17 movies where life writes the plot

A top model picks up a camera and becomes a renowned war journalist and photographer, even getting snapped taking a dip in Hitler’s bathtub. A French widow revolutionises the champagne industry. A brilliant Black Yale student becomes a drug dealer to pay his dad’s legal fees. A chimpanzee becomes a boy band star and a tabloid sensation! Yes, well. While the truth has to be nudged along a little for the sake of our entertainment now and then, there’s nothing like a real-life story for taking truly daring plot twists and turns.

Check out our list of 17 sensational biopics, where the most unbelievable moments probably really happened. Except that chimpanzee thing.

Quick links

1. September 5

2. Lee

3. Rob Peace

4. Better Man

5. My Penguin Friend

6. Widow Cliquot

7. Moneyball

8. The United States vs Billie Holiday

9. Rocketman

10. Bob Marley: One Love

11. Joika

12. Spencer

13. Girl You Know It’s True

14. American Gangster

15. One Life

16. Darkest Hour

17. Public Enemies

Real life writes the plot

1. September 5

During the 1972 Olympic games in Munich, Germany, the terrorist group Black September took Israeli athletes hostage, demanding the release of imprisoned Palestinians. Hearing gunshots, America’s ABC Sports team shifted their coverage to the attack, even infiltrating the locked-down Olympic Village to investigate.

But as competition among news crews reached fever pitch, the ABC team realised that Black September was watching their broadcasts. They weren’t just covering the story, they were sabotaging rescue attempts and giving the terrorists a global audience as they started killing hostages.

The film takes us inside the ABC Sports news room in Munich, with Ben Chaplin as ABC Sports head of operations Marvin Bader, American actor Peter Sarsgaard (Dr Hammond in Green Lantern) as ABC Sports president Roone Arledge, and John Magaro (Ray in LaRoy) as ABC Sports’ control room head in Munich, Geoffrey Mason.

Fun fact: September 5 uses archive footage from ABC's coverage of the 1972 Summer Olympics and the hostage crisis. Director Tim Fehlbaum also studied ABC news anchor Jim McKay and Roone Arledge’s memoirs. 

2. Lee

This critically acclaimed biographical drama was adapted from Anthony Penrose’s book about his mother, The Lives of Lee Miller.

The film takes us to the front lines of World War II with model-turned-photojournalist Lee Miller (Kate Winslet, who also produced the film) as she bucks social norms to record some of the most devastating and memorable images to come out of Europe during the war. Rather than centring her work on soldiers, battles and leaders, Lee records the toll the war is taking on civilians and survivors. Lee becomes one of the first journalists to record the horrific conditions in extermination camps like Dachau and Buchenwald. And she captures the complex emotional storm as the French Resistance shave the heads of women suspected of collaborating with the Nazis.

Fun fact: Lee’s director Ellen Kuras sparked the project after saw a book about Lee Miller’s war photography and sent a copy to Kate Winslet (Mare in Mare of Easttown). Years later, Kate started developing the film and asked Ellen to direct. 

3. Rob Peace

Biographical drama based on the 2014 biography The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs, who was the real-life Rob Peace’s college roommate at Yale University. 

Rob Peace stars Jay Will (Tyson in Tulsa King) as Rob, a brilliant young man destined for greatness. Raised by his devoted mother Jackie (Mary J Blige, Monet Tejada in Power Book II: Ghost), who works three jobs to get him into a private school, Rob risks everything he has worked for to free his father, Skeet (Chiwetel Ejiofor, who is also the film’s writer and director), from prison, where he’s serving a life sentence for murder.

Certain that his father is an innocent victim of racial profiling and a miscarriage of justice, Rob turns to selling marijuana to raise money for Skeet’s legal fees, while also pouring himself heart and soul into his studies and community work.

Fun fact: Chiwetel (Mr Wallaker in Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy) met with Rob’s mom Jackie and reviewed the court documents surrounding his own character, Robert “Skeet” Douglas, to get a deeper understanding of the family’s story.

4. Better Man

This biographical musical about the life of Take That singer Robbie Williams swaps out a human Robbie for a CGI chimpanzee – inspired by Robbie’s quip that he often saw himself as a performing monkey – with actor Jonno Davies providing the motion capture performance along with the character’s voice. Director Michael Gracey also noted that replacing the familiar “bad boy of pop” with a monkey allowed audiences to take a more sympathetic view of the story.

Like Rocketman, Better Man turns what could have been a paint-by-numbers biopic into a carnival of absurd fun, unleashing Robbie’s inner critics as living characters as it traces Robbie’s obsession with fame from his childhood in the 1980s, his arrival on the boy band scene of the early 1990s, his creation of the tabloid-tempting Robbie Williams celebrity persona, his spotlight jockeying, his solo career, and his ongoing career and relationship-wrecking substance abuse issues and self-loathing.

Fun fact: The motion capture was handled by Wētā Workshop and Wētā Digital, who created Gollum in The Lord of the Rings.

5. My Penguin Friend

In May 2011, Brazilian fisherman João Pereira De Souza found a young Magellanic penguin caught in an oil spill on Ilha Grande beach near Rio de Janeiro. He took the bird home to clean its clogged feathers and nurse it back to health, nicknaming it DinDim (pronounced Jin-Jin) after a child’s mispronunciation of the Portuguese, “pinguim.” Their story inspired Brazilian director David Schurmann’s new live-action film My Penguin Friend – with a flock of rescue penguins playing DinDim, and human actor Jean Reno (Mission: Impossible) playing João.

Once DinDim was clean, dry, healthy and well-fed, João took him back to the ocean. But later that day he heard a familiar squeak from his back garden. DinDim had waddled back. João had a house guest until DinDim felt that he was ready to leave – then off he went, most likely to his original penguin colony in Patagonia (pull up your world map and take a look at that distance). But the next summer, DimDim came back to João’s house. And for years afterwards, the 4.5kg little penguin continued his holiday visits with his favourite human in Brazil.

Fun fact: Fabian Gabelli and his team trained each of the 10 penguins who play DinDim three times a day in quick, 30-minute sessions to keep things playful and motivating. It took about two weeks of daily practice to train the penguins in each “trick” they needed to learn, or for them to associate specific cues with actions. 

6. Widow Cliquot

Raise a glass to the gorgeous biographical drama Widow Clicquot, based on the 2008 book The Widow Clicquot by Tilar J Mazzeo, which tells the story of Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin Clicquot (Haley Bennett), the woman who founded the Veuve Clicquot champagne empire.

After the death of her eccentric husband François (Tom Sturridge, Irma Vep) in 1805, everyone expects 27-year-old Barbe-Nicole to step back and let the men take charge while she mourns. But after years of adoringly standing by her husband, listening to his raving, and watching his experiments, she has a much firmer grip than any of them do on the brilliant potential of their family’s vineyards. In the teeth of opposition from her father-in-law, banker Philippe Clicquot (Ben Miles, Nathan in Canary Black), as well as a legal system that stripped women of rights, Barbe-Nicole holds her ground and turns champagne from a mere bubble into the sparkling heart of France’s luxury market.

Fun fact: Barbe-Nicole earned enough to build a palatial French chateau – Château de Boursault – in honour of her granddaughter’s wedding. Guess who died a proverbial merry widow at the age of 88?

7. Moneyball

Brad Pitt (Achilles in Troy) plays Oakland Athletics baseball team general manager Billy Beane in this biographical sports comedy based on Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis (adapted by Steven Zaillian and Aaron Sorkin).

Billy and his assistant Peter Brand’s (a made up character played by Jonah Hill, himself in This Is the End) use of a sports analytics approach dubbed sabermetrics to scout, and the fact that Billy hired the best players he could afford at the lowest cost created waves of resentment in the industry.

Try it if you love the mix of humour, truth and style in sports docu-drama series Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty.

Fun fact: While Moneyball plays fast and loose with the truth in places, the Oakland As’ 20-game winning streak really happened. 

8. The United States vs Billie Holiday

This biographical drama film, centred on jazz singer Billie Holiday, was based on a small section in Johann Hari’s book Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs.

The film starts with Billie being interviewed about her heartbreaking anti-lynching song Strange Fruit, and follows her determination to keep performing it in the face of government harassment, as she’s targeted by the FBI and eventually arrested on charges of drug use and possession.

Grammy Award-winning R&B artist Andra Day won the Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Drama, Golden Globe for her role as Billie, and created the original song Tigress and Tweed for the film.

Fun fact: According to musician and historian Lewis Porter, Billie was never forced off stage during any performance of Strange Fruit nor was there any mention of the song in her FBI file. There’s also no evidence that she had an affair with narcotics agent Jimmy Fletcher (Trevante Rhodes). 

9. Rocketman

Taran Egerton’s singing and attitude are both flawless in his Golden Globe-winning role as Sir Elton John in this musical fantasy biographical drama that focuses on the first half of the performer’s life.

It’s a bigger, better take on rock star reality that’s more bedazzled than Elton’s sequinned glasses as it tackles his life from childhood (with the young Elton played by Matthew Illesley and Heartstopper’s Kit Connor) through his partnership with songwriter Bernie Taupin (Jamie Bell, Esca in The Eagle), to fame highs and drug addiction lows, to his comeback era.

Produced by Elton John and his partner David Furnish, this passion project took nearly 20 years to make it to the big screen, and its combination of honesty, accuracy and rocket-fuelled energy earned it a standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival.

Fun fact: Before Rocketman, Taran Egerton performed Elton John’s I’m Still Standing as Johnny the Gorilla in the animated movie Sing.

10. Bob Marley: One Love

Jamaica’s biggest star, Bob Marley, lives on through his reggae music and its calls for social justice, liberation and peace for all. His legacy is celebrated in the sensitive character portrait captured in this biographical docu-drama produced by Ziggy Marley and Brad Pitt. Kingsley Ben-Adir captures the essence of Bob Marley’s magnetism, with Lashana Lynch (Bianca in The Day of the Jackal) as Rita Marley.

Whether we’re in the studio recording I Shot the Sheriff, sitting at a spiritual beach drum circle, playing soccer and swimming under waterfalls to Get Up, Stand Up, jogging through the street to Jammin’, or watching Bob Marley unite and move a concert crowd, the music forms a glowing thread that ties the film’s emotions together as it traces 10 years of the singer’s life between 1971 and his death from cancer in 1981. 

Fun fact: British actor Kingsley Ben-Adir shot this film back to back with Barbie (in which he played Basketball Ken) and spent all his down time on the Barbie set bingeing Bob Marley interviews, recordings and music. He even hid a laptop behind the Mojo Dojo Casa House for quick access. 

11. Joika

Seen enough musician biopics? Try this dreamy, gritty biographical drama based on the life of American prima ballerina Joy Womack.

Joy’s childhood training took her from the Austin School of Classical Ballet in Texas, to a scholarship to the Kirov Academy of Ballet of Washington, DC, to an invitation to study at Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet Academy at the age of 15.

Joy (Talia Ryder) became the first-ever American woman to graduate from the Bolshoi Ballet Academy’s main training programme and the first American woman to sign a contract with the Bolshoi Ballet. But getting there was an ugly struggle. The film touches on Joy’s real-life battles with fellow students, the brutal training regime under Tatiyana Volkova (Diane Kruger, Clare in Marlowe), and her decision to earn Russian citizenship through a Green Card marriage. Ballet’s glamour hurts like a fleck of glitter in your eye!

Fun fact: Joy personally trained dancer and actress Talia Ryder, who played her in Joika, along with four stunt doubles, including former Moscow State Ballet dancer Aleksandra Ostatek. Joy also served as Talia’s dance double and as Joika’s choreographer and ballet consultant. 

12. Spencer

Quick, what’s the connection between Princess Diana and the Twilight movies? The surprising answer is Kristen Stewart (Em in Adventureland), in a multi-award-winning performance as the doomed British royal.

The film is a snapshot of one of the most dramatic times in the Princess’s life – Christmas 1991, as Diana weighed up her decision to divorce then-Prince Charles (Jack Farthing, Florian in Rain Dogs).

Several members of Diana’s staff spoke out to praise Kristen’s portrayal, but don’t expect documentary-style realism – the movie is filled with fantasy sequences including ones in which Diana believes she’s being haunted by Anne Boleyn, memories of her childhood, and a moment in which she steals her father’s old jacket off a scarecrow, which winds up dressed in one of her outfits later in the film.

Fun fact: Spencer’s writer Steven Knight (the creator of Peaky Blinders) interviewed staff who’d worked at Sandringham that Christmas to get a handle on the Royal family’s holiday traditions.

13. Girl You Know It’s True

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, German dancer Rob Pilatus (Tijan Njie) and French choreographer Fab Morvan (Elan Ben Ali) shot to stardom as musical duo Milli Vanilli thanks to German music producer Frank Farian (Matthias Schweighöfer), the founder of smash hit disco group Boney M.

But as they partied in LA and basked in the spotlight of a Best New Artist Grammy Award, two singers named Brad Howell and John Davis were starting to mutter. Where was their award? It was their voices on every hit track that Rob and Fab were secretly lip synching to. When the backlash came, it was Rob and Fab who caught the blow rather than Frank, and this film does a lot to humanise the duo who became a public laughing stock. But it’s also a fun dive into the absurdity of 80s fame and excess.

Fun fact: Several scenes in Girl You Know It’s True were filmed in and around Cape Town, so look out for local spots like Sea Point pools and promenade, and local stars like Ashley Dowds as Milli Vanilli's American manager Benny Dorn, Anel Alexander as a cafe owner, and Carel Nel as a security guard.

14. American Gangster

More “inspired by” than a biopic, director Ridley Scott’s action film tells the story of the rise and fall of New York drug lord Frank Lucas (The Bone Collector’s Denzel Washington in one of his most celebrated roles), and his run-in with detective Richie Roberts (Gladiator star Russell Crowe), who would later become his defence lawyer.

Frank Lucas climbs the ladder to become the right-hand man of the Godfather of Harlem, Bumpy Johnson – a tale that has been met with skepticism, along with Lucas’s claims that he was the mastermind behind the Golden Triangle heroin connection during the 1970s. But none of that should affect your enjoyment of this grippingly told gangster thriller, or its fascinating mid-70s Harlem locations.

Fun fact: Three former DEA agents filed a defamation lawsuit against Universal. While the case was dismissed, judge Colleen McMahon warned Universal not to place “inaccurate statements at the end of popular films”. It seems Frank Lucas did nothing helpful that led to the arrest of three quarters of the DEA’s agents on corruption charges. 

15. One Life

This biographical drama tells the story of Nicholas Winton, a young London broker who, on the brink of World War II, helped rescue as many Jewish children as possible from the Nazis, taking a key role in the Kindertransport organisation.

Fifty years on, 79-year-old Nicholas is haunted by the fate of the children he wasn't able to save. It’s not until a TV show reintroduces him to some of those he helped rescue that he finally begins to come to terms with the guilt and grief he carried.

Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins (The Father) and Critics' Choice nominee Johnny Flynn (Ian Fleming in Operation Mincemeat) co-star as the older and younger Winton. One Life also stars Helena Bonham Carter (The Harry Potter franchise’s Belatrix Lestrange) as Nicholas’s mother, Babi.

Fun fact: Helena Bonham Carter is the granddaughter of Spanish diplomat Eduardo Propper de Callejón, who was recognised for his work to save thousands of Jewish people from the Holocaust.

16. Darkest Hour

Focusing on Winston Churchill’s earliest days as Prime Minister and his refusal to sign a peace treaty with Nazi Germany, biographical war drama Darkest Hour centres on the 1940 War Cabinet Crisis, during which British leaders debated whether to strive for peace with Germany.

Winston Churchill is best remembered for his wit, and the late Prime Minister’s political savvy has been the subject of many recent biographical productions including Churchill, The Crown and Darkest Hour. But at the start of this story, he is a political outcast thanks to his actions during the 1936 abdication crisis. It’s the evacuation of Dunkirk that becomes a true testing ground of his rise to leadership.

Gary Oldman (The Dark Knight’s Commissioner Gordon) is definitely not the first person you’d think of for the role. Yet, through the magic of Oscar-winning makeup and prosthetics, he becomes the spitting image of Winston Churchill, embodying his mannerisms, vocal affectations and spirit to earn a long overdue Oscar.

Fun fact: Gary Oldman reportedly chomped and puffed his way through more than 400 cigars while filming Darkest Hour.

17. Public Enemies

Director Michael Mann adapted Bryan Burrough's 2004 non-fiction book Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933–34 to create this biographical crime drama about notorious bank robber John Dillinger (Johnny Depp, Willy Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory).

During the Great Depression, the film chronicles the final years of the notorious bank robber FBI agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale, Batman in The Dark Knight) has one single-minded goal: capturing Dillinger and his gang. To that end, he uses some groundbreaking new techniques including cataloging fingerprints and tapping telephone lines.

Public Enemies spotlights the murderous, criminal tactics employed both by the gang and the FBI agents as the chase turns into a war zone and Dillinger is declared "Public Enemy No 1".

Fun fact: Johnny Depp listened to recordings of John Dillinger’s father speaking to understand the rhythm of his voice, while Christian Bale spent time with Melvin Purvis’s son Alston.

Also watch: Ray (Jamie Foxx plays musician Ray Charles), Back to Black (Marisa Abela plays singer Amy Winehouse), and Cadillac Records (Adrien Brody plays Len Chess, Jeffrey Wright plays Muddy Waters, and Beyoncé plays Etta James).