Top — The Casino of Ouistreham in the film during the assault on June 6, 1944.
Bottom — The real bunker Germans built on the site after demolishing the casino in 1943.
Bottom — The real bunker Germans built on the site after demolishing the casino in 1943.
Artistic License – History in The Longest Day isn't as prominent as in other war movies of the time (yes, we're looking at you, Battle of the Bulge), due to the source material being Cornelius Ryan's nonfiction book (and by extension, interviews of actual survivors, along with the consulting of some of the historical event's protagonists who were still alive). That being said, the film did help popularize a few misconceptions about the invasion.
- The opening scene with parading German armies is a mix of real life Stock Footage edited with the film's footage of Generalfeldmarschall Von Rundstedt (Paul Hartmann) and General der Infanterie Blumentritt (Curd Jürgens) looking at it. The thing is, the real life footage is taken from reels of Adolf Hitler's 50th birthday parades in Berlin in 1939, not from parading troops in Normandy in 1944, so Stock Footage Failure applies.
- The Verlaine poem being the message to the French Resistance announcing the invasion. In reality, the message was a code for one specific group to perform specific acts of sabotage; it just so happened that the Germans had learned of this code and correctly interpreted it to mean the invasion was imminent. However, the film does mention that different resistance groups got individual messages and shows a group of resistance fighters reacting to a completely different phrase, like "John has a long moustache".
- The real "Rupert" paratrooper dummies were crudely made
◊ and did not look like elaborate action figures. - According to veteran Heinrich Severloh, Major Werner Pluskat was not with his unit the day of the invasion, while in the film he's the first German to spot the Allied fleet from inside a big beach bunker. On the other hand, Severloh's own account of his actions that day are not considered the most accurate source of the day's happenings on Omaha Beach by professional historians, either (being most likely clouded by the adrenaline of the day's events and the fog of memory).
- That the Ranger assault on Pointe du Hoc was a failure (or simply unnecessary) due to them not finding the coastal guns they were meant to destroy, which some see as implying that the guns had not been installed yet. In actuality, the Germans had moved the guns about a kilometer inland before (probably in reaction to air raids), and patrols sent out by the Rangers found and disabled them that same day.
- Engineers are seen removing explosives from the Orne Bridge. In reality they hadn't been placed in their slots when the gliders landed. Zanuck chose to ignore Major John Howard himself telling him this for the sake of drama. Averted when a scene where German soldiers are seen running out of the café near that bridge wasn't shot, as one of the owners insisted vehemently she had never allowed Germans to sleep there.
- The casino of Ouistreham was blown up by the Germans in 1943 and a bunker was built in its place. The movie's casino is still intact with the ground floor turned into a bunker. And it didn't look like the real casino◊ to begin with.
- Speaking of Ouistreham, there were no nuns walking in the field mid-battle to take care of wounded soldiers.
- Beachmaster Commander (Acting Captain) Colin Maude's dog, Winnie, was a German Shepherd. The director decided to "improve history" by using a British Bulldog instead.
- More of a case of Dated History: the "Generals Smart, Idiot Hitler" has been shown to be more of a case of the generals trying to look better than they actually were. The German generals were completely fooled by the invasion happening in Normandy instead of the Pas-de-Calais. And the armored divisions they wanted Hitler to release would have been shredded by naval gunfire, as something similar had been attempted at Salerno in Italy a year prior — a single Allied destroyer wiped out a German tank force. In Normandy there were battleships waiting for those tanks to show up. The tank battles of the larger battle of Normandy (a few weeks after D-Day) happened deeper in the Norman countryside for a reason.
