Movies Based on a True Story #2

Can you identify these films based on actual events?

"Based" on a true story doesn't mean the movie was non-fictional

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Last updated: September 19, 2017

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First submitted	September 9, 2014
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Average score	57.9%
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Year	Description	Movie
1965	In the hills of Austria, seven musical children get a new governess	The Sound of Music
2000	Foolhardy fishermen confront a monster storm off the coast of Canada	The Perfect Storm
1993	Undersized Notre Dame football walk-on gets a brief chance to play	Rudy
2002	White rapper from Detroit wins a rap battle	8 Mile
2004	Hotel manager protects Tutsis from genocide	Hotel Rwanda
1995	Houston problem solvers must help save a wounded spacecraft	Apollo 13
1995	In a gangsta's paradise, only an inspirational ex-Marine teacher can reach troubled youth	Dangerous Minds
1997	Upper class girl and lower class boy have a forbidden romance aboard a doomed ocean liner	Titanic
1967	Man and woman are lovers and also notorious 1930s bank robbers	Bonnie and Clyde
1993	Jamaicans compete in the Winter Olympics	Cool Runnings
1993	German industrialist hires Jews to protect them from the Nazi regime	Schindler's List
1992	When the boys go off to war, the girls get a chance to play professional baseball	A League Of Their Own
2001	Prize-winning economist becomes unhinged and looks for hidden messages in newspapers	A Beautiful Mind
2006	Passengers battle terrorists on a hijacked plane on 9/11	United 93
1995	Scottish patriot William Wallace fights for freedom	Braveheart
2007	Small number of oily Spartans battle a much larger force of Persians	300
2008	Soldier becomes addicted to the thrill of defusing bombs in Iraq	The Hurt Locker
2003	Undersized race horse inspires a nation during the Great Depression	Seabiscuit
1998	Medical student uses humor to help patients	Patch Adams

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31 Comments

Level 81

Nov 15, 2014

Fine quiz, and hope this isn't annoying, but... while many of these could be considered loosely based on a true story and that's fine, Hollywood does that all the time, some others I don't think really count even by that definition. Most notably 8 Mile, which, although it borrows a couple elements of the story from Eminem's life it is in no way meant to be a true story. It's pure fiction, maybe inspired somewhat by a true story.

and then there's Titanic, which although set against the backdrop of a meticulously recreated true event in history, is also the story of a couple that are totally 100% fictional. The main story of Titanic and the two main characters are not in any way based on a true story, it's just that they happened to be living in the real world at a specific time and place. This would be like saying Anchorman is based on a true story because there really was a city called San Diego in the 1970s. I think The Hurt Locker might also fall into this category.

Level 81

Nov 15, 2014

Actually Anchorman's not even a good example since the events of that movie actually are supposed to tell the true story of something that happened in history- the integration of female news anchors in network affiliate newscasts. That actually happened. On the other hand there's no evidence at all that first class girls on the Titanic were slumming around in steerage with penniless artists. hmmm... okay a better example would be saying that The Wedding Singer was based on a true story because the 80s really happened. Even though all the main characters in the movie never existed (aside from Billy Idol) and were not inspired by anybody who ever existed. But the historical backdrop of the story was accurate. Still, it's the setting of the story. Not the actual story.

Level 74

Nov 15, 2014

I've never seen 8 Mile so I can't discuss that one, but The Hurt Locker was based on reports of a journalist who was actually embedded with a bomb squad in Iraq. While the characters were fictional, I think they were based on people who really exist. Titanic, as you said, was not based on any known persons but because the setting was crucial to the story, for me it fit the caveat of fiction based on a true event. The Wedding Singer was not based on real people or any real event. A time period is not an event and is too broad. To make it fit the caveat, it would have to have been about a real or fictional singer from a real wedding, such as a person who sang at the wedding of Charles and Di.

Level 81

Nov 15, 2014

Okay what about Forrest Gump. Is that a true story? There are plenty of real events in that movie. The integration at the University of Alabama. The Vietnam War. The assassination of several different leaders. And so on and so on. Does that make it a true story? I think just because the backdrop of Titanic is so incredibly dramatic people start to think that the story of the film IS the backdrop of the film, but I would simply disagree. The story of Titanic is the love story between Jack and Rose, and this is not in any way based on a true story.

Didn't know about The Hurt Locker. You might be right.

Level 71

Nov 17, 2014

I would say the same about Braveheart obviously inspired by but not based on, such an inaccurate movie.

Level 81

Nov 21, 2014

I think that's different. Braveheart takes a lot of liberties and has many inaccuracies, but William Wallace and Edward the Longshanks were real people and the story being told is supposed to be a reflection of true events. Similarly, 300... obviously there were not goat men and cleaver-armed demon executioners in the Persian army, and Xerxes wasn't a 10 foot tall fetishist ladyboy, but the events in the film, though presented in a highly stylized fashion, are actually based on history. Even some of the corniest lines of dialogue that most people assume is pure comic book invention are actually lifted straight from the accounts by Herodotus.

Level 61

Apr 18, 2017

Dude...you've got to say spoiler alert when you give away important details like Anchorman not being a true story.

Level 41

Oct 12, 2017

that's because 300 was based on the graphic novel an not te actual event if you want a film based more so on the event wath The 300 Spartans which was made in the 50s or 60s

Level 81

Feb 27, 2018

the graphic novel was based on the historical accounts of Herodotus, though, with heavily sylized elements inserted and many creative liberties taken.

Level 41

Nov 17, 2014

All I could think of instead of Dangerous Minds was "Only The Strong". Anyone remember that one? Same concept, more brazillian dance fighting?

Level 71

Nov 17, 2014

Every time I hear "based on a true story," I think of the animated film Balto.

Level 38

Nov 18, 2014

Every time I glance at the icon, I think it is Lord of the Rings and then I shed a tear because that isn't real life :'(

Level 66

Dec 26, 2014

I agree with others that Titanic shouldn't be on here. I saw the qualification the quizmaster added above, but all based-on-a-true-story films are in some sense fictionalized. What gets me with Titanic is that the two major plot points (the heart necklace and the Jack/Rose fiasco) are made-up, so it literally can't be based on a true "story." The backdrop of the film is based on actual events, but the film itself is not.

Level 41

Apr 25, 2016

braveheart is incredibly inaccurate

for instance, the battle which he won in the film and gets knighted for..... Wallace had already been executed by the time the battle even took place..... and he sure as hell never slept with the princess let alone got her pregnant

Level 41

Apr 25, 2016

and longshanks also died long before Wallace was executed

Level 81

Feb 27, 2018

The History Buffs channel on YouTube pointed out that the princess at the time was in France and only about 8 years old at the time so Wallace would have had to have been a teleporting pedophile.

Level 70

Apr 28, 2018

And also Mel Gibson isn't William Wallace. He's actually Mel Gibson in real life.

Level 63

Sep 8, 2016

THANK YOU for the additional info! I hate when people cry about how this or that is totally unreal and the movie doesn't deserve to be titled as "based on a true story". Even if there's just an event that actually happened but all the people are fictional you can use that phrase.

Level 75

Oct 25, 2016

How can that be the qualifier for allowing a film / book / etc claim to be based on a true story?

It's like saying Rise of the Planet of the Apes is based on a true story because drugs have indeed been tested on chimps before.

Adding the backdrop of some factual event to a fictional tale does not in any way make the tale 'based on a true story'

Level 55

Sep 14, 2016

John Nash wasn't actually an economist, but a mathematician, though his work on game theory is used in economics.

Level 34

Oct 5, 2016

You should add Fargo if you count Titanic and 8 Mile as true stories.

Level ∞

Nov 2, 2016

And Harry Potter too! But seriously, these aren't true stories, they are "based" on a true story. Hollywood likes to do that.

Level 81

Feb 27, 2018

As I pointed out above there's a difference between story and setting.

Level 81

Feb 27, 2018

but if this is the paradigm we're using I will do the same on the sequels I make.

Level 70

Apr 28, 2018

Surprised not to see Star Wars Ep3

Level 56

Apr 30, 2018

A better clue than Titanic would be A Night to Remember. That was actually a pretty accurate depiction of the sinking. Other movies that were largely true to events include Gettysburg and Tora Tora Tora.

Level 81

Sep 25, 2018

I included two of those films on the sequels I made which you can find here and here

Level 58

Apr 14, 2020

What about the true story of that guy who fought an alien in the South American jungle?

Level 93

Apr 13, 2021

The Hurt Locker came out in 2009.

Level 57

Aug 31, 2023

I got every single one of them right. I'm kind of a nerd.

Level 83

Oct 1, 2023

I can't remember the difference between Dangerous Minds and The Substitute besides one has Tom Berenger and the other has Michelle Pfeiffer who, apparently, played a Marine too?

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