Inaccuracies/artistic License
As the film opens, Gehrig is depicted belting a home run through the window of his alma mater's athletics department. Actually, his farthest hits smashed not into the athletic department, which was located on the north end of campus, but through the windows of the nearby Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Gary Cooper, who was right-handed, could not master a convincing left-handed swing, and was filmed swinging from the right side. Editors then created the appearance of left-handed batting by reversing the film negative. During filming Cooper would run to third base instead of first to complete the illusion.
In one of the film's more memorable scenes, a physician matter-of-factly informs Gehrig of his tragic diagnosis, dismal prognosis, and brief life expectancy. In fact, the Mayo Clinic doctors painted an unrealistically optimistic picture of Gehrig's condition and prospects, reportedly at his wife's request. Among other things he was given "a 50–50 chance of keeping me as I am" for the foreseeable future, and was told that he "...may need a cane in 10 or 15 years." Deliberate concealment of bad news from patients, particularly when cancer or an incurable degenerative disease was involved, was a relatively common practice at the time.
Read more about this topic: The Pride Of The Yankees
Famous quotes containing the words artistic and/or license:
“Persons grouped around a fire or candle for warmth or light are less able to pursue independent thoughts, or even tasks, than people supplied with electric light. In the same way, the social and educational patterns latent in automation are those of self- employment and artistic autonomy.”
—Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)
“Surely the fates are forever kind, though Nature’s laws are more immutable than any despot’s, yet to man’s daily life they rarely seem rigid, but permit him to relax with license in summer weather. He is not harshly reminded of the things he may not do.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)