U-571 Achieves Its Aim of Entertaining the Public; Its Inaccuracies Are Minimal and Unimportant as These Events Happened over 50 Years Ago. Without Such Films People Would Forget About the Events of the Second World War

U-571 achieves its aim of entertaining the public; its inaccuracies are minimal and unimportant as these events happened over 50 years ago. Without such films people would forget about the events of the Second World War entirely. How far do you agree with this statement?

The film U571 was released in 2000 and was directed by Jonathan Mostow. It is considered one of the most inaccurate war films made.   In fact during the release of the film, Tony Blair condemned this film in parliament as an “insult to the Royal Navy”. This is because throughout the film, we can spot many historical and other inaccuracies. Some of these are tiny details, just to make the film more exciting however some of these inaccuracies are quite significant and have caused controversy.  
The film is based on the capturing of the Enigma coding device that the German used in the War to contact their command centres, and each other. It is arguable that the capturing of the Enigma machine is what allowed the British to gain an advantage over the Germans.   The coding machine was captured by the British during a battle on the Atlantic, and it wasn’t captured from a ship called U-571. The inaccuracies in this film are very significant and therefore it is wrong to say that they are “minimal and unimportant”. In this essay I will explain my views on the statement above, and will support my arguments with sources and detail.  
The film begins in the spring of 1942, and an American submarine is pursuing the Atlantic preparing to board and capture a German U-boat. The American Sailors plan to board the U-571 posing as a German supply crew in order to steal its Enigma.
Firstly the real submarine U-571 was sunk by an Australian plane in 1944 two years after the film inaccurately states it was captured. In fact the British had already captured a German submarine U-110 and with it an Enigma code machine along with the Enigma documents in 1941 and at this stage the Americans had not even entered World... [continues]

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