Newsies

Newsies
DISNEY/SHUTTERSTOCK

The 1992 Disney musical Newsies is based on a real event, the Newsboys strike. The boys involved just didn’t happen to sing and dance in the streets in 1899. They chose to strike in order to protest increased profits for newspaper bigwigs. While the general events remain pretty accurate, the characters are not. For instance, the lead character, Jack Kelly (Christian Bale), was based on a composite of actual strike leaders.

Advertisement

Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette
COLUMBIA/SHUTTERSTOCK

Historians were mad at Sophia Coppola’s biopic in which Kirsten Dunst plays the French queen, arguing the film depicted the famous ruler as a shallow teenager in love with fashion and excess. The record rather shows Antoinette as intelligent and politically savvy. And she probably never said her famous line: “Let them eat cake.”

Here are 25 of the most memorable movie quotes of all time. 

A Beautiful Mind

A Beautiful Mind
ELI REED/SHUTTERSTOCK

Russell Crowe plays the real-life math genius John Nash, but critics felt that the biopic didn’t accurately portray the actual man or his mental illness. Nash had schizophrenia, which manifested differently than the depiction in the film would indicate. The movie doesn’t accurately capture the complexities of Nash’s diagnosis or his treatment.

Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor
ANDREW COOPER/SHUTTERSTOCK

Michael Bay’s rousing, action-packed Pearl Harbor drove the experts crazy. Yes, there was an attack on Pearl Harbor, but the Japanese pilots did not target hospitals during their bombing raids as the movie depicts. One hospital was hit, but only one staff member died during the attack. Numerous other military details are glossed over in favour of boosting the star power and romance. Case in point: The movie showed Franklin D. Roosevelt climbing out of a wheelchair to prove “impossible” things can happen, but that evidently was totally made up by the script writers.

Anonymous

Anonymous
ENTERTAINMENT FILM/SHUTTERSTOCK

Ever heard of Edward de Vere? There’s a theory that he actually wrote all of Shakespeare’s plays, and this makes Shakespeare scholars livid. The film’s premise, that de Vere wrote the plays to exert political control over the masses, is totally at odds with the facts of Shakespeare and his life, say historians.

The Sound of Music

The Sound of Music
20TH CENTURY FOX/SHUTTERSTOCK

Turns out that the actual Captain Von Trapp was a loving dad, not the militaristic meanie played by Christopher Plummer in the film. Another major detail that was switched around was the family’s great escape. They didn’t have to hike the Alps – that would’ve taken them to Nazi Germany, not Switzerland. They basically crossed into Italy over nearby railroad tracks in broad daylight – just in time too. The Austrian borders were sealed the next day.

10,000 BC

10,000 BC
WARNER BROS. PICTURES/SHUTTERSTOCK

Granted, this film is basically science fiction, emphasis on fiction, but the historical inaccuracies still totally bugged audiences. The movie shows ships, industries and weapons that didn’t come along until thousands of years later. No biggie. In real life there also weren’t woolly mammoths building pyramids (or any pyramids for that matter) in 10,000 BC.

Sign up here to get Reader’s Digest’s favourite stories straight to your inbox!

Source: RD.com

Never miss a deal again - sign up now!

Connect with us: