Stories of the past tend to make for good movie material, as evidenced by this year’s releases of “Oppenheimer” and, more recently, “Napoleon”.

However, adapting historical events for the silver screen can be difficult, with filmmakers sometimes having to sacrifice veracity for artistry.

Then there are those directors who throw the baby out with the bathwater, with the end results being egregiously untruthful.

Here are just a handful of titles that play fast and loose with the truth.

1. ‘Ip Man’ (2008)

It’s good thing that this iconic franchise never marketed itself as a biopic, given how much fiction it mixes in with fact.

For one, the real Ip Man left his home region of Foshan when the Japanese arrived, so he was never forced to be a coal miner at any point.

He was also a Kuomintang colonel, not a resistance leader, though it remains unclear if he saw much active duty during his service.

The famous scene that sees Ip Man duelling up to 10 karate practitioners – well-choreographed as it may be – is entirely made up. How disappointing.

Also, at the time, judo was the favoured Japanese martial art, with karate actually being regarded as foreign owing to its Okinawan-Chinese roots.

2. ‘Braveheart’ (1995)

Anti-Semitism aside, Mel Gibson has a knack for jingoistic and highly inaccurate films, and “Braveheart” was his personal directorial project.

The film depicts the Scottish people as kilt-wearing, warpaint-covered warriors, charging ferociously across the battlefield.

In truth, kilts were invented 300 years after William Wallace’s rebellion, and the warpaint was a southern Briton practice from 800 years before!

One of the climactic moments is the real-life battle of Stirling Bridge – but in the film, there is not a bridge or river in sight!

Funnily enough, when Gibson told a Scottish extra that he omitted the bridge because of how difficult it was to work with, the extra replied: “Aye, that is what the English found.”

3. ‘300’ (2007)

It should be noted that the events surrounding the battle of Thermopylae in 480 BCE had already been greatly exaggerated by the ancient Greeks.

That said, Zack Snyder took the exaggeration to new heights: his Spartan characters are depicted as muscle-bound, half-naked heroes who take on unending Persian hordes.

On the military side of things, no sane Spartan would have ever gone into battle without kilogrammes of armour on them!

And in the actual battle of yore, more than 300 Spartans had been on the battlefield, with about 4,000 troops from allied Greek cities.

In the movie, the Persian king Xerxes is depicted as a god-king, when the real one was a devout Zoroastrian, who would have seen such an act as blasphemy!

4. ‘Gladiator’ (2000)

Before he was a French emperor, Joaquin Phoenix played a Roman one in the form of Commodus, a real-life figure.

Unlike his cinematic counterpart, though, the historical Commodus was neither incestuous nor patricidal. While he was considered a poor heir to his father Marcus Aurelius, his detractors merely called him incompetent rather than evil.

It is true that he did participate in gladiatorial combat, albeit in mock fights against disabled military veterans, among other things.

Also, the film ends with the dying hero, Maximus, ordering Rome to be a republic again. Of course, this never happened, and Rome would remain an empire to its final days.

5. ‘The Last Samurai’ (2003)

While Edward Zwick’s film is lovely by all accounts, the fall of the samurai in the 19th century was far less romantic than what the big screen would suggest.

For one, samurai were not averse to using guns at all. In fact, their 16th-century forefathers were avid fans and early adopters of European firearms.

The Satsuma Rebellion, on which the movie is loosely based, saw both sides using rifles and cannons, though the rebels did use traditional arms as well.

Additionally, Tom Cruise’s character is an American military adviser. At this point of time, the Japanese army would have been trained by Frenchmen and Germans.

Finally, Hollywood’s black-garbed ninjas are a thing of Japanese theatrical plays, when historical ninjas would often dress inconspicuously to blend in with civilians.

This all said, it’s a good thing nobody actually watches movies for their historical accuracy!