“Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” was originally planned to start with Indie riding a motorcycle on the Great Wall of China, followed by the discovery of a “Lost World” type of hidden valley with dinosaurs. The idea was scrapped when the Chinese government refused to let them film there.
films
George Lucas was fined $250,000…
George Lucas was fined $250,000 and “The Empire Strikes Back” was nearly pulled from theatres because he put screen credits at the end of the movie (which was rare) to preserve the dramatic opening sequences.
During the space race, Stanley Kubrick…
During the space race, Stanley Kubrick was so worried that humans would soon make first contact with aliens that he tried to buy an insurance policy for 2001: A Space Odyssey in case audiences found his depiction of aliens ridiculous.
In his famous scene in…
In his famous scene in ‘The Shining’, the crew made a fake door for Jack Nicholson to break through, but had to replace it with a real door as the fake one broke too quickly due to Jack previously being a Fire Marshall.
In The Shining, Stanley Kubrick…
In The Shining, Stanley Kubrick intentionally isolated Shelley Duvall and argued with her often. Duvall was forced to perform the iconic and exhausting baseball bat scene 127 times. Afterwards, Duvall presented Kubrick with clumps of hair that had fallen out due to the extreme stress of filming.
In 1975 Al Pacino was offered the role…
In 1975 Al Pacino was offered the role of Han Solo in the film Star Wars, but he refused the role because “The script was too confusing”.
40 years before James Cameron’s…
40 years before James Cameron’s “Avatar” was released, the “Noon Universe” Russian sci-fi novels were published, set on a forest planet called Pandora in the 22nd century, inhabited by humanoids called Nave (compared to the “Na’vi” in Avatar).
Die Hard was a sequel to…
Die Hard was a sequel to the 1968 movie “The Detective” starring Frank Sinatra. As such, 20th Century Fox were contractually obliged to offer Sinatra the leading role. He turned it down due to his age.
Although it is commonly shown…
Although it is commonly shown in medical dramas, you do not shock someone with a flatline. You only use defibrillators on people with ventricular fibrillation, and pulseless ventricular tachycardia (heart beats out of rhythm or heart beats that are really fast and out of sync).
Francis Coppola was worried…
Francis Coppola was worried his film Apocalypse Now would be a box office flop and could bankrupt him, so he decided to quickly make a happy musical to recoup his losses. In the end Apocalypse Now was a success, but the happy musical (One From the Heart) was a disaster and bankrupted him anyway.