The 22 Best Movies Based on True Stories

We're going to keep saying the word "impressionistic" on this list, so we should probably define it. While some artistic styles seek clear verisimilitude—depicting things as they might have seen from without—impressionistic filmmaking is an attempt at phenomenology, capturing what it must be like from within. "From within" best explains The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, which is based on the story of Jean-Dominique Bauby who, at 43, suffered a seizure which caused "locked-in syndrome," meaning, for the rest of his life, he could only see and hear, but not move. The film does its best to capture this from Bauby's perspective. The result is magic.

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