So if you don't mind, just quickly tell me which parts were fiction. Without looking it up.
Probably the part where more than the six people directly in front of him could hear what he was saying during that speech.
Like the evil king they were fighting -- was he a real historical figure, too? What about Wallace's palooka friend, Hamish? Or the crazy Irish sidekick? Were those real guys? That part where Mel Gibson's main ally (Robert the Bruce) betrayed him and sided with the English in that big battle (aka the turning point of the entire story)-- did that really happen? What about the bit at the end, where Wallace has sex with that princess, revealing that the future king of England would actually be Mel Gibson's son? That's the most historically important thing in the whole film, surely that was true, right?
You don't know, do you? But who cares, right? It's not like that impacts your life at all. It's just historical trivia. OK, now consider this: After Jaws hit theaters, we nearly drove sharks to extinction with feverish hunting, to the point that their populations may never recover.
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"Fetch my spear gun. These bastards will pay for what they did to Quint!"