Truth is stranger than fiction! Join us as we explore shocking moments from historical films that seem too incredible to be real. From heroic acts during Pearl Harbor to space mission ingenuity, these dramatic scenes actually happened exactly as portrayed on the silver screen.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00It's been 84 years.
00:02It's okay, just try to remember anything. Anything at all.
00:06Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the scenes in period films that seem far-fetched, but are actually true to real life.
00:14Do they know they're not on the air?
00:16Yeah, they'll tell them when they get back.
00:20Number 10. Dory Miller guns down enemy planes. Pearl Harbor.
00:25You in?
00:26Yes, ma'am.
00:28And what do you get for winning?
00:32Respect.
00:33Most of the main characters in this Michael Bay war drama are fictional, but Doris Miller was a real person, and a real hero.
00:39When the attack on Pearl Harbor began, the mess attendant first helped move wounded men, including the ship's captain, to safety.
00:46Find my axel. Tell him to assume command, and you make sure the gunner's—
00:50Everyone's where they need to be, Captain. You trained us well. You trained us well.
00:56Then, he jumped on one of the massive anti-aircraft machine guns, and fired until he ran out of ammo.
01:02Despite never having been trained on the weapon, Miller took down at least two enemy planes.
01:07After that, he went back to moving the injured, and is credited with saving numerous lives.
01:11Did you ever lose a fight, Miller?
01:15You've been lucky so far, Captain.
01:17From what I hear, it ain't luck.
01:20The ship's proud of you, son.
01:22There's no question that he earned that Navy Cross.
01:24And in case you were wondering, the infirmary really did put donated blood in sterilized Coke bottles.
01:30Number 9. A Swiss doctor suggests letting Stephen Hawking die. The theory of everything.
01:48Imagine that you're a doctor, and one of the greatest scientific minds in the world has just been admitted to your hospital with pneumonia.
01:54Would you just let him die?
01:56This almost happened to Stephen Hawking on a trip to Switzerland in 1985.
02:10By then, he was using a wheelchair, and had difficulty speaking due to ALS.
02:15A Swiss doctor suggested to Hawking's wife, Jane, that taking him off the ventilator would be the most humane option.
02:21Everything plays fast and loose with the facts at times, but it got this scene right, as well as Jane's response.
02:41After the incident, Hawking would go on to make many more scientific discoveries, and finish his most popular book, A Brief History of Time.
02:49Number 8. Al Capone beats a man with a bat. The Untouchables.
03:05It might seem unlikely that a man, even a crime boss, would beat another man to death with a baseball bat at a black tie gala.
03:12And it's true. Al Capone didn't do that in real life.
03:15He actually beat three men to death with bats.
03:18His rival, Joe Aiello, had talked three of Capone's heavies into overthrowing him, and Capone found out about the plot.
03:24The brutal killings were probably intended to send a message about how dangerous Capone really was.
03:45Although some historians have questioned whether the stories of the beatings are true, researchers have found reports from the time period that seem to corroborate them.
03:52Al Capone was one bad dude.
04:07Number 7. Ron Stallworth is David Duke's bodyguard. Black Klansman.
04:11Just about every scene of this movie is hard to believe. And yet, most of them really happened.
04:24Stallworth really was a black police detective who infiltrated the KKK with the help of a white colleague.
04:30When Grand Wizard David Duke traveled to Colorado, Stallworth was indeed assigned to be his personal security.
04:42However, Duke was there for a publicity tour, not to attend Stallworth's initiation into the white supremacist group as the movie shows.
04:49But Stallworth did manage to get a photo with his arm around Duke, which Duke was not happy about.
04:55According to Stallworth's memoir, that scene happened pretty much just as it did in the film.
05:00Number 6. Tommy Wax Spider. Goodfellas.
05:25This Martin Scorsese classic is loosely based on the book Wiseguy, a real-life account of the mob enforcer Henry Hill.
05:32Joe Pesci's character, Tommy DeVito, was inspired by Tommy DeSimone, who was just as dangerous in reality as he is in the movie.
05:40According to Hill, Tommy shot Spider the bartender like he does in the film, although he probably didn't make him dance first.
05:46Even crazier, that's not the only time Pesci commits a barbaric act of violence in a Scorsese movie that's based on real events.
06:10In Casino, he plays Nicky Santoro, who's based on an actual Wiseguy, Anthony Spilotro.
06:15And he really did torture a man by putting his head in a vice.
06:19Number 5. Get the Girl to Check the Numbers. Hidden Figures.
06:23John Glenn was the first American to orbit the Earth, and it might never have happened without Katherine Johnson.
06:30She was one of the most brilliant minds of her generation, and NASA relied on her to calculate extremely complex launch and landing trajectories.
06:39That scene where Glenn refuses to fly unless Johnson verifies the landing coordinates? It actually happened.
06:44At the time, the IBM computer was pretty new, and the engineers at NASA didn't totally trust it.
06:50But they did trust Johnson, and so did Glenn.
06:59You mean Katherine?
07:00Yes, sir. The smart one. I mean, she says they're good. I'm ready to go.
07:04In fact, Johnson was often asked to verify the IBM's calculations.
07:08She worked on Alan Shepard's first spaceflight, the moon landing, and helped the Apollo 13 crew get back to Earth safely.
07:15She was a true American hero.
07:17It's a little hard to trust something you can't look in the eyes.
07:20That's right, Colonel. Katherine did manage to calculate a few decimal points further than that hunk of metal.
07:26Well, I will take every digit you got. Be sure to thank her for me.
07:33The true story behind this scene is heartbreaking.
07:36The couples seen embracing each other as their cabin floods are Isidore and Ida Strauss.
07:41They also appear in a deleted scene in which Ida refuses to leave Isidore.
07:45Please, Ida, get into the boat.
07:48No! We've been together for 40 years.
07:52And where you go, I go. Don't argue with me, Isidore.
07:57The real Isidore Strauss was the co-owner of Macy's department store and a U.S. congressman.
08:02When the Titanic sank, an officer was willing to let both Isidore and Ida onto a lifeboat.
08:07But Isidore didn't want to take a spot from the women and children.
08:10It's goodbye for a little while. Only for a little while.
08:13There'll be another boat for the daddies. This boat's for the mummies and the children.
08:17You hold mummy's hand and be a good little girl.
08:20Ida wouldn't leave her husband, and the two were last seen holding each other on the deck.
08:24Although the film is a mix of fact and fiction, the portrayal of the actual sinking is pretty accurate,
08:29including the ship breaking in half.
08:31God Almighty.
08:32Number 3. Amungut shoots people from his balcony. Schindler's List.
08:36You want these people? These people? My people? I want my people.
08:40Who are you, Moses? Come on, what is this? Where's the money on this? Where's the scarf?
08:45Steven Spielberg took great care to ensure that the violence and cruelty
08:49perpetrated by the Nazis were depicted accurately in his film.
08:53Although it's shocking, the portrayal of Amungut's sadism and brutality is no exaggeration.
08:58By this evening, those six centuries are a rumor. They never happened.
09:06He was nicknamed the Butcher, and according to survivors,
09:09he entertained himself by torturing and killing concentration camp prisoners every single day.
09:14Not only did he shoot people from his balcony, he also trained his dogs to attack prisoners and tear them apart.
09:20Everyone in the camp was terrified of him.
09:22One of the Jews, saved by Oskar Schindler, said of the man,
09:25When you saw gut, you saw death.
09:42Solomon Northrup is left to hang. Twelve years a slave.
09:56And I have a debt to be mindful of.
09:59This film isn't just a graphic look at the horrors of slavery.
10:02It's based on the real Solomon Northrup's autobiography, and it follows the book pretty closely.
10:07Tybeats actually existed, and he was just as evil as the film portrays him.
10:11Oh, my, you are a brute.
10:16You are a dog.
10:18And no better for following instruction!
10:20When he tried to punish Solomon for basically no reason, Solomon fought back.
10:24And was almost hanged for it.
10:26In the movie, the scene plays out as it did in real life.
10:29The overseer prevents Tybeats and his cronies from killing Solomon, but leaves him hanging all day.
10:34If you hang him, he will lose his debt.
10:37You have no claim to his life.
10:40As for you two, if you have any regard for your own safety, I say be gone!
10:46The biggest difference is that in reality, Solomon was hanging in the sweltering Louisiana sun, not the shade.
10:52His suffering must have been unimaginable.
10:54Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to our channel and ring the bell to get notified about our latest videos.
11:00You have the option to be notified for occasional videos or all of them.
11:04If you're on your phone, make sure you go into your settings and switch on notifications.
11:10Number 1. DIY Carbon Dioxide Filtration, Apollo 13
11:15CO2 levels are gonna be getting toxic.
11:17Well, I suggest you gentlemen invent a way to put a square peg in a round hole.
11:22Rapidly.
11:23This Ron Howard film depicting the failed moon mission is just about as accurate as a historical movie can be.
11:29The oxygen tank explosion and its aftermath are depicted correctly,
11:33and much of the dialogue is taken directly from NASA's transcripts.
11:36What did you do?
11:37Nothing, I stirred the tanks.
11:38Whoa!
11:40Hey!
11:44Uh, this is Houston, uh, say again please?
11:47Houston, we have a problem.
11:48After the tank blew up, the astronauts had to take refuge in the lunar module,
11:52which had enough oxygen for all of them.
11:54However, its CO2 filtration was only designed for two people.
11:58The astronauts and ground crew worked together to jerry-rig a device
12:01to adapt the command's modules filters for the lunar module.
12:04We gotta find a way to make this fit into the hole for this, using nothing but that.
12:12It was an incredible feat of human ingenuity, and it's super satisfying to see Hollywood get it right.
12:17We just have one question.
12:19Why isn't Katherine Johnson in this movie?
12:21Which unbelievable scene blew your mind?
12:23Let us know in the comments.
12:25Everybody had their hands out. Everything was for the taking.
12:30And now it's all over.
12:47NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology