FILM 1924: THE OTHER GUYS

FILM 1924: THE OTHER GUYS

TRIVIA: The idea of teaming up of Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg had been gestating since The 79th Annual Academy Awards (2007), where Will had been viciously insulting other actors as part of a bit, but became extremely polite to Mark.

DIRECTOR CAMEO: Adam McKay: Dirty Mike.

FILM 1800: ZODIAC

FILM 1800: ZODIAC

TRIVIA: The Zodiac case was re-opened after the release of the film.

The only real comment that Robert Graysmith said about the finished screenplay was, "God, now I see why my wife divorced me."

The shooting script was two hundred pages long. To prevent any problems with length, that such a long script might cause, Director David Fincher decided to ask his cast members to speak faster.

The producers hired a private investigator to track down the real-life Zodiac survivor, Mike Mageau.

Hair was digitally added to the close-ups of Jake Gyllenhaal's knuckles as he draws or holds letters. David Fincher felt that Gyllenhaal's hands "were too hairless and pretty".

When Mark Ruffalo met David Toschi, the investigator he plays in the film, he was very impressed to learn that Toschi had perfect recall of every detail of every case.

Robert Graysmith and Paul Avery were not actually friends. Their relationship is fictionalized for the film.

David Fincher was always first choice to direct, based on his work on Se7en (1995).

Jake Gyllenhaal shares one of the film's creepiest scenes with Charles Fleischer. In real-life, the two have known each other since Gyllenhaal was three years old.

Anthony Edwards was cast as Armstrong because David Fincher wanted him to be played by a thoroughly decent person. Fincher already knew him, not so much from his work on ER (1994), but because he was a neighbor.

Because he wanted the film to be as accurate as possible, David Fincher decided not to depict any of the alleged Zodiac murders for which there were no surviving victims or witnesses.

In order to save time, David Fincher decided to digitally add all the blood in the murder scenes.

Robert Downey Jr. was so unaccustomed to the experience of both David Fincher's multiple takes, and the process of filming digitally, that he rebelled against David for "having no time to get my shit together in my trailer" by hiding mason jars full of his urine on set.

(At around thirty-three minutes) Dave Toschi, in real-life, was the inspiration for Steve McQueen's performance in Bullitt (1968). In the film, Graysmith mentions that Toschi wears his gun like Bullitt. Avery replies that Bullitt got it from Toschi.

Dermot Mulroney had to wear a fat suit for his few short scenes, because David Fincherfelt he was in far too good shape for his character.

David Fincher's template for the film was Alan J. Pakula's All the President's Men (1976).

South Korean film Director Joon-ho Bong has classified David Fincher's film as a "masterpiece," writing that "There was really nothing to find fault with about it, down to the cinematography, art direction, and action."

Daniel Craig was first choice for Paul Avery.

(At around fourteen minutes) The bar Paul Avery frequents in the film, is called Morti's. Mortis is Latin for death.

Two of the lead actors, Mark Ruffalo and Robert Downey, Jr., would go on to co-star in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as The Hulk and Iron Man respectively.

The historical Paul Avery did not withdraw from working at the San Francisco Chronicle to a life of reclusive obscurity, as the film suggests. In 1974-75 he did reportage on the kidnapping of Patricia Hearst which he turned into a high-profile published book, "The Voices of Guns" (1976); he was also married with two daughters, a fact the film does not mention.

FILM 1739: TANGO & CASH

FILM 1739: TANGO & CASH

TRIVIA: Patrick Swayze was originally cast as Cash, but he dropped out to star in Road House(1989).

The glasses Sylvester Stallone wears early in the film are his own, not props. He usually wears contact lenses in his films. The lenses show that he is very near-sighted in one eye, less so in the other. Plus, he has astigmatism.

When Tango and Cash escape from the prison, Cash turns to Tango and asks if he stopped "for coffee and a Danish." Tango says, "I hate Danish," an in-joke referring to Sylvester Stallone's recent divorce from Danish actress Brigitte Nielsen.

When Brion James was originally hired to play Requin, it was a very small role with only two lines. In an effort to give the character something that would make him stand out, James decided to speak in a horrible "cockney" accent. Sylvester Stallone loved it, and re-wrote the script to give Requin a much bigger role.

The production was beset with problems from the start. The intended star, Patrick Swayze, dropped out. Principal photography began without a completed script. Sylvester Stallone had the original Director of Photography, Barry Sonnenfeld, fired. Then, Jon Peters fired Andrey Konchalovskiy. The film ultimately went $20 million over budget, and had to be completely re-edited by Stuart Baird prior to release.

FILM 1690: WAR ON EVERYONE

TRIVIA: The director said when Garrett Hedlund dropped out 3 weeks before shooting began, he was given a list of 6 actors he could potentially choose from, 3 he dropped immediately. He went on to choose Skarsgard because of a YouTube video he saw of him drunk at a football match, in which he's trying to whip the rest of the crowd in a frenzy as he thought they were being too quiet. He thought this made him perfect for the role of Terry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHbtq2C2PEQ 

FILM 1539: THE FRENCH CONNECTION

TRIVIA: The car crash during the chase sequence, at the intersection of Stillwell Ave. and 86th St., was unplanned and was included because of its realism. The man whose car was hit had just left his house a few blocks from the intersection to go to work and was unaware that a car chase was being filmed. The producers later paid the bill for the repairs to his car.

The early scene where Doyle and Russo chase down a drug dealer with Doyle dressed in a Santa Claus suit is based on a real-life tactic used by Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso. While on stakeouts in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Egan and Grosso discovered drug dealers could easily spot undercover cops, and would often flee the scene before the cops could arrest them. One Christmas, Egan came up with the idea of dressing in a Santa Claus suit, figuring the dealers would never suspect Santa Claus of being a cop. As depicted in the film, Egan walked the neighborhood streets as Santa Claus, singing Christmas carols with local kids. When he saw a deal going down, Egan sang "Jingle Bells" as a signal to his partners to move in and make the arrest. The tactic worked beautifully, and Egan and his partners made dozens of Christmas arrests over several years.

The scene where Doyle and Russo chase down the dealer near the beginning and Gene Hackman shouts out his famous question "Did you ever pick your feet in Poughkeepsie?" is based on actual "good cop/bad cop" interrogations by the real "French Connection" detectives, Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso according to William Friedkin in the DVD commentary. Grosso would gingerly ask a suspect direct questions about his crimes, then Egan would always butt in and yell unusual questions like the Poughkeepsie one. The suspect would get so rattled by Egan's offbeat questioning that he felt more comfortable answering Grosso's, thus, tending to eventually incriminate himself.

According to William Friedkin, the significance of the straw hat being tossed onto the shelf of the rear window in Doyle and Russo's car was that at that time it was a universal signal in New York City that the undercover cops in the car were on duty.

In at least one glimpse of the Manhattan skyline (as the car is being unloaded from the cargo ship), you can see the first of the World Trade Center towers under construction.

According to William Friedkin on his DVD commentary, the scene where Weinstock's chemist tests the heroin's purity uses actual heroin, and not flour or cornstarch or some other commonly used substitute.

Al Copeland named his restaurant chain, Popeye's Mighty Good Fried Chicken, after Popeye Doyle, Gene Hackman's character in the film The French Connection (1971). The chain that grew from the one restaurant became Popeye's Famous Fried Chicken.

William Friedkin credits his decision to direct the movie to a discussion with film director Howard Hawks, whose daughter was living with Friedkin at the time. Friedkin asked Hawks what he thought of his movies, to which Hawks bluntly replied that they were "lousy." Instead Hawks recommended that he "Make a good chase. Make one better than anyone's done."

FILM 1481: THE CHESHIRE MURDERS

In the quiet suburb of Cheshire, Connecticut, Jennifer Petit and her two young daughters were killed in a horrific home invasion; husband and father William Petit was the only one who escaped alive. This gripping film explores the events of that shocking triple homicide that rocked the town and set off a politically charged death-penalty trial. The result is a disturbing revelation of police failures and untold personal dramas that point out the biggest tragedy of all: the crime could have been prevented at many turns.

(IMDB)