Secrets From Famous Action Movies
Who doesn’t like going to the theater to watch a good old-fashioned action flick? They’ve got everything we want, fast-paced fights, loud explosions, and high-speed chases. While some judge the genre as mindless violence, fans realize the amount of work and risk that goes into these flicks. From actors facing extreme phobias to performing risky stunts, the set of an action movie has a lot going on. In this article, we’re diving into some of the behind-the-scenes secrets from some of the greatest action movies of all time.
Take a look at the unbelievable moments that happened on the set of these action films!
Die Hard
Regardless of how you feel about the holidays, Die Hard is just one of those films that are great every day of the year. It has action. It has Bruce Willis. It also has a litany of memes that will probably outlast the memory of the movie itself. While it has everything going for it, back when it was released in the 80s, one thing didn’t sit well with people: Willis’ paycheck. It’s pretty common these days for movie stars to make millions off of big-name films.
However, back in ’88, Willis’ $5 million payment was seen as obscenely bloated! Nobody was sure what Rupert Murdoch was thinking! Despite his questionable decisions since then, we’re kind of with Rupert on this one. Willis earned every single penny of that payout.
Enter The Dragon
It’s hard to believe two of the greatest martial artists of the modern age also ended up being fantastic actors. However, very little about this timeline makes sense, so here we are. Both Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan are masters in their crafts and defensive martial arts. For a moment, they also acted together!
Once during a film, Chan accidentally took a nunchaku to the face! As an apology, Lee told Chan he could star in all of his future movies whenever he wanted! Unfortunately, Lee’s life was tragically ended shortly after he extended the offer.
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Part of the fun of an Indiana Jones film is seeing an archeologist use modern equipment to solve ancient problems. It also helps that Harrison Ford’s adorable smirk could help him get away with murder and nobody would bat an eye. In Raiders of the Lost Ark, both come to his aid! Remember when the swordsman challenges Indie to a duel? Instead of grabbing a blade, Dr. Jones just up and shoots the guy!
None of that was in the script. Jones was originally supposed to finish off the swordsman with his whip. However, due to some food poisoning, Harrison Ford had a better idea. Instead of acting out a whole scene, he just grabbed the prop pistol and ended everything with a simple squeeze of the trigger. Short. Effective. Iconic.
Kill Bill Vol. 1
Some filmmakers love to typecast an actor based on their nationality and race. Others prefer to only use actors of a certain nationality to fit a script. Then there’s Quinten Tarantino. As one of Hollywood’s most prolific and interesting filmmakers, he’s made stories that introduced us to a universe’s worth of diverse characters. Some of the most multi-layered can be found in the first volume of the Kill Bill movies.
O-Ren Ishii was originally supposed to be just a Japanese crime lord. However, after he saw Lucy Liu’s incredible performance in Shanghai Noon he rewrote the entire part just for her! O-Ren was transformed into a Chinese-Japanese-American citizen to more closely match Liu’s own heritage (though she is not Japanese). She was then offered the part and proceeded to knock it out of the park!
Predator
Despite Alien being one of the best space horror films around, there is one thing more terrifying than that lube-covered space demon. What could it be? Obviously, the things that hunt the lube-covered space demons: the predators. The only creature in the universe that can stand up to them is the one and only Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Despite having muscles upon muscles, the veteran actor was almost taken out by Mother Nature herself. Due to some of the physical effects used in the film, the Terminator’s body temperature dropped dramatically. In an effort to get him warmed up, they fed him a special cocktail with schnapps. Instead of providing warmth, it just made him cold and drunk while filming!
The Bourne Ultimatum
Sometimes people get a big break from being an extra in a feature film. Other times, those extra people aren’t needed. During the Bourne Ultimatum, hundreds upon thousands of extras are seen in the film. However, unlike most Hollywood productions, most of them had no idea what was going on. Those people weren’t actors at all!
While filming in Tangier, the daily crowds were so thick they were used as extras on the set as they were impossible to clear away. Whenever an actor was pushing and shoving people in front of the camera, they were doing it to regular people! Hopefully, some royalty checks got sent out after all that.
Heat
It’s not uncommon for an actor to play a character so memorable that they become part of their identity. Once the cameras stop rolling, they just can’t seem to escape the character’s likeness or name. Kevin Gage knows this all too well. After delivering an unforgettable performance in Heat, almost everyone threw out his name and started referring to him as Waingro!
Even the guards and his newfound friends in prison called him by the character’s name during his two-year sentence. This begs the question: did his uniform feature the name as well? And why was he sentenced? He had a license to grow medical cannabis but still got busted!
Lethal Weapon
There’s a difference between method acting and taking unnecessary risks just to make a scene more believable. Someone failed to explain that to Mel Gibson when he was filming Lethal Weapon. Aside from his lapse in moral judgment and common sense, Gibson is a pretty prolific actor. Good acting ability doesn’t mean someone is capable of smart decisions.
On the set of Lethal Weapon, Gibson felt he needed to inject some actual danger into his character’s fake suicide attempt. To help himself feel actual fear, he loaded a blank bullet into a gun and pressed it to his head! While it wasn’t a live round, blanks are enough to kill someone or cause severe brain damage if your skull is hurt.
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
Some movies take a long time to go from script to screen. An actor can prepare for a film longer than it takes for the thing to shoot, be edited, and make it to the award show circuit! To ensure she could nail her lines in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Michelle Yeoh cleared her schedule. But she didn’t just take a few extra lessons in Mandarin.
She refused to work for an entire calendar year so she could focus on mastering the language! Not only did she embody her character, she became a near-expert on the intricacies of Mandarin to make sure her performance was believable, authentic, and verbally astounding. In just 365 days she went from having no Mandarin knowledge to practically being fluent! That’s dedication to your craft.
Mission Impossible
Hollywood has an interesting way of creating personas for entire professions. Even before we know what a character looks like, if we know their job we already have an idea of what they look like. The NASA scientist wears glasses. The grizzled war vet has a five-o-clock shadow and a drinking problem. The hacker is a shut-in whose skin burns upon the faintest ray of sunlight.
To break the tradition for Mission Impossible, the producers thought outside of the box. They ended up casting Ving Rhames because they felt he was the polar opposite of what people thought a hacker looked like! Do you think they made the right decision?
Leon The Professional
Some actors have the uncanny ability to deliver tragically beautiful tears on command. Others need to be assaulted by the film crew to ensure that they can cry. Sound extreme? It is. It’s also true. On the set of Leon The Professional, THE Natalie Portman was unable to cry during a particularly emotional moment. To avoid wasting any time by grudging up a bad memory, someone sprayed mint oil into her eyes.
Why did it have to be mint? We have no idea. According to Portman, it was so painful that she instantly learned to cry on command.That way, she didn’t have to get sprayed ever again. At least it sounds like it works.
John Wick
Have you ever daydreamed about your boss one day being your employee? What about a senior colleague finally taking orders from you for once? That’s exactly what Keanue Reeves and Chad Stahelski experienced when making John Wick. When Reeves was cast as The One he did a lot of cool things, however, he didn’t do his own stunts.
Instead, Stahelski was his stunt double! The tables turned when it was time to start making John Wick. Stahelski was directing the film and Reeves, still the star, was taking orders from him and learning how to do some stunts!
300
Could imagine 300 being anything other than the masterpiece we all experienced when it premiered? It almost sounds like a sick and twisted joke. There actually exists a conversation between Zach Snyder and Warner Bros. where they tried to get Snyder to tone the movie down. In the early days of the film’s creation, Warner Bros. told Snyder to make the movie PG-13.
Thankfully, Snyder knew what the world wanted and gave them the professional and well-researched answer: “No”. Anything other than an R rating would have made the movie a radically different experience. Some movies need to be able to show the subject as it’s meant to be seen.
Rambo
There are some instances where a fictional tale can inspire real-world changes. Some movies are so powerful that the entire cultural makeup of a country can shift. When Rambo premiered it was a big deal. It was such a hit that the formally-free citizens of Myanmar began to adopt Rambo-isms into their daily lives! Since Rambo was born in Myanmar/Burma, audiences took the film personally.
Soldiers that saw the film began to use the characters phrase, “Live for nothing, or die for something” when they were on the battlefield! Word about this got back to Sylvester Stallone and he was thrilled to say the least. He said it was one of the proudest moments of his entire career!
The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly
Life in the wild west was wild and filthy. It may come as a shock to some, but washing machines and dryers didn’t exist back in the days of saloons and old-timey bank robberies. Even when filming Western films, washing machines just didn’t exist for certain actors. One of the most devoted to this historical fact was Clint Eastwood. Throughout the three “Man with No Name” films, Eastwood’s character wore the same poncho.
But he didn’t have multiples of the same one. For three movies, the man wore the exact same poncho without washing it. It smelled like history, filth, and excellence. It probably has enough of his DNA in it to clone a new Eastwood, too.
Raging Bull
Sometimes a movie will be made about famous people without their input. Biopics, historical reenactments, or even straight-up fictitious tales involving real people will be made for entertainment purposes. That’s not uncommon. What is, is the famous person learning something new about themselves after watching the film! Jake LaMotta, the boxer who inspired the film Raging Bull, was pretty extreme.
After watching the movie he didn’t realize how extreme he had actually been. After the film was over, he turned to his wife Vicki LaMotta to see if she saw the same thing. She looked him up and down and told him he was worse than they made him look on the big screen!
Miami Vice
If you have an iconic television show it can be risky to try and make it into an iconic film. How can you live up to something that has already done so well across several seasons? Condensing it into a ninety-minute adventure can be tough. The bond between the main characters in Miami Vice is friendship goals for a lot of guys.
The movie though didn’t seem to capture that same 80s bromance that most people fell in love with. Colin Farrell, one of the stars, was the first to admit it! In an interview he said the movie was more about capturing the style instead of creating something worthy with substance!
Total Recall
Some people tend to play the same type of character over and over. No matter the film, no matter the genre, they’re the same person every time. But it usually works out great for them. In Total Recall, Sharon Stone delivers a completely unhinged and bizarre performance that perfectly fits into the film’s setting.
The director of Basic Instinct was so enchanted he just had to give her the lead role! On top of that, the director said it wasn’t much of a difference in her actual persona! According to Paul Verhoeven, Stone acts the same on-camera as she does when they stopped rolling.
The Mummy
The Mummy (the original with Brendan Fraser) is a cinema classic. The entire cast gives their all, especially Kevin O’Connor. The actor is hilarious, committed, and frustrated for the entire run of the film. While his character may have been difficult to swallow, all the humans understood why. The animals used in the film? Not so much.
Every camel in the movie had a personal grudge against the guy for some mysterious animal reason. Every time O’Connor tried to get a camel to move or respond to pulling the reins, they would just stare at him with quiet disdain. What did they know that we don’t? If only there had been a camel whisperer on set!
From Dusk Till Dawn
Actors are just like the rest of us. Aside from mountains of money and fame, they have deep-seated phobias that are sometimes rational and sometimes not. Salma Hayek, despite being able to transform into nearly any persona for a role, has some lines she refuses to cross. One of them used to be snakes.
It was so bad that it almost stopped her from accepting her part in From Dusk Till Dawn. She eventually had to get over it because she was jealous of someone else. Robert Rodriguez told a little fib and said if she didn’t take the part he’d give it to Madonna. That was enough to send Hayek to therapy to conquer her fear for the movie!
Blade
One of the coolest, and earliest, Marvel heroes to be adapted for the big screen was Blade. This vampire hunter wasn’t afraid to fight the good fight and look cool while doing it. While Wesley Snipes is the first person everyone thinks of when Blade is mentioned, he almost didn’t do the movie at all! Snipes actually wanted to do a Black Panther movie instead of Blade.
He told the filmmakers that he felt more of a connection to the character and vibe of the Black Panther comics. Plus, he was honest and said he wanted to fight in a cool leather suit. While that sounds awesome, at least Blade got to suit up in some leather for his film.
Rush Hour
The Rush Hour series is super fun and extremely funny. Whoever had the idea to unite Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker deserves some sort of lifetime achievement award. Director Brett Ratner probably deserves some recognition for being the first to cast Jackie Chan in a non-dubbed role. While Chan was no stranger to films, most if not all of his prior movies featured dubbing!
The language barrier proved to be an issue with previous movie makers. According to Ratner, Chan’s accent and lack of total fluency was exactly what he wanted. He said it would be more authentic to feature Chan speaking as naturally as he did off-camera. And it totally paid off in the end.
Taken
Whoever doesn’t want Liam Neeson for a father clearly hasn’t seen Taken. Regardless of how you feel about the sequels, the first is one of the best action movies of all time. Neeson plays an ex-CIA operative who stops at nothing to find his kidnapped daughter. The whole basis for the film relies on the fact that a teenager and her friend were traveling alone in Europe, and end up getting kidnapped because the continent is horrifically unsafe.
The problem with the movie is it isn’t as dangerous as you’d think. After parents said he convinced them to never let their kids travel to the EU, he tried his best to explain the movie was just for entertainment purposes only. While these things happen, they’re rarely like the film.
Goldfinger
With so many films to choose from, any action fan has at least one or two favorite James Bond movies. The spy with the triple-digit codename supersedes time and always delivers a great adventure. His jet-setting quests to stop villains and save the world are legendary and have inspired millions of fans. However, Bond isn’t as well-traveled as most would think.
When Sir Sean Connery was playing the spy, he actually preferred to stay in London for most of his scenes. Even when Bond was seen in the US, like in Goldfinger, it was all Hollywood magic. Sir Connery filmed his US scenes at Pinewood Studios near London!
Edge Of Tomorrow
Sometimes adrenaline can make people react in curious ways. Even when things aren’t going too fast to handle, people can display a trauma response that seems wildly out of proportion to whatever’s going on. In Edge Of Tomorrow, Emily Blunt insisted on doing some of her own stunts. What most people don’t realize is that stunt work requires more than just a body of steel.
You have to be precise with your actions. During a dangerous car scene, Blunt was supposed to drive fast and dangerously around a curve. Instead of hitting her mark, she drove straight into a tree! While everyone involved was okay, she and her co-star Tom Cruise couldn’t help but start laughing after slamming head first into Mother Nature.
Mad Max: Fury Road
Mad Max: Fury Road is one of the most visually beautiful and action-packed movies of the 00s. Everything was shot perfectly. All of the characters are fully realized and portrayed amazingly. It’s simply a masterpiece from start to finish. It is also a feminist anthem to the strength, resilience, and skills of women everywhere. Even outside of the acting and script, women were responsible for making the film as perfect as it is.
George Miller’s wife, Margaret Sixel, even insisted on editing it herself. While she didn’t have experience in action films, she said it had to be done. Why? Because, if a man had been in the editing room, it would have just been another action-packed nonsense movie with no substance. She was absolutely right.
Independence Day
The original Independence Day was almost a documentary of sorts. Even though the American government still denies the existence of extraterrestrials and Area 51, they wanted in on the film. They even allowed the cast and crew to film scenes on actual army bases for a more authentic feel! However, things came to a screeching halt once they learned about all of the references to the Area 51 military site.
Once they realized how important of a role it played in the movie, they immediately withdrew their support and troops. Aliens and secret military bases weren’t going to fly with them. Apparently, the government didn’t want to be seen working with people that supported those theories. Too bad they don’t realize that the truth is still out there.
The Crow
While The Crow itself isn’t the best of films, it does hold a soft spot in many people’s hearts. Given that it was Brandon Lee’s last movie, many consider it an important work. Despite passing away in the middle of filming, the show still had to go on after Lee’s death. While digital magic was used to finish his scenes, a more practical and realistic alternative was on the set.
The crew had a mask made of Lee’s face (prior to his death). They tried to film his body-double wearing it, however, something was off. Everyone was far too uncomfortable seeing someone with his face walking around! In the end, the mask was destroyed and everyone agreed computer magic was the best way to go moving forward.
Baby Driver
Even when a movie isn’t in his genre, Michael Myers (the murderous one) has a way of showing up in some unexpected places. In Baby Driver, a whole bunch of Michael Myers masks appear for a surprising reason. The crew wanted to use them in the film, but the owners of the Halloween series said it was a no-go.
Instead, the prop department turned to the other Mike Myers (the funny one) for some help. They asked if they could use masks of HIS face instead. The actor thought it was so ridiculous that he gave his approval immediately.
Midnight Run
Some movies leave a lasting impression on audiences. Others leave a permanent impression on the people who star in them. In Midnight Run, Charles Grodin wears some very heavy and very tight looking handcuffs. Despite having more comfortable options available, he chose the real pair. Why? Because Robert De Niro told him too!
He said it would be more authentic. He was correct. Unfortunately, real handcuffs tend to scar if they’re on for too long and are too tight. Both of those things are exactly what happened to Grodin. Years after the film, he still sports scars from the cuffs! Talk about a unique souvenir.