FILM 1543: GIGI 

TRIVIA: The cat in the movie reacted violently whenever it was in a scene with Leslie Caron, but director Vincente Minnelli insisted on having that particular cat, so it had to be heavily drugged. This is especially obvious during "Say a Prayer for Me Tonight".

When Alan Jay Lerner met Leslie Caron in London to discuss the film with her, he was surprised to discover that Caron, who was of French birth, had become so immersed in the English culture that she had lost her French accent.

Several characters in Beauty and the Beast (1991) are an homage to characters in Gigi: Lumiere is a tribute to Maurice Chevalier, perfectly impersonated by Jerry Orbach. The main male protagonist's name is Gaston, with a similar air of confidence as Gaston from Gigi. When Gigi rebuffs him, it is similar to when Belle rebuffs Gaston and both sing a self righteous song of indignation. Gaston of B&B is not redeemed in the end however unlike Gigi's Gaston. Beauty and the Beast is itself a take on the classic french novel La Belle et la Bete. Though not the same source material, both being french themed, B&B pays homage to great French actors and themes past in Gigi. Watching Gigi will lead to a greater appreciation of Beauty and the Beast.

Cecil Beaton had to supply over 150 period costumes for the scene in the Bois, and 20 ornate gowns for the scene in Maxims. Beaton had difficulty procuring such a large amount of costumes in Paris but when the production moved to Hollywood, he found warehouses stuffed to bursting with period furniture and costumes.

Gaston's walk through Paris while singing "Gigi" uses camera magic to make parts of Paris which are miles apart seem adjacent to each other. This technique, called "creative geography", was created and named by French filmmaker Jean Cocteau.

The cast had to mouth the songs as production was so swift that the score had yet to recorded by the time it came to filming.

As he often did with his films, Vincente Minnelli looked toward the art world for inspiration on how each scene should look. He found inspiration in the work of French caricaturist Sem, whose sketches had been admired by Colette herself when she was writing the original characters in Gigi. For the opening sequence in the Bois du Boulogne he looked to the work of artist Constantin Guys. Boudin's work served as the inspiration for the beach sequences in Gigi. In addition, Minnelli also threw in some Art Nouveau to represent the character of Honoré Lachailles. Minelli recalled, "Our reasoning for using the influence in the settings was to show how avant garde Chevalier's character would be, using the brand-new style in his bachelor digs."

FILM 1312: KINGSMAN: THE SECRET SERVICE

TRIVIA: Actor Colin Firth did 80% of his own stunts according to stunt coordinator and second unit director Bradley James Allan.

Many of the villains in the James Bond franchise have had some form of physical dysfunction, difference or abnormality. Samuel L. Jackson's character of Richmond Valentine was originally intended not to have a lisp, however Jackson completed his first take with a lisp. Director Matthew Vaughn yelled cut and talked to Jackson who revealed to Vaughn that prior to having an acting career he actually had a lisp which he eventually overcame. It was also jokingly remarked that this lisp is Valentine's reason for being villainous.

According to "The Gentleman's Guide" on the film's official website, "The Rules" of a Kingsman Gentleman are as follows: (1) A gentleman never tells about conquests, private matters, or dealings. His business is nobody else's. (2) A gentleman doesn't clash in public with enemies or exes, or worse, with out-of-fashion contrasts, colors or styles. (3) A gentleman is always happy to serve, whether it's opening the door, picking up the bill, or merely calling a cab the next morning. Ask him for help and he cannot refuse. (4) A gentleman never reacts to rudeness. He pretends he doesn't recognize it and moves on like it never happened, because it never should have. (5) A gentleman is always on target with witty remarks, interesting facts, and conversation starters that bring the best out of everyone. And (6) A gentleman asks non-invasive questions to keep a conversation going and attention focused on others. He makes them feel like the most interesting person he's ever met, whether that's true or not.

Director Matthew Vaughn wanted the character of Merlin (Mark Strong) to have a Welsh accent but Strong found the accent too challenging and persuaded Vaughn to let him use a Scottish accent instead.

In the film, the character of Professor James Arnold is played by Mark Hamill. In the comic series, Hamill is the first celebrity kidnapped by Dr. Arnold.

The canvas shown in Richmond Valentines (Samuel L. Jackson) luxury mansion, is the same one Mark Strong has in his office in Kick-Ass (2010).

Comic book writer Mark Millar once told director Matthew Vaughn about a newspaper article he had read about how director Terence Young, who directed the first James Bond film Dr. No (1962), and had cast Sean Connery against the wishes of James Bond creator Ian Fleming. Fleming had seen Agent 007 as more of a James Mason or David Niven type, the latter actually portraying him later in the unofficial spoof Casino Royale (1967). Millar has said: "Young realized he had to turn Connery, this rough Edinburgh guy, into a gentleman, and before they started shooting the film he took him to his tailor, to his favorite restaurants, and basically taught him how to eat, talk, and dress like a gentleman spy."

FILM 1301: OF DOLLS AND MURDER

Of Dolls and Murder is a documentary film about a collection of dollhouse crime scenes and society's collective fascination with death. It was released in April 2012.

In the 1930s and 1940s, heiress Frances Glessner Lee, created dollhouse crime scenes to help train detectives in the art of reading crime scenes. The dollhouses, known as The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, are on permanent loan to the Maryland Medical Examiner's Office in Baltimore, and are not open to the public.

The film follows how these intricate dioramas are still used to train homicide detectives, despite all the technological advances in death investigation. The dioramas also provided inspiration for The Miniature Killer, a recurring villain in season seven of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. The villain's modus operandi is to leave behind accurate dioramas of her crime scenes.

In a further exploration of morbid curiosity, the filmmakers also shadow a Baltimore homicide detective, and visit The Body Farm, a famous forensic anthropology site in Tennessee where researchers study the decay of bodies.

From the iconic CSI television show to the Body Farm and criminally minded college students, legendary filmmaker and true crime aficionado, John Waters narrates the tiny world of big time murder.

FILM 1179: ROCKY

TRIVIA: After producers Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff became interested in the script, they offered writer Sylvester Stallone an unprecedented $350,000 for the rights, but he refused to sell unless they agreed to allow him to star in the film (this despite the fact that he had only $106 in the bank, no car and was trying to sell his dog because he couldn't afford to feed it). They agreed, but only on the condition that Stallone continue to work as a writer without a fee and that he work as an actor for scale. After Winkler and Chartoff purchased the film, they took it to United Artists, who envisioned a budget of $2 million, but that was on the basis of using an established star (they particularly wanted Robert Redford, Ryan O'Neal, Burt Reynolds or James Caan). United Artists didn't want Stallone to star, and when Winkler and Chartoff told them that the only way they could get him to sell the screenplay was to agree to cast him, United Artists cut the budget to $1 million, and had Chartoff and Winkler sign agreements that if the film went over budget, they would be personally liable. The final cost of the film was $1.1 million. The $0.1 million came after Chartoff and Winkler mortgaged their homes so as to complete the project.

Most of the scenes of Rocky jogging through Philadelphia were shot guerrilla-style, with no permits, no equipment and no extras. The shot were he runs past the moored boat for example; the crew were simply driving by the docks and director John G. Avildsen saw the boat and thought it would make a good visual, so he had Sylvester Stallone simply get out of the van and run along the quays whilst Avildsen himself filmed from the side door. A similar story concerns the famous shot of Rocky jogging through the food market. As he runs, the stall keepers and the people on the sidewalks can clearly be seen looking at him in bemusement. Whilst this works in the context of the film to suggest they're looking at Rocky, in reality, they had no idea why this man was running up and down the road being filmed from a van. During this scene, the famous shot where the stall-owner throws Rocky an orange was completely improvised by the stall owner-himself, who had no idea that a movie was being filmed and that he would be in it.

Rocky's dog Butkus was actually Sylvester Stallone's dog in real life.

According to Burt Young, during filming of the scene where Paulie walks home drunk, an actual drunk wandered onto the location and told Young he wasn't acting drunk convincingly, so Young asked the man to demonstrate it. Young then copied the man's actions for the scene.

When shooting the scenes in the meat-locker where he punches the slabs of beef, actor Sylvester Stallone punched the meat so hard for so long that he flattened out his knuckles. To this day, when he makes a fist, his knuckles are completely level.

In the film, the poster above the ring before Rocky fights Apollo shows Rocky wearing red shorts with a white stripe when he actually wears white shorts with a red stripe. This was an actual mistake made by the props department that they could not afford to rectify, so Sylvester Stallone came up with the idea for the scene where Rocky points out the mistake himself. The comment about Rocky's robe being too baggy came about the same way - the robe delivered to the set was far too baggy for Stallone, so rather than hope people wouldn't notice, the character himself simply points it out.

The first sports film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture.

The ice rink scene was originally written to feature 300 extras, but the production couldn't afford so many people. When Sylvester Stallone turned up to shoot the scene, to his horror, there was only one extra. So, Stallone hastily threw together the scene as it exists in the completed film. Ironically, this scene has become one of the most popular in the entire Rocky saga.