In 1666, there was a puritan colony in Massachusetts where The Scarlet Letter took place; this was a time of new English settlement. The story line for the movie does portray history accurately in the way the puritans are portrayed by religion, witchcraft, indentured servants and punishment. However, it does not accurately portray the names of the historical people that were involved or that Hester Prynne was not hung also when the Native Americans take her husband captive. The Scarlet Letter portrays the religious aspect of a woman who was caught being unfaithful to her supposedly dead husband and committing adultery. The loyalty of Hester to the father of her bastard child causes her to be chastised from the puritan community.
Native Americans in this film are portrayed accurately in the beginning when the movie shows Metacom, the leader of the tribe, at his father's funeral. Davidson J. et al., (2010) stated "Masasoit died and was succeeded by his son Metacom" (p. 94). When the minister tells Hester that he is trying to rewrite the scriptures in Algonquian, history shows that this was accurate. Davidson J. et al., (2010) stated, "A puritan minister named John Eliot who had begun preaching in Algonquian in the 1640s" (p. 94) was a part of history. Davidson J. et al., (2010) stated that "John Eliot over next two decades he over saw a project to publish the scriptures in Algonquian using the Latin alphabet" (p. 94). In the movie there was an Indian interpreter who already was converted as a Christian that helped the reverend translate with Metacom. Timothy Shannon (2004) stated that there was a minister named John Eliot who did acquire two interpreters in his endeavor, and their names were Cockanoe and Job Nesctan. In the movie, women in the colonies gossiped about Hester. They stated, "Did you hear Mistress Prynne has a bathing tote, what is she French?" (The Scarlet Letter).