True Annie Oakley Biography Would Make Great Film

You are quite correct.

In real life Annie Oakley beat Frank Butler in a sharpshooting match, and he fell in love with her, wooing her until she agreed to marry him. Annie did win her man with a gun! Butler was never jealous of his famous wife. They were a devoted couple, who both died in November 1926. The story, possibly apocryphal, is that when Butler was told that his wife had died he stopped eating, and then followed her in death 18 days later.

Annie was a lady from head to toe, and sewed her own very conservative performance attire. Although she was pretty, she never used sex appeal to entertain her audiences, just her amazing shooting skills.

It's long past due for Hollywood to stop lying about historical figures. I hope the real life of Annie Oakley is someday made into a film. And yes, Hailie Steinfeld would be an excellent choice to play the great Annie Oakley.

Annie Oakley's own words:

“Aim at a high mark and you will hit it. No, not the first time, not the second time and maybe not the third. But keep on aiming and keep on shooting for only practice will make you perfect. Finally you’ll hit the bull’s-eye of success.”

“I would like to see every woman know how to handle [firearms] as naturally as they know how to handle babies.”

“After traveling through fourteen foreign countries and appearing before all the royalty and nobility I have only one wish today. That is that when my eyes are closed in death that they will bury me back in that quiet little farm land where I was born.”

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Movies made about historical figures are rarely true to life. For one, it's hard to make a movie that includes just the main highlights of a person's life. The day-to-day events are often not on record so they have to be created in order to build a story. What they have to do is link the major events we know with the made up minor events that really define a person's life. In the end, the story sometimes comes out all wrong. To make the story fit, events for which we do have the details have to be altered as well.

Another problem involves the other people in the famous person's life. Characters in a movie are sometimes composites of one or several people. Using the names and information about actual people is tricky. It could open the filmmakers up to lawsuits and other problems. Family members or the people, themselves, if they’re still alive, may not like the way they're portrayed and/or they may demand exorbitant fees for their participation.

My point is it's not an easy endeavor to make that type of movie. If in this movie, for example, if Annie married her rival early on, where would the story go from there? It would just show a series of shooting exhibitions in the US and in Europe and then what; the movie ends? How boring! A filmmaker has to tell a story that’s interesting and entertains the audience. By making a boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl again story we are entertained. There’s suspense, tension, sadness, hopelessness, and then the happy ending.

Few of our lives could be made into a movie exactly as we lived. I wouldn't say that's reason enough to not tell a biographical story. There are documentaries, of course, but a movie tends to attract more attention and a broader range of viewers. A movie often is the way a lot of us are introduced to some historical figures. Even if their story has to be altered a bit, isn’t it better we learn about them than not? For a lot of people, that initial interest will spark a curiosity that will lead them to learn what really happened. That may even begin to happen on a movie message board.


Woman, man! That's the way it should be Tarzan. [Tarzan and his mate]