Name your favorite films based on true stories.

[ChiTownScion]

Der Untergang (Downfall) and Das Boot, to note two more films regarding the Second World War.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

A Night To Remember (1958)

 

[MisterCairo]

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

 

[SteveZ]

THE DAM BUSTERS 1955

 

[El Zipster]

Yankee Doodle Dandy (Cagney)
Shindlers List
Unbroken

Cheers
Zip

 

[Fading Fast]

THE DAM BUSTERS 1955

A very good one. With fantastic B&W cinematography. I love those '50s British films done in this style.

 

[green papaya]

"To HELL and BACK" starring Audie Murphy as himself during WWII

"Sgt YORK" starring Gary Cooper as WW1 soldier Alvin York

"TORA TORA TORA"! true story about the attack on Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941

"PORK CHOP HILL" starring Gregory Peck as a US Army officer during the Korean War

"MERRILL'S MARAUDERS"

Brigadier General Frank D. Merrill leads the 3,000 American volunteers of his 5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), aka "Merrill's Marauders", behind Japanese lines across Burma to Myitkyina...

 

[lolly_loisides]

In Cold Blood, Breaker Morant, Che (part 1), An Angel at my Table, Newsfront and because it was the first full length feature film ever made (and Australian to boot) The Story of the Kelly Gang.

 

[Panadora]

With a little twist; the true story being "making-of" another film.

Burden of Dreams is a 1982 "making-of" documentary film directed by Les Blank, shot during and about the chaotic production of Werner Herzog's 1982 film Fitzcarraldo, and filmed on location in the jungles of South America.

 

[Bolero]

I've always been a fan of "Alvin and the Chipmonks"

 

[green papaya]

U571 was a true story except it was the Royal Navy that captured the German sub and the decoder [Not the US NAVY]

The Royal Navy deserves credit for that story

 

[Fading Fast]

U571 was a true story except it was the Royal Navy that captured the German sub and the decoder [Not the US NAVY]

The Royal Navy deserves credit for that story

That's a pretty big "tweak" to the real story. Still an entertaining movie even if Hollywood was still trying to kid itself that Jon Bon Jovi had a future in acting.

 

[Stearmen]

U571 was a true story except it was the Royal Navy that captured the German sub and the decoder [Not the US NAVY]

The Royal Navy deserves credit for that story

I remember hearing the ad for the movie, I was in my truck, so all I heard was U5.., so I immediately thought, good, a movie about the Americans capturing U505! Wrong, what a let down! Typical Hollywood, no history from them, just entertainment.

 

[Stearmen]

I am getting better at watching old movies about true events. I now put it into the context of the time the movie was made, then make allowances for inaccuracy! John Wayne, Flying Tigers for one. I can now watch it, realizing it was WWII propaganda, so no truth to the script! Sorry folks, the AVG were not fighting the Japanese before Pearl Harbor.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

From Hell
Melvin and Howard
A Bridge Too Far
Cass (based on the life of Cass Pennant who in the 1980s was leader of the notorious soccer hooligan gang The Intercity Firm aka The ICF.)
Young Guns
Tombstone

 

[Haversack]

The Sea Wolves (1980) about a group of geriatric Anglo-Indian retired soldiers, (members of the Calcutta Light Horse), covertly returned to active service in order to destroy a German freighter interned in the neutral Portuguese colony of Goa on the west coast of India. The freighter was transmitting shipping movements to German U-boats and commerce raiders operating in the Indian Ocean. The movie stars Gregory Peck, David Niven, and Roger Moore.

 

[MisterCairo]

Seriously though:

Lawrence of Arabia
The Great Escape (historical jabs notwithstanding)
Battle of Britain
Von Richthoven and Brown (aka The Red Baron)
Bridge on the River Kwai

Most decent war movies in fact

 

[Edward]

Here's another Kenneth More: A Night to Remember. Lacking the effects of the later Titanic, but in every other way so far superior that to compare the two is somewhat insulting to the former. Still the best screen rendition of the Titanic story, by far.

Also the French film Joyeaux Noel, about the Christmas ceasefire on the Western front in 1914. Captures beautifully that brief moment of human triumph against the interests of clashing empires.

 

[Fading Fast]

Here's another Kenneth More: A Night to Remember. Lacking the effects of the later Titanic, but in every other way so far superior that to compare the two is somewhat insulting to the former. Still the best screen rendition of the Titanic story, by far.

Also the French film Joyeaux Noel, about the Christmas ceasefire on the Western front in 1914. Captures beautifully that brief moment of human triumph against the interests of clashing empires.

Haven't seen "Joyeaux Noel," but that is one of my favorite historical events ever. Says so much; it is uplifting and poignant at the same time.

 

[Edward]

Well worth seeing, beautifully done. Now one of my favourite Christmas films.