Worst movie based on actual events (films, script, Hollywood, accuracy)

[Suburban_Guy]

What do you feel are some of the worst movies based on actual events?

Off the top of my head I can think of two.

One is the 2012 Ben Affleck movie Argo. The movie was actually a good box office performer, and was also a critic's darling that won the Academy Award for best picture that year (and was Roger Ebert's favorite movie of the year).

I actually hated it because Mr. Affleck felt it necessary to insert fictional sequences in order to up the suspense level. Like the entire ending sequence with the guards chasing after the people all the way to the runway. I rolled my eyes at that. It's almost as if they felt the true story was not riveting enough without sticking in tired cliches to make it more 'thrilling.' Stupid.

And similarly, Marky Mark's Lone Survivor was also a manipulatively cliche movie that ended with an absolutely ludicrous and totally fictional action shootout sequence. How the real life lone survivor approved this nonsense is beyond me.

50 Worst Movies Based on True Events

[ironpony]

I think it's necessary for movies to add in fictional elements to true story movies to get more drama out of them. If not, a lot of true story movies, would be quite boring to watch really.

[Iconographer]

Not that it was necessarily a bad movie, but Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil was a highly inaccurate depiction of events surrounding the murder trial of Jim Williams. In the movie, the trial was short, swift and tied up in a neat little bow; IRL, it was a 10 year ordeal that involved a trial, three appeal trials and a change of venue from Savannah to Augusta in the last one in which he was finally acquitted. But you've only got two hours to tell the story, so...
I'd like to see the book remade in a miniseries format.

[scarabchuck]

Speed Kills, staring John Travolta. It was based on the life of Don Aronow founder of Cigarette, Magnum, Donzi, Formula, Squadron, and Apache, all powerboat companies for those that don't know.


I was so excited for this movie. I've read pretty much every book on him and the companies, and have been a fan of offshore powerboat racing since the early 90's.


His story has all the makings of a blockbuster movie, bad guys, action, glamour, money, politics...it just never pans out. And this one was absolutely horrible.


https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6749318/


Real news article
https://www.miamiherald.com/latest-n...le1932705.html


They did a good job casting Travolta as Don, he is a ringer.
https://static1.squarespace.com/stat...garette+Racing

[phetaroi]

Well, "The Bridge On The River Kwai" was a fine movie, but so innaccurate. I've been to the bridge twice, and the general setting is NOTHING like the setting in the film. And the bridge was partially hit by aerial bombing, not the story that was told. But, having just watched it again a few nights ago, I'm reminded that the point was not accuracy. The point was telling of the mistreatment of Western POWs by the Japanese and the heroism of many men.

[Iconographer]

The story told in The Sound of Music bears little resemblance to the true story of the Von Trapp family.

In the movie, Maria and Georg return from their honeymoon to find the Nazis on their doorstep ready to conscript Baron von Trapp for military service. IRL they had been married for eleven years and she had borne three additional children before the Germans occupied Austria.
The music and subsequent formation of a performing family chorus came about as a matter of economic necessity. Most of the von Trapp's wealth had evaporated in the economic turmoil of the 30's, a fact that the movie glosses over. By the time the Nazi's occupied Austria, the family had already performed professionally and had just returned from a year-long European tour.
The von Trapps left Austria with no interference from the Nazis; there was no dramatic Alpine escape. They simply took a train to Italy and from there sailed to the United States.

[2x3x29x41]

Stop watching fictionalized movies and complaining that they contain historical inaccuracies. If you want to watch something that reliably tracks history, then watch a documentary.

Anyone who watches a movie, and then carps "But it didn't really happen that way!", is woefully confused as to that nature of historical dramas.

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by 2x3x29x41

Stop watching fictionalized movies and complaining that they contain historical inaccuracies. If you want to watch something that reliably tracks history, then watch a documentary.

Anyone who watches a movie, and then carps "But it didn't really happen that way!", is woefully confused as to that nature of historical dramas.

Nobody is 'carping', just stating points of fact.

I'm sure that there are other threads to occupy your time if this one is so bothersome to you.

[ironpony]

One movie based on a true story, that I perhaps was a little let down by was The Hurricane (1999), based on the true story of Ruben Carter.

In the movie, they felt they had to give Ruben Carter, a nemesis from his childhood past, who was the villain out to get him all along, who does not exist in the true story. Makes me wonder if it really added anything or not.

[Brave New World]

I have seen numerous youtube videos about 'The Hurt Locker' being totally inaccurate nonsense, some of them by people who actually served in US bomb disposal.

Whilst historians just shake their heads at the likes of 'Braveheart', William Wallace was nothing like he was potrayed, indeed this was a man who had a belt made out of the skin of his enemies. Whilst another one of Mel Gibsons films 'The Patriot' has also been labelled a load of nonsene by many historians.

I understand that Hollywood is about entertainment, however mixing fact and fiction and presenting it as the truth, just makes Hollywood itself look laughable and stupid.