19 Behind-The-Scenes Facts About Iconic Horror Movies That’ll Leave You Frightened

Just because it’s November and Halloween is over doesn’t mean we can’t still enjoy some wicked cool content. Behind the blood-curdling screams, haunted houses and scary slashers that fill the screen in some of our favorite horror movies, there is a hotbed of horror movie trivia waiting to be uncovered. 

It’s time to bone up on your horror knowledge with these facts about some of your favorite scary movies.

1) Whilst filming Scream (1996) Drew Barrymore accidently called 911 for real several times. The prop master had forgotten to unplug the phone before filming. Barrymore would call, scream and hang up. In the middle of one take the police rang back in confusion to ask why they kept calling.

2) Carrie (1976)- Brian De Palma based Carrie’s posture and walk at the end of the film after Gustave Moreau’s 1851 painting The Study of Lady Macbeth.

3) In Scream (1996), Matthew Lillard improvised “You fuckin’ hit me with the phone, dick!” The phone stuck to Skeet Ulrich’s hand because of the fake blood and he didn’t mean to nail him in the back of the head.

4) Silence of the Lambs (1991) When characters are talking to Clarice, they often talk directly to the camera. Director Jonathan Demme has explained that this was done so as the audience would directly experience her point of view, and more readily identify with Clarice, over her male counterparts.

5) In the beginning of The Ring (2002), the Dreamworks logo briefly flashes the titular “ring” from the cursed videotape.

6) In Poltergeist (1982), the chair-stacking scene was done in one take using an already-assembled cluster of chairs.

7) Since Psycho (1960) was filmed in black-and-white, watered-down Hershey’s chocolate syrup was used for the infamous shower scene. This was the “fake blood” of choice for the film industry back then.

8) 28 Days Later (2002): the motorway scene was filmed on one of the busiest stretches of the M1, the UK’s main North/South motorway, using a police rolling roadblock.

9) Halloween (1978) Since there was limited time to use the child actor, Michael’s hands in the beginning scene belong to the movie’s co-writer/producer Debra Hill.

 

10) In Aronofsky’s “Black Swan”, Nina is seen eating a Grapefruit and Hard boiled Egg for breakfast, drawing reference to Aronofsky’s previous film “Requiem for a Dream” where Sara Goldfarb, the Mother, eats the same meal as part of her goal to lose weight for her upcoming appearance on Television.

11) In Get Out (2017) the last name of Rose’s family, Armitage, was the last name of the protagonist in H. P. Lovecraft’s The Dunwich Horror. The short story is an allusion to the movie’s ending as The Dunwich Horror is one of Lovecraft’s few stories that ends with the hero defeating the monster.

12) In a scene from Rosemary’s Baby (1968), Rosemary (Mia Farrow) simply walked out into a New York street and hoped the oncoming cars would stop. Director Roman Polanski assured her that “Nobody will hit a pregnant woman.”

13) In A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), the effect of blood rushing to the ceiling during Glen’s (Johnny Depp) demise was achieved using an upside down set. It was actually spilling onto the floor. Director Wes Craven and DP Jacques Haitkin captured the scene strapped to the wall in race car seats.

14) In The Exorcist (1973), Linda Blair fractured her spine during filming. She was rigged to a mechanical bed that shook her so-violently; she broke her back. The shot was used in the final film and her screams were real. Linda later suffered from scoliosis and chronic pain.

15) In Candyman (1992) when the productors used bees they only used 12 hour old bees so they wouldn’t sting. But there would be a few occasions where the bees would sting Tony Todd

16) In the Cabin in the Woods (2012), the scene with the monitors was described in one sentence in the script, “there is chaos on every screen”. Each kill was individually filmed and played back on the screens for this scene. Joss Wheadon said that was the most difficult part of the movie to film.

17) In Se7en [1996], Fincher never told John C. McGinley that the corpse used for ‘Sloth’ was actually a living actor in heavy makeup. McGinley’s character’s initial shock when ‘Sloth’ wakes in the movie was in fact McGinley’s genuine surprise from the first take.

18) “Get Out”(2017) title and premise was inspired by 1983’s Eddie Murphy’s “Delirious” bit. He joked on how white people in horror films would literally hear a ghost say “get out” yet still stay in the haunted house. Black people would take the hint and leave, as Chris does in “Get Out”.

 

19) Black Swan (2010). Natalie Portman revealed that director Darren Aronofsky would subtly try to pit her and Mila Kunis against each other during filming in an attempt to increase the on-screen tension between their two characters.

 

Got some horror movie facts to share? Tell us in the comment box below!

 

Source: BuzzFeed