Islam. The film purports to be “a fascinating history
lesson.” Unfortunately (though not surprisingly), the “fascinating
history lesson” is a false one, and one that defames the Knights
Templar and the West, while portraying Saladin as a hero.
The Telegraph article quotes Britain’s leading
authority on the Crusades, Jonathan Riley-Smith, as saying of the
film, “It’s Osama bin Laden’s version of history. It will fuel the
Islamic fundamentalists.” He goes on further saying, “It’s rubbish.
It’s not historically accurate at all. They refer to [Sir Walter
Scott’s] ‘The Talisman,’ which depicts the Muslims as sophisticated
and civilized, and the Crusaders are all brutes and barbarians. It
has nothing to do with reality.” Even the French historian Amin
Maalouf, author of The Crusades Through Arab Eyes,
comments: “It does not do any good to distort history, even if you
believe you are distorting it in a good way. Cruelty was not on one
side, but on all.”
Indeed. Though Saladin, the hero of Ridley Scott’s story, was
widely celebrated, even in the West, for his examples of
magnanimity, he could also be as cruel and barbaric as anyone else,
even to fellow Muslims, as when he crucified opponents to his rule
in Cairo. And though the Crusaders were often poorly led and often
committed brutal actions, it is usually forgotten that the Crusades
were a short-lived counter-offensive in a long (and usually brutal)
history of Islamic military expansion (which continued into the
17th century when Islamic armies were finally defeated at the gates
of Vienna).
A spokesman for Ridley Scott, however, counters that they are
“trying to be fair, and we hope that the Muslim world sees the
rectification of history.”
INTERESTINGLY, JUST HOURS BEFORE I OPENED this e-mail, I was
listening to the outstanding, but sadly under-appreciated score of
another movie that dealt with a real-life conflict between the West
and the Muslim world — the 1966 British classic Khartoum.
The brilliantly rousing and evocative score by Frank Cordell is, in
fact, better than the movie. I obtained my current copy of the
score by finding an original LP on E-bay a couple years ago (to my
knowledge it has, unfortunately, never been recorded on any other
medium for commercial distribution). The film itself is marred by
some really bad painted backdrops and the film critic Leonard
Maltin is somewhat justified in calling it “too talky,” but it is a
great story.
For those of you not familiar with the story of the siege of
Khartoum of 1884-85, shame on you. But at least you are reading the
right column.
In the early 1880s, a Muslim fanatic who took the title of the
Mahdi, thinking himself to be a prophesied Messiah, led a revolt
against Egyptian authority in the Sudan, and in 1883 routed an
Egyptian force led by a British officer sent to deal with him.
British Prime Minister William Gladstone, having just intervened
militarily to put down a coup in Egypt that had threatened British
interests there, was not keen on getting Britain involved in the
Sudan (in which he saw no British interests). He, nonetheless,
dispatched a famed war hero, General Charles Gordon, to Khartoum,
Sudan’s capital, to organize the evacuation of the Europeans living
there as well as the Egyptian garrison.
Gordon was widely celebrated in England as a devout, though
quirky, evangelical Christian (though when posted to positions of
authority in Muslim countries, he always respected Muslim
traditions and encouraged the people to practice their religion,
never trying to convert them). He became known as “Chinese” Gordon
after successfully leading the “Ever Victorious Army” on behalf of
the Emperor of China during the Taiping Rebellion. But Gordon was
also no stranger to the Sudan. At the behest of the Khedive of
Egypt, he had earlier served as governor of one of its provinces,
Equatoria, and as Governor-General of the Sudan, itself. In these
posts he distinguished himself as an incorruptible administrator
and a shrewd military tactician, and he successfully suppressed the
slave trade run by powerful Arab Muslims. Gordon’s displays of
courage, devout manner, and his “flashing eyes” even caused some
Sudanese to think that Gordon was the new Prophet the Mahdi claimed
to be. Gordon’s return to Khartoum in early 1884 was, therefore,
celebrated by the locals.
Gordon dutifully evacuated thousands of the city’s women and
children. But he had no intention of leaving Khartoum and the rest
of the Sudan to the mercy of the Mahdi (who did not have Saladin’s
reputation for magnanimity) and he made clear to the British
government the he, and the Egyptian garrison, would stay to defend
the city. He immediately started work on the city’s defenses,
relying heavily on the rising waters of the Nile (Khartoum is
situated at the confluence of the White and Blue Niles) which
provided a natural barrier, at least through November or so when
the waters would start to recede. By April, the Mahdi’s forces had
surrounded Khartoum and cut the telegraph lines linking the city to
the outside world.
Gladstone was, of course, furious. Nonetheless, he was
eventually compelled by political pressure to send a relief
expedition to save the famous hero. On January 17, 1885 the relief
force, headed by General Garnet Wolseley, defeated a Mahdist army
and two days later the advance column reached the Nile at
El-Metemmah with orders from Wolseley to commandeer anything that
could float and to make haste for Khartoum. As it happened, Gordon
had previously dispatched four steamers to El-Metemmah with the
hopes that they would find the rumored relief force. Inexplicably,
the advance force waited three days before sailing. On January 28th
the vanguard of Wolseley’s army finally arrived in sight of
Khartoum. Unfortunately, in the pre-dawn hours of January 26th —
just two days before — the Mahdi’s forces crossed the fallen Nile,
breached the city’s defenses, and slaughtered the woefully
outnumbered Egyptian garrison, as well as many of the residents who
had remained defiant of the Mahdi.
HOW GENERAL GORDON MET HIS FATE is not exactly known. The most
dramatic version, and hence the one used in the film, has Gordon
stepping out of the Governor-General’s palace as the Mahdist forces
break into the palace compound. As he makes himself seen at the top
of the stairs above the palace’s courtyard, the Mahdist swarm
temporarily halts, in awe of the Great Man, until one warrior
throws a spear into Gordon’s chest.
Like almost any dramatization, Khartoum is not without
historical inaccuracies, though its are minor transgressions and
are solely for dramatic purposes rather than to promote a PC
agenda. For instance, the film portrays the Mahdi (Sir Laurence
Olivier) as respecting Gordon (Charlton Heston) and regretting
Gordon’s death. In actuality, the Mahdi had Gordon’s decapitated
head stuck on a pole where his men threw rocks at it until its
features were cut away. Gordon’s body was thrown down a well.
Though the Mahdi died of typhus just five months later, his
rebellion was not put down until 1898 when Lord Kitchener defeated
his followers at the battle of Omdurman just outside of
Khartoum.
If you have not seen this movie, I recommend that you go to your
local video store right now to try to find it. I should warn you,
however, that in Khartoum Gordon is unashamedly portrayed
as the hero. So if you think George Bush has blood on his hands for
taking out the Butcher of Baghdad, you may find this film morally
confusing. And if you, like senator Patty Murray, think Islamic
militants are motivated to kill infidels because of a lack of
Western provided health clinics and day care facilities and can be
mollified with a little self-flagellation, you will probably prefer
Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven.
