True Stories That Were Too Ridiculous For Historical Movies To Include

War drives technological innovation, and the outbreak of the Cold War at the end of WWII forced both the US and the Soviet Union to spend billions and billions of dollars developing technology to defeat the enemy. This meant that during the 1960s, the CIA tested a variety of projects to give America an edge over the Soviets. Some of these projects were nefarious, like MK Ultra. Others were just silly, like Project Acoustic Kitty. The elevator pitch went something like this: Let's spy on the Soviets with microphones surgically implanted in house cats. 

Using animals for national security purposes is common, but cats are notoriously difficult to train. Even so, the CIA believed that a cat was inconspicuous enough to avoid notice. The bigger problem was designing a functioning recording device that could be implanted inside a cat without harming it. This took about five years to complete. Altogether, the CIA spent $20 million to get their FrankenKitty operational. And on its very first mission, it was run over by a taxi before reaching its target. 

What's the worst part about being stuck in a bunker with Hitler during the fall of Berlin? The fact that he was a substance-using megalomaniac who refused to accept the truth 'til the end? Okay, but what's the second-worst part? He was notoriously gassy. Actual medical records written by the chancellor's private physician Theodor Morrell show that this particular patient sought treatment for both "excessive flatulence" as well as constipation. To treat this, Dr. Morrell prescribed Dr. Koester’s Anti-Gas Pills, a remedy that contained strychnine. It didn't work. 

But it's not just Downfall. Practically zero movies have ever shown Hitler cut one. You can imagine why a serious WWII movie wouldn't have a farty Führer - but the comedies? Seems like somebody should have done it by now.

Roman gladiators weren't just professional warriors who fought for the public's amusement. The best gladiators were something like the professional athletes we have today. When they weren't fighting, they lived in relative comfort and received the best possible medical care. And the most successful gladiators could become so popular that they actually endorsed products, just like a Michael Jordan or a Serena Williams. Gladiators would agree to lend their names to be used on the Roman version of billboards, or they would directly endorse products to the masses before their fights. It's one of the earliest versions of marketing in history. 

The filmmakers behind Gladiator tried to make the film as accurate as possible, and an earlier draft of the script included Maximus endorsing olive oil. But producers eventually decided the scene would have been too jarring to include. "If you cut to Russell Crowe endorsing a chariot or olive oil, that would become parody when in fact it’s true,” said producer Douglas Wick.

Nikola Tesla was a singular genius who's one of the two people responsible for the AC electrical current system we still use today, along with George Westinghouse. But he was also a bona fide eccentric whose habits were unusual even for his time. Whether Tesla's genius derived specifically from his peculiarities is an interesting question for another article, but for now, we're going to focus on just one peculiarity: the pigeon love. 

Tesla devoted his life to his career. He never married and remained celibate throughout his life. But while he was living in New York City, he did form a special bond with the city's pigeon population. Tesla would often feed pigeons in parks and bring injured ones home with him, and he even asked the hotel's chef to concoct a special birdseed mixture for his feathered friends. But Tesla was more than just a pigeon fanatic. At one point, he met and fell in love with a white pigeon whom he saw frequently. “I loved that pigeon as a man loves a woman, and she loved me," he said about her. "As long as I had her, there was a purpose to my life." One night, his avian paramour flew into his hotel room. Tesla believed she was telling him she was about to perish, and then she did. At that point, Tesla knew his life's work was over. 

Unfortunately, the 2020 biopic about the Serbian inventor mentions none of this. It did include a made-up scene in which Tesla and his main rival Thomas Edison have an ice cream fight, though, so it's not like Tesla was married to the truth.  

If there's a theme to this list, it's that people are complex, even historical figures. And Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is one of the more complicated people in history. He wrote music that's still played centuries later. He also loved bathroom humor. Not only were Mozart's personal letters full of poop jokes, he also wrote songs that elementary schoolers would have loved. In 1991, a Harvard University librarian rediscovered a song Mozart wrote in 1782 titled "Leck Mich Im Arsch," a German expression that roughly means "Kiss My A**." Mozart apparently wrote several songs like this and meant for them to entertain his friends. "Leck Mich Im Arsch" was still included in an 1804 compilation, but the title was changed to "Let Us Be Glad." 

It's understandable why other depictions of Mozart would avoid mentioning these songs, but they would have been more at home in the 1984 dramedy Amadeus. That film portrays Mozart as a genius who's so talented that the rules of decorum don't really apply to him, all of which infuriates his rival Antonio Salieri. It's unfortunate that Mozart's B-sides weren't discovered until seven years after the movie came out. 

Many of the small stories and side characters in Titanic are real or partially real. The elderly couple that stays on the ship together were essentially real, plus First Officer Murdoch and J. Bruce Ismay were both real people, though their dramatized portrayals in the film raised some backlash. The film does also briefly portray a baker named Charles Joughin, who helps a man onto a railing and glances over at Rose right before the ship capsizes. But Joughin's full exploits that evening were much more involved.

Joughin was, by his own account, highly intoxicated that evening. This rendered him unnaturally calm throughout the chaos, and also presumably stopped him from having any second thoughts about literally throwing women and children into lifeboats to save them:

Immediately after hearing the collision with an iceberg, the chief baker leapt out of his bunk and began dispatching his staff to stock the lifeboats with bread and biscuits.

This done, he popped back into his cabin for a drink before heading topside to help load lifeboats.

Not only did Joughin refuse his own place in a boat, but he and a few other men began forcibly chucking reluctant women into empty seats, likely saving their lives.

“We threw them in,” he testified later.

Joughin did also survive the night himself, improbably, which some speculators owe to his inebriated state keeping him from panicking even when he hit the water. In hindsight, though, it's understandable why James Cameron might've assumed a liquored-up baker tossing screaming children into a lifeboat in the background of the Jack/Rose drama could have been a little distracting.