70+ Movie Trivia Facts From Your Favorite Films

With the vast amount of knowledge that the Internet provides us nowadays, its hard to stump anyone without them just “googling it”.  However, these little known trivia facts about some of your favorite movies may just win you a bet or a drink at the bar.  Enjoy!

• Walt Disney refused to allow Alfred Hitchcock to film at Disneyland in the early 1960s because he had made “that disgusting movie Psycho.”
• Pierce Brosnan was contractually forbidden from wearing a full tuxedo in any non-James Bond movie from 1995-2002.
• Fox passed on The Watchmen because they thought the script was “one of the most unintelligible pieces of shit they had read in years.”
• Steven Seagal was choked unconscious on a movie set by “Judo” Gene LeBelle, and Seagal shit himself.
• The original raw footage of Apocalypse Now consisted of 1,250,000 feet of film which is over 230 hours’ worth.
• The director of Cannibal Holocaust had to prove in court that the actors were still alive and didn’t get killed during the movie.
• Ryan Gosling was cast as Noah in The Notebook because the director wanted someone “not handsome.”
• For Dr. Strangelove, Peter Sellers was paid $1 million, 55 percent of the film’s budget.
• Django Unchained is the first time in 16 years that Leonardo DiCaprio didn’t get the top billing.
• Samuel L. Jackson used the word mother-fucker to overcome his stammer/stutter.
• There is a sound effect called the Wilhelm Scream that has been used in over 200 movies and TV shows since 1951.

• Jim Caviezel was struck by lightening while he was on the cross in Passion of the Christ.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger was paid approximately $21,429 for every word he said in, Terminator 2: Judgement Day (which is around 700 words).
• Sigourney Weaver actually made that ‘impossible’ basketball shot in, Aliens: Resurrection.

• The carpet in The Shining and the second floor of Sid’s house in Toy Story are almost identical.

• Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn failed his driving test eight times.
• Barbie in Toy Story is voiced by Jodi Benson, best known for her role as Ariel in The Little Mermaid.
• Pornstar Asia Carrera plays the flatmate of Tara Reid in Logjammin’, the film within the film in The Big Lebowski.

• Courtney Love insists that the role of the drug dealer, Lance, in Pulp Fiction was offered to Kurt Cobain.
• The original cut of The Wolf of Wallstreet had over four hours worth of content so had to be cut further.
• Mark Wahlberg and Matt Damon agree that if they’re ever confused for one another, they will just go along with it.
• Sam Raimi has a lucky car that is in all of his films, including his pre-automobile western, The Quick and the Dead.

• Viggo Mortensen had no intention of working on The Lord of the Rings until his son begged him to do it.
• In Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Charlie Sheen stayed awake for 48 hours to achieve a suitably wasted look for his cameo.
• The ornaments that Marv steps on in Home Alone are actually candy.
• Fantasia (1940) was originally a short called The Sorcerers Apprentice, but Walt Disney overspent on the score and decided to make it feature length film rather than waste money.
• Sean Connery turned down roles in The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones 4 and Blade Runner.
• Within’ three days, The Hunger Games became the highest grossing film for Lionsgate Movies.
• In an alternate ending for Alien: Resurrection, Ripley finally makes it back to earth.
• To thank Robin Williams for his work on Aladdin, Disney sent him a late Pablo Picasso painting.
• The poop in Trainspotting was made from chocolate.

• When Mark Zuckerberg posts his art essay question on Facebook during The Social Network his alias is Tyler Durden.

• Saw was filmed in 18 days.
• Director Nicolas Winding Refn called director Gasper Noe midshoot asking how to shoot a ‘head smashing’ scene for the movie ‘Drive‘

• The charcoal drawing of Kate Winslet in James Cameron’s, Titanic was actually drawn by James Cameron.

• In Harry Potter, Alan Rickman was the only person other than J.K. Rowling to know Snape was defending Harry because he was in love with Lily Potter to make his performance genuine.
• When Edward Norton first fights Brad Pitt in Fight Club, he was asked to actually hit Pitt. Pitts reaction is genuine and Norton was trying to stop himself from laughing during the scene.
• Heath Ledger almost broke Jake Gyllenhaal’s nose by grabbing his head and kissing him too hard in Brokeback Mountain.
• The scene with Jenny on the ground outside her house in Forrest Gump is similar to painting, Christina’s World.
• The Green Goblins prototype mask in Spider-Man (2002) was going to look a lot more like the comic book version.

• Pixar’s, UP was the first ever animated film and 3D film to open the Cannes Film Festival.
• Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King won all 11 Academy Awards it was nominated for.
• Fritz Lang’s, Metropolis (1927) was reportedly one of Adolf Hitler’s favorite films.
• The Studio Ghibli film, Ponyo: On the Cliff by the Sea is actually a re-imagining of The Little Mermaid.
• When Harry Met Sally’s Meg Ryan laughed at the Pecan Pie improv and looked at the director who told her to keep going.
• Peter O’Toole has been nominated for eight performance Oscars and not won any.
• David Patrick Kelly’s infamous “Warriors, come out to play” line in The Warriors (1979) was completely improvised.
• Each frame of the CGI scenes in James Cameron’s, Avatar (1/24 of a second) took an average of 47 hours to render.
• Spirited Away is the only non-western animated film to win an Academy Award for best animated feature.
• 28 Days Later was filmed on a Canon XL-1 DV camera using mini-DV tapes instead of 35mm film.
• The word “Nigger” is said exactly 113 times in Quentin Tarantino’s, Django Unchained.

• Paranormal Activity cost $15000 to make and has grossed $210 million since.
• Danny Dyer has only starred in UK produced films.
• The ‘Bong’ sound/musical cue in Inception is actually the song Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien by Edith Piaf slowed down.

• The floating pen in Kubricks 2001: A Space Odyssey wasn’t done with CGI, but camera trickery using glass and tape.
• After a slew of drug related offences, Robert Downey Jr. was a semi-blacklisted celebrity until Kiss Kiss Bang Bang reignited his career
• Quentin Tarentino was originally going to use the song Wise Man by Frank Ocean in Django Unchained but chose not to.
• Waldo (Where’s Waldo) appears in Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto at 01:31:34, lying on the pile of dead bodies.

• Hasbro denied Pixar the use of GI Joe in Toy Story when found that the GI Joe doll was going to be blown up by Sid.
• C.S. Lewis reviewed The Hobbit in 1937 saying, ” The Hobbit may well prove a classic.”
• The Shawshank Redemption, #1 on IMDb was the 51st highest grossing film in 94′, way behind Street Fighter (1994).
• Orson Welles (Citizen Kane) voiced Unicron in The Transformers Movie (1986), his penultimate film role.
• Bender from Futurama was named after John Bender from The Breakfast Club.
• Ron Jeremy, the pornstar is an extra in Ghostbusters.
• Peter Ostrum, Charlie from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, never acted in another movie after that and is now a veterinarian.
• On the set of one of the Pirates of the Carribbean films, Johnny Depp spent £40,000 on 500 coats for the cast and crew.
• On the set of 1982’s The Thing, the whole cast and crew was male.
• On the first day of filming the exorcism sequence in The Exorcist , Linda Blair’s delivery of her foul-mouthed dialogue so disturbed the gentlemanly Max von Sydow that he forgot his lines.
• In Iron Man/Avengers, J.A.R.V.I.S is an acronym for “Just A Rather Very Intelligent System.”
• In 2002, Steven Spielberg finally finished college after a 33-year hiatus. He turned in Schindler’s List for his student film requirement.
• In Saving Private Ryan, all of the main cast were given basic military training except Matt Damon, in the hope that the cast would build a resentment towards him necessary for the role.
• The Soviets made a version of The Hobbit movie in 1985