Trivia for
The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000) More at IMDbPro »

• Originally, the lead roles were going to be played by Morgan Freeman and Robert Redford. But, after careful consideration, Redford decided that the movie would work better with younger men playing Rannulph Junuh and Bagger Vance.
  
  
• "Bagger Vance" and "R. Junuh" are representations of Bhagavan (Krishna) and Arjuna, from the Hindu text "The Bhagavad Gita". The lessons learned by Rannulph are loosely based on those Krishna teaches to Arjuna while masquerading as his lowly chariot driver.
  
  
• Brad Pitt was offered the role of Junuh but turned down.
  
  
• Matt Damon did not have any previous experience playing golf; he spent a month with golf pro Tim Moss in Hilton Head, South Carolina, to prepare for the role.
  
  
• Rannulph Junuh (Matt Damon) lectures Hardy Greaves (J. Michael Moncrief) about the honor of working a blue collar job. In Good Will Hunting (1997), Damon's character gives a similar lecture to Sean Maguire (Robin Williams) about the honor of being a blue collar worker.
  
  
• Lane Smith's last film.
  
  
• Although the film is based on fiction, both Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen were real golfers. Jones was the more famous because, among other things, he founded the US Masters tournament in Augusta.
  
  
• Final film appearance of Jack Lemmon, though he is uncredited.
  
  
• When The Narrator (Jack Lemmon) tees up at the beginning of the movie, he says, "It's magic time." That is the phrase Lemmon would say before every take in every movie he ever did.
  
  

• SPOILER: The scene in which Rannulph's ball moves and the officials are trying to get him to say it was a trick of the light or that he imagined it, is based on an actual incident that involved Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen. In 1925 Jones was challenging for the U.S. Open Championship at Worcester Country Club in Worcester, MA. On the 11th hole, as he addressed his ball in the rough, it appeared to move. It was determined that no one else saw the infraction, including his fellow competitors Gene Sarazen and Hagen, and the marshals left it up to Jones as to whether a foul should be called. Jones called the breach on himself and, after the marshal announced the stunning act of sportsmanship to the crowd, Jones replied, "Do you commend a bank robber for not robbing a bank? No, you don't. This is how the game of golf should be played at all times." He eventually lost the U.S. Open by one stroke.
  
  

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