Fictional Elements In Historical Films
Many films that come to Hollywood are inspired by real events. In some cases, directors use a real story as a starting point and create a whole different world out of it. But other times, the movie is supposed to reflect true events accurately. However, a film has to have conflict, plot, and suspense. If the original story doesn’t provide enough of these dramatic moments, the film team will often insert some of their own. That’s why there’s a difference between a documentary and a film that’s “based on a true story”. Below are some famous films that you might’ve thought were completely true, but actually have a couple of facts missing. Don’t believe everything Hollywood puts in front of you.
You’re about to find out how often they alter the facts. Spoilers ahead!
Schindler’s List
The famous Holocaust movie, Schindler’s List breaks the hearts of just about every person who watches it. Though it’s quite accurate, Hollywood left out a vital character, Mietek Pemper. Schindler’s Jewish assistant Stern helped him keep his accounts and communicate with the Jewish workers, but villain Amon Göth also had a Jewish secretary, Mietek Pemper. He secretly helped Schindler and Stern create and carry out their list.
Pemper’s access as Göth’s assistant was huge. He saw confidential documents and messages Göth received from Nazi authorities and helped to form Schindler’s infamous list. He was the one that became aware Nazi Germany was demanding more armament and helped form the brilliant idea to relocate Schindler’s workers to Czechoslovakia instead of Auschwitz. Unfortunately, he was completely left out of the film. Maybe adding him would have created too much side plot.
Argo
This movie is about the 1979 event in which Americans were taken hostage at the US Embassy in Iran by Islamic extremists. Amid the chaos a few managed to escape to a neighboring embassy and call for help. Extractor Tony Mendez, played by Ben Affleck, is recruited to put together a rescue. He has the brilliant idea to pose as a Hollywood producer scouting locations for his film and train the escapees as his crew.
Though this crazy rescue mission is a true story, several aspects of the story were dramatized in order to create more tension. In the film, there are several last minute crises added to create suspense. They also make it so the Iranian guards grow suspicious and chase down the escapees’ plane. In reality, the rescue mission worked smoothly and successfully.
Bonnie and Clyde
The film neo-noir classic Bonnie and Clyde was groundbreaking in many ways. It was considered one of the first movies of the New Hollywood era and tackled taboos of sex and violence in films. Its success prompted other producers to start including more vulgar content. Bonnie and Clyde’s ending had the bloodiest death Hollywood had ever seen. But the real Bonnie and Clyde were not as glamorous as they were made out to be.
In the movie, the pair holds up banks, and completes a successful heist. In reality, the couple was quite inept. Most of their burglaries were at mom-and-pop shops and small stations on the side of the road. Though they definitely became quite the nightmare for law enforcement, Hollywood made them a little more fabulous than they actually were.
Judy
The film Judy is a biographical account of the beloved American actress Judy Garland, best known for her role as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. Actress Renée Zellweger’s portrayal of the star won her several awards including an Oscar for Best Actress. The film follows Garland through her last year of life and includes flashbacks from her childhood and earlier career.
In the movie, you meet Garland’s fourth and final husband, nightclub owner, Mickey Deans. In the film, they meet at a party. But in Deans’ book he says they met at Garland’s hotel when he was delivering stimulants to her. Other than that, the film does a great job of portraying the star’s rise to fame and struggle with substance abuse. They even accurately recreated the wedding dress she wore at her and Dean’s ceremony.
1917
Though the World War I film 1917 is supposedly based on a true story, a more accurate description would say it was inspired by an idea. Director Sam Mendes came up with the plot. He was inspired by the war stories his grandfather told him when he was a kid. Though it’s true that his grandfather did serve as a runner at one point in his war career, his mission was nowhere near as dramatic as what the main characters of 1917 went through.
Grandpa Mendes writes in his autobiography that after a disastrous British effort to reclaim the village of Poelcappelle, several men from his battalion were scattered across No Man’s Land unable to communicate their location. He volunteered to go through, find survivors and relay their location for them. This was definitely a brave undertaking with many close calls, which is precisely why it likely wouldn’t have been a task given to two runners.
Braveheart
Mel Gibson’s movie Braveheart is ridiculed by historians left and right. Many complain that it’s one of the most historically inaccurate movies of all time. It’s not just the fabrications in the plot, but also the details of each scene. For example, Wallace’s rag-tag band of Scots is depicted wearing kilts. Apparently during that time period Scots didn’t wear those clothes yet, and even if they had been, they didn’t wear them backwards.
Another fudged plot point is the capture of William Wallace. In the film he was betrayed by his own men, but in reality, Wallace was turned in by a Scottish knight, John de Menteith after he spent several years in exile in France. The ending was also completely made up. The final battle wasn’t a spontaneous, exciting uprising. It also had nothing to do with Wallace’s legacy. Robert the Bruce had been at war with the English the whole time. The nickname “Braveheart” actually belonged to him, not William Wallace.
Lawrence of Arabia
The movie Lawrence of Arabia is constantly praised as one of the best movies ever made. After its release in 1962, it won countless awards including Best Picture at the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes and BAFTA. In 1991, it was chosen by the Library of Congress to be preserved in the National Film Registry. But despite all of its accolades, the film is full of historical inaccuracies.
The film’s WWI timeline and Hejaz geography are off. For example, when two characters have a meeting about the lack of US involvement in the war, it’s late in the year of 1917 after the fall of Aqaba. In reality, the US would’ve already joined. They entered the war in the first months of 1917. Lawrence is also acting as a lone British representative for much of the movie, when in truth, he had several colleagues to assist him.
Lincoln
The 2012 film, Lincoln is a biographical, historical drama about the president, the Civil War and the abolition of slavery. Though many historians praised the film for being quite accurate, especially for Hollywood’s standards, it’s impossible to be perfect. However, some said that Daniel Day-Lewis’ performance exactly matched the image of Lincoln they had in their head.
But a couple historians wrote in with some complaints. Eric Foner angrily wrote that there’s no way the war ended in 1865 with slavery still intact and that the 13th amendment wasn’t introduced by Lincoln, but with a petition campaign led by famous suffragists from the Women’s National Loyal League. Harold Holzer complained that the opening scene was over the top and that no one from that period would’ve had Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg address memorized.
Malcolm X
While the 1992 film Malcolm X did a great job portraying the life of the African-American activist, it took a couple liberties with his story in order to make the movie more coherent. One of the biggest departures from the truth is the character Malcolm X meets in jail, Brother Baines. In reality, this person never existed! The producers made him up completely.
In the film, Brother Baines is the reason Malcolm X converts to the Nation of Islam. But in actuality, his spiritual revelation was much more gradual. The first people that told him about the Nation of Islam were his brother and sister. They wrote him letters while he was in prison explaining the doctrines and legacy of Elijah Muhammad. Producers decided to create Brother Baines in order to make the conversion more concise.
12 Years A Slave
The movie 12 Years A Slave is an incredibly intense and honest look into slavery and its horrors. Though the movie is based on Solomon Northup’s autobiography, Hollywood snuck in a couple extra events. Directors said that they wanted to really show the brutality of the era and as a result, some plot points were added.
In the beginning of the film, Northup has a somber sexual encounter with an unnamed female slave. The scene is quite striking, using an unflinching still camera to show the desperation and sadness in both characters. However, this incident is never mentioned in Northup’s book and honestly, if he were still alive today he probably would be upset that the directors implied he was unfaithful to his wife.
Hidden Figures
Hidden Figures was a wildly successful film earning US$236.2 million from box office across the world. The fact that three Black women carved out a space for themselves at NASA during a time of racism and segregation is completely true. They were trailblazers and key players in the struggle to get humankind to space.
But though they each were incredibly skilled and smart, the space program at NASA was a lot more collaborative than the film depicts. The film focuses on each woman’s individual contributions and heroics to dramatize their impact. For example, Vaughan actually mastered the IBM 7090 computer with a whole team, not on her own. This doesn’t mean these women weren’t amazingly intelligent and crucial to the NASA team, just that Hollywood exaggerated a little.
BlacKkKlansman
The film BlacKkKlansman is serious and funny all at the same time. It’s based on the account of Ron Stallworth, the first Black policeman in the Colorado Springs Police Department. The movie focuses on the part of his service when he and his team worked undercover in the KKK. But though the film does a great job showing the tension and racism of the time, producers added a couple dramatic details to make the plot more exciting.
Firstly, Stallworth never names or describes the partner who became initiated into the KKK undercover in his memoir. Producers decided to make him Jewish in the film in order to cause more suspense. The love interest in the movie, Patrice Dumas, is also a fabrication. Stallworth mentioned dating someone during the investigation, but he wasn’t specific. Lastly, there was no dramatic moment in which Stallworth revealed his identity to Klan leader Duke. In reality, Duke only found out he was fooled in 2006 when a reporter asked him to fact check the story.
Apollo 13
The Apollo Space Program was what brought humanity to its first steps on the moon. Apollo 11 held the first people to ever touch down on the moon’s surface, astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong. Apollo 13 was the seventh crewed mission in the program. The people onboard were supposed to be the third group to land on the moon’s surface.
They unfortunately failed to set foot on the moon due to a malfunctioned oxygen tank. But despite several problems, the crew was able to return home early and safely. Their successful return was a big deal. The movie Apollo 13 is known for its quotable moments. But the famous “Houston we have a problem,” was actually “Houston we’ve had a problem.” Writers chose to use the more common wording because they thought it would catch on better.
The King’s Speech
The King’s Speech follows the British Patriarch, King George VI (known as Bertie by those close to him) and his trouble with his stutter. The film won numerous Academy Awards and many historians applauded it for its historical accuracy. Actors Colin Firth and Helena Bonham Carter were praised for their accurate representations of King George VI and his wife Lady Elizabeth.
However, Hollywood couldn’t help but dramatize Bertie’s relationship with his speech therapist Lionel Logue a little bit. Firstly, the therapy methods shown in the movie are based on the writers’ experiences with speech therapy. Logue’s methods were never revealed to the public! And secondly, Bertie and Logue became close friends. There’s no record of the small falling out they had in the movie.
Ray
The movie Ray is an amazing homage to the incredibly talented musician Ray Charles. But in their attempts to give him a happy ending, Hollywood glossed over some of the messier details of Charles’ life. For example, it’s true that he got over his heroin addiction, but the musician never stopped abusing substances. He just moved to marijuana and alcohol. As a result, he suffered from liver damage and Hepatitis C.
Another less glamorous detail that was smoothed over was his womanizing tendencies. By the end of his life Charles had twelve children with ten different women and two marriages. Though in the movie his relationship with Della gets a happy ending, in reality, they divorced in 1976. Apparently, when Ray Charles died he gifted each of his children $500,000 and donated the rest to charity.
The Queen
It seems like the British Royal family will forever be the subject of numerous movies and TV shows. Their high status coupled with inevitable family drama always makes for a good story. This movie focuses on the aftermath of Princess Diana’s death and how the public’s opinion of the royal family fluctuated as they tried to properly deal with their grief.
Though the movie does a great job depicting the family’s thought process, there are some small details that fall flat. At one point in the movie Prince Phillip expresses disgust about the idea of “soap stars and homosexuals” attending Diana’s funeral and is rude about Elton John performing in Westminster Abbey. In reality, the Queen was well known to be supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. She also had Elton John play for her privately numerous times.
The Imitation Game
The Imitation Game follows mathematician, code breaker, and computer engineer Alan Turing and his building of the machine that broke the Germans’ Enigma Code. But a couple things were embellished for the film. Firstly, it’s implied that Turing single handedly invented and built his groundbreaking machine.
In reality, a similar device called the Bombe had been invented by Polish cryptanalysts before Turing ever got started. He also had a collaborator, Gordon Welchman, who was left out of the movie. Though he greatly improved upon the earlier code breaking machine, enabling it to work much faster, he didn’t come up with the whole thing on his own. Critics also complained that Benedict Cumberbatch’s depiction of Turing as autistic and off-putting was a little over the top. The real Turing did have close friends and a sense of humor.
Munich
At the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich the Palestinian terrorist group Black September killed eleven Israeli athletes. The film Munich follows Israeli Mossad agent Avner Kaufman and his team on their mission to assassinate the members of Black September in retaliation. The group had a French informant who helped them move from target to target.
The real Israeli Mossad was pretty annoyed with the film’s portrayal of the department. In reality, one small team would never be sent out to complete such a long series of assassinations. They were actually carried out by a much larger personnel (that would’ve included women) with different people recruited for each one. The mission was also stopped not because agents lost their nerve, but because of the Lillehammer affair in which an innocent Moroccan waiter was mistaken as a target and killed.
The Passion Of The Christ
It’s impossible for a movie that describes the crucifixion of Jesus Christ to be 100% historically accurate. There isn’t enough information from the time period. Also, many stories related to Jesus are based on religious beliefs and faith, not historical records. But that didn’t stop Mel Gibson from creating an epic biblical drama.
However, archaeologists still weighed in on the movie’s level of accuracy especially in relation to the crucifixion itself. They point out several small details that the film incorrectly portrayed. The first is that those sentenced to crucifixion only carried out the crossbeam, not the whole cross. Second, that many victims were tied to crosses with rope. They didn’t always use nails. And lastly, that people were crucified naked!
Kingdom of Heaven
Kingdom of Heaven is a movie about the fall of the Christian Crusaders’ Kingdom of Jerusalem. Interestingly, when the historical epic was first released, it was a huge flop. Director Ridley Scott was forced by the studio to shorten the film and the resulting cuts greatly hurt the movie’s integrity. After its initial failure, Scott was allowed to release the full version. Though it was fifty minutes longer, critics liked it much more.
But even the extended version had some historical inaccuracies. The villain of the movie, Guy de Lusignan wasn’t actually the hated antagonist he was made out to be. In reality, Balian and De Lusignan were occasional allies. The dramatic duel between them was also a fabrication. Though it’s enjoyable to watch a villain humiliated, there’s no real record of the fight.
300
The movie 300 uses the 1998 comic book series of the same name as inspiration rather than actual history. In reality, Spartans wore several layers of armor to war, not just a speedo and a cape. The color red was used for intimidation as well as to camouflage their bloody wounds. Also because the Spartan fighting techniques aren’t well recorded, 300’s fight choreographer and stunt coordinator took skills from Filipino martial arts. Though the movie’s portrayal of Spartan training culture was spot on, the actual moves are a product of the crew’s imagination.
The representation of the Spartan senate was also a little off. Members were well respected and quite old. But despite all these fudged details, people love the movie. The gore, the action, and all the exposed abs definitely boosted box office numbers.
Pearl Harbor
December 7th, 1941 will forever be a tragic day in American history. The attacks on Pearl Harbor were brutal and resulted in many casualties and traumas. It was the catalyst that led the US to join the Allied efforts in WWII against the Nazi regime. Of course Hollywood couldn’t resist making a movie out of the dramatic day.
Unfortunately, Pearl Harbor is riddled with historical errors. There are several technologies used in the movie that weren’t around in 1941. Details as small as the brand of cigarettes to the types of airplanes flown were sloppy. Historians complain that it makes the film incredibly hard to watch. When you see E-2 Hawkeyes from 1960 flying around using the wrong type of aircraft weapons during a movie that’s set in the 40s, it’s hard to focus on the plot.
Dunkirk
Here’s another World War II film. But this one depicts the evacuation of Allied soldiers from the Dunkirk beach or Operation Dynamo. Even without Hollywood dramatization the mission was described as miraculous. 338,000 soldiers were rescued from a French beach after being surrounded by German forces and cut off from supply chains.
Interestingly director Christopher Nolan is pretty candid about several of the historical inaccuracies in his film. One example is the yellow noses on the German planes. This paint choice only started after the Dunkirk operation. Nolan explains that he added it into his movie so that viewers could easily discern German planes from Allied planes. Honestly, with all the fast action in the movie, it was the right choice.
Hacksaw Ridge
The movie Hacksaw Ridge follows the life and army service of Desmond Doss. He was the first person to win a Medal of Honor as a conscientious objector, or someone who refuses to perform certain aspects of military service due to personal beliefs. Doss never carried a gun and blatantly refused to kill. He joined the WWII efforts as an army medic and won his medal by saving over seventy wounded soldiers at the Battle of Okinawa.
Though the film does an incredible job portraying Doss and how his beliefs as a Seventh-Day Adventist Christian affected his army service, it dramatized his romantic relationship a little. Dorothy wasn’t a nurse when the pair met and they got married before he was shipped off to active duty. There was never any delay to the wedding because he was jailed. It’s just always hard for Hollywood to resist a dramatic love story.
Blonde
Despite her successes and fame Marilyn Monroe led a very troubled life. Though she might’ve seemed all glitz and glam on the outside, she suffered from mental illness, substance abuse and was mistreated by the industry. The 2022 movie, Blonde, took a deep dive into the personal life of the starlet. But because the film is based on a semi-fictional book of the same name, the line between truth and fabrication is quite blurred.
Several moments in the movie weren’t based on any real evidence. Though Monroe’s mother was mentally ill, there’s no record of her trying to drown Monroe in a bathtub. Her polyamorous relationship with Charlie Chaplin Jr. and Edward G. Robinson Jr. was also a stretched truth. Though she had relations with each separately, there was never a moment they were all together.
Elvis
The year 2022 came with another biographical film about an American icon, Elvis Presley. But experts on the musician’s life complain that this film is oversimplified. They made certain aspects of Presley’s life very black and white instead of the murky gray humanity is known to be. A prime example is the character Colonel Parker. The film paints him to be an unambiguous antagonist who’s constantly trying to sabotage Elvis’s career. But in reality, he wasn’t a total bad guy and even liked Elvis’s performance style.
The film also glosses over his love life. Elvis only focuses on Presley’s first wife Priscilla Beaulieu and completely smoothes over the fact that he started his relationship with her while she was only fourteen! Later relationships, such as Ginger Alden and Linda Thompson aren’t mentioned at all.
Harriet
The 2019 movie Harriet is the first film to pay homage to the famous abolitionist. The plot follows Tubman’s escape from slavery, her numerous rescue trips and her role as the first woman to lead an armed military raid in the Civil War. Her incredible life makes you think that Hollywood’s exaggerating, but a lot of her accomplishments in the film are completely true.
However, a couple characters were added to provide more conflict. Gideon Brodess, the son of Tubman’s owner, and his relentless pursuit of Tubman after she escaped slavery was added for dramatic effect. There’s also no evidence that he hired a slave catcher to track her down. Though it was entirely possible for slave catchers to be Black freemen.
Titanic
Everyone knows that the love story between Jack and Rose in Titanic is completely fictional. However, there are several details in the movie that actually happened during the sinking of the Titanic. Pieces of the ice did land on the deck of the boat, the band played as the boat sank, and most of the underwater shots of the wreckage were real. Special cameras were made to withstand the water pressure and twelve dives were completed to get the shots.
The Picasso paintings Rose displays in the movie made several viewers nervous that a few of the artist’s originals were really lost to the ocean. But don’t worry, the Picasso paintings are just included to set up a moment of humor. Though several works of art on the Titanic are definitely lost to the fish, Picasso’s work didn’t turn into coral.
The Revenant
Leonardo DiCaprio’s Oscar winning performance in The Revenant was based on a true story. However, Hugh Glass never left behind a documented account of the bear attack and there were no eyewitnesses. The story of the mauling first appeared in a local newspaper in 1825. It was written by a local lawyer looking for literary success. The tale quickly spread across the US and became legend.
The murder of Hugh Glass’s son was also entirely made up. There was never any record of Glass even having children. His entire revenge journey was added for dramatic effect. Though it’s true his companions left him for dead, he didn’t feel the need to exact revenge. When he caught up with John Fitzgerald and Jim Bridger, he actually forgave them instead.
American Sniper
American Sniper is the story of one of the most prolific snipers in American history. Chris Kyle was incredibly talented and disciplined and his service in and after the army saved tons of lives. While the movie correctly portrays a lot of the details of his life, a couple details are smoothed over.One big detail that was fabricated was Kyle’s motivation behind joining the army.
In the movie, Kyle applies to join the Navy SEALs after hearing about the 1998 attacks on the US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. But this moment of inspiration wasn’t true. Apparently joining the army had always been a part of his plan. Kyle wrote in his autobiography, “With my rodeo career ended, I decided that I would quit college, stop ranching, and go back to my original plan: join the military and become a soldier.”