The stories behind these infamous scenes will creep you out! For this list, we’ll be looking at the most unsettling facts that concern iconic or well-known movie scenes.
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00:00 "It's only a dream!"
00:02 "Come to Freddy."
00:04 Welcome to WatchMojo,
00:06 and today we're counting down our picks
00:08 for the top 20 creepiest true stories
00:10 behind movie scenes.
00:12 "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse."
00:14 For this list, we're looking at
00:18 the most unsettling facts that concern
00:20 iconic or well-known movie scenes.
00:22 We'll be omitting instances where
00:24 actors perished on set, as that is
00:26 already a list of its own.
00:28 Do you know all of these facts?
00:30 Let us know in the comments.
00:32 Number 20.
00:34 Sissy Spacek slept in blood.
00:36 Cary. Continuity is a hugely important
00:38 aspect of the movie-making process.
00:40 However, it's not necessarily
00:42 an actor's job to keep tabs
00:44 upon their wardrobe to this end.
00:46 Sissy Spacek, however, went the extra mile
00:48 when she was filming Cary back in 1976.
00:50 "Stop it, Mama!"
00:52 "Stop hurting yourself, Mama!"
00:56 "They're all gonna laugh at you!"
00:58 "They're all gonna laugh at you!"
01:00 The actor, determined to retain continuity
01:02 for the scene, slept in Cary's
01:04 bloodied prom dress until the scene was finished.
01:06 This wasn't done in a single day, mind you,
01:08 meaning that Spacek slept for
01:10 multiple nights in her dirtied and sticky dress.
01:12 Spacek, to her credit,
01:14 actually told Yahoo in 2014
01:16 that the warmed corn syrup felt like,
01:18 quote, "a warm blanket."
01:20 "I was dead, Mama."
01:24 "They laughed at me."
01:26 Number 19. Sliced Open.
01:28 The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
01:30 The filming of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
01:32 in 1973 is notorious
01:34 at this point for the hellish conditions
01:36 endured by the entire production.
01:38 Marilyn Burns' character may have
01:40 made it to the end of the film alive,
01:42 but the actor didn't escape unharmed.
01:44 "Young lady, you just make it easy there,
01:46 now, but we'll fix you some supper
01:48 in a few minutes, huh?"
01:50 Die-hard fans of the film
01:52 may know that Burns actually cut
01:54 her finger during the scene
01:56 where her character Sally Hardesty
01:58 is being tortured by the Sawyer clan.
02:00 This wasn't the only time Burns
02:02 suffered for her art, either,
02:04 as the actor can be seen suffering cuts and bruises
02:06 while frantically fleeing from Leatherface.
02:08 [Screaming]
02:10 Number 18. Real Tears.
02:18 Skippy.
02:20 Not every actor can cry
02:22 on cue. It's even more challenging
02:24 when a production is working with a child actor.
02:26 But this does not mean that any
02:28 director should go to the lengths Norman Taurog
02:30 did on 1931's Skippy.
02:32 One scene in the film required
02:34 lead Jackie Cooper to cry over
02:36 the loss of his character's dog,
02:38 and the young boy was having some difficulty.
02:40 So, Taurog actually had Cooper's
02:42 own dog let away and ordered
02:44 a production assistant to fire a gun.
02:46 The director told Cooper his dog
02:48 had been shot in order to get...
02:50 well, the shot.
02:52 [Crying]
02:54 To make things worse,
02:56 Cooper was so inconsolable that he
02:58 kept on crying after Taurog brought the
03:00 unharmed dog back on set.
03:02 Number 17. Injuries and a
03:04 real murderer. The Exorcist.
03:06 Ellen Burstyn wasn't the only
03:08 actor to get hurt on the set of The Exorcist.
03:10 Linda Blair also suffered
03:12 some debilitating injuries during the filming
03:14 of this classic fright fest.
03:16 I'm speaking specifically of the sequence
03:18 where Blair's possessed character, Regan,
03:20 is thrashing around in a bed.
03:22 [Screaming]
03:24 [Growling]
03:26 The harness that held Blair
03:28 down was improperly secured,
03:30 to the point where the actor's beleaguered
03:32 pleas for help were just that.
03:34 She was in some real pain.
03:36 I didn't know what to do, and so
03:38 I'm just yelling. It hurts really,
03:40 really, and somebody thought I yelled "Billy."
03:42 And I actually never broke character.
03:44 Blair would develop scoliosis
03:46 as a result of the sequence.
03:48 But even more troubling is the case
03:50 of Paul Bateson, who played a radiographer
03:52 in the film. Regan, I'm just gonna
03:54 move you down on the table, okay?
03:56 Bateson served actual prison time
03:58 for the murder of film industry reporter
04:00 Addison Verrill in 1977.
04:02 Number 16.
04:04 Real bees. Candyman.
04:06 We have a bargain.
04:08 And I'm afraid.
04:10 Do you fear the pain,
04:12 or what is beyond? Both.
04:14 The pain, I can assure you,
04:16 will be exquisite.
04:18 We're not sure how many
04:20 trained Hollywood stunt bees exist
04:22 out there, but we do know that Candyman
04:24 star Tony Todd held a remarkable
04:26 amount of them in his mouth during
04:28 this legendary sequence. The bees
04:30 in Todd's mouth are actually babies.
04:32 Although they appear like the
04:34 normal, everyday bees you'd see pollinating
04:36 a flower. However, baby
04:38 bees have less developed stingers.
04:40 So the effect of an attack
04:42 is less painful than if Todd was getting
04:44 stung by a fully grown honey bee.
04:46 Oh, Todd was stung, however.
04:48 Stung 23 times, in fact.
04:50 However, the actor had
04:52 a clause in his contract that paid out
04:54 a cool thousand bucks for every sting
04:56 on set. Not too shabby.
04:58 Allow me at least a kiss.
05:00 Just one
05:02 exquisite
05:04 kiss.
05:06 (Screams)
05:08 Number 15. That horse head.
05:10 The Godfather.
05:12 600,000 dollars on four
05:14 hooks. I'll bet Russian design never paid
05:16 that kind of dough for a single horse.
05:18 It seems so simple, right? Develop
05:20 a mock horse head that you can put in the bed
05:22 during that infamously bloody scene in The Godfather.
05:24 This wasn't what director Francis
05:26 Ford Coppola had in mind, however.
05:28 He wanted realism, to the
05:30 point where he ordered an actual horse
05:32 head from the local slaughterhouse.
05:34 A horse that was being put down anyway, mind you.
05:36 Soon enough, a box
05:38 containing a severed horse head arrived
05:40 on set, enclosed in a package
05:42 of dry ice. Coppola
05:44 and crew set up the head on the bed, shot
05:46 the scene, and the rest is history.
05:48 Gross, bloody history.
05:50 (Screams)
05:52 Number 14. Danger.
05:56 Then fiction. Roar.
05:58 The 1981 movie Roar
06:00 is one of the craziest ideas
06:02 from an industry that is basically defined
06:04 by crazy ideas. The
06:06 decision to film a family comedy drama
06:08 surrounded by real wildcats
06:10 was that of writer/director Noel Marshall
06:12 and his wife, film star Tippi Hedren.
06:14 "What are you trying to prove?
06:16 That you can have lions socializing
06:18 with people?" "No, but we can't keep
06:20 exterminating them. We can't keep
06:22 eliminating their land.
06:24 We can't keep exterminating everything
06:26 that we fear that inconveniences us."
06:28 The film itself would probably
06:30 be forgotten today, were it not
06:32 for the extremely dangerous and
06:34 potentially deadly situations Roar
06:36 provided for its cast and crew.
06:38 At least 70 people were injured
06:40 during the making of Roar, including
06:42 the main cast of Marshall, Hedren
06:44 and Hedren's daughter, Melanie Griffith.
06:46 "Why did you bring us here?
06:48 We're just gonna die!"
06:50 "No, we are not going to die. Your father
06:52 is gonna be here soon and it'll be all over."
06:54 These injuries and attacks can be
06:56 seen on screen too, and Roar's
06:58 infamous reputation eventually grew
07:00 to the point where documentaries were
07:02 made about this stranger than fiction
07:04 exercise in poor judgment.
07:06 Number 13. Don Doe.
07:08 Dawn of the Dead. George A. Romero
07:10 and the crew from 1978's
07:12 Dawn of the Dead didn't intend to
07:14 utilize real human remains in their movie.
07:16 However, Don Doe,
07:18 as she's now affectionately known by
07:20 fans, was indeed a mummified
07:22 corpse that was accidentally featured
07:24 in Romero's film. "Annie
07:26 have died last week
07:28 on these threes
07:30 in the basement of this building.
07:32 We find them." This occurred when
07:34 special effects legend Tom Savini
07:36 brought over what he thought was a rented
07:38 prop from a man named Larry Wintersteller.
07:40 Don Doe wasn't a
07:42 prop, however, but a real person
07:44 and she then spent time in the front
07:46 window of a costume shop for years
07:48 after her brush with undead fame.
07:50 The skeletal remains were then spotted by
07:52 a police officer, positively identified
07:54 and finally laid to rest
07:56 in a grave on March 19th, 1983.
07:58 Number 12.
08:00 Lemming Toss. White
08:02 Wilderness. It's an animal
08:04 myth that has persisted for decades,
08:06 thanks in part to one old school
08:08 Disney film. "The story is one of the
08:10 persistent tales of the Arctic.
08:12 And as often happens in man's nature lore,
08:14 it's a story both true and false,
08:16 as we shall see in a moment." White Wilderness
08:18 presented the idea that lemmings commit
08:20 self-destruction in groups, hurtling
08:22 themselves over cliffs to their deaths.
08:24 This actually isn't true, but that doesn't
08:26 mean White Wilderness is off the hook
08:28 with regards to creepy behavior.
08:30 That's because the crew on set actually
08:32 tossed lemmings from cliffs and into the water
08:34 in order to achieve the illusion of self-destruction.
08:36 It's unclear as to
08:38 whether any lemmings were actually hurt
08:40 during this sequence, but it's always controversial
08:42 when any production stages animal
08:44 behavior in a dangerous or reckless manner.
08:46 Number 11.
08:48 Nearly Electrocuted. A Nightmare
08:50 on Elm Street. What do you
08:52 think of when the original A Nightmare on Elm
08:54 Street pops into your head? Maybe it's
08:56 the reports of actual dream death
08:58 that inspired director Wes Craven's creative
09:00 vision for the film? Or maybe it's
09:02 that iconic Johnny Depp death scene?
09:04 [Screaming]
09:06 [Screaming]
09:08 Well, as
09:10 classic as that scene is, getting it
09:12 in the can did not come without cost.
09:14 The rotating room turned into
09:16 a wheel of electrified death after
09:18 fake blood spilled onto some set equipment.
09:20 "So the guy pouring the water
09:22 got electrocuted."
09:24 "Oops."
09:26 Multiple crew members were
09:28 non-fatally electrocuted during the scene.
09:30 And Robert Anglund recalled in an interview
09:32 how he assisted in getting co-star
09:34 Heather Langenkamp out of the way from
09:36 suffering similar shocks.
09:38 "Come on Freddy, time to catch me."
09:40 [Music]
09:42 "I'm gonna split
09:44 you in two."
09:46 Number 10. Lion Attack.
09:48 Tarzan the Ape Man.
09:50 John Derrick directed a number of films that
09:52 starred his wife, the actor and model
09:54 Bo Derrick. One of them was
09:56 1981's Tarzan the Ape Man,
09:58 featuring the hunky Miles O'Keefe
10:00 in the lead role.
10:02 "Are you Tarzan?"
10:04 "100 feet tall?"
10:08 "Maybe a thousand?"
10:12 It would be O'Keefe that would ultimately prove
10:16 Bo Derrick's guardian angel on set,
10:18 since it was the actor's quick thinking that allowed
10:20 his co-star to escape a potentially
10:22 fatal lion attack. The attack
10:24 was actually kept in the finished film too,
10:26 although it's edited in a way that
10:28 cuts out the drastic moment where O'Keefe
10:30 restrains the lion long enough for his co-star
10:32 to escape with just minor injuries.
10:34 Number 9. Ghostly
10:36 Goings-On. The Conjuring.
10:38 "God brought us together for a reason?"
10:40 "This is it." At this point,
10:42 it's almost expected to have some supernatural
10:44 story come out of the making of a scary movie.
10:46 Even more so for The Conjuring,
10:48 due to its basis on the true
10:50 paranormal investigations of demonologists
10:52 Ed and Lorraine Warren.
10:54 "But we prefer to be known simply as
10:56 Ed and Lorraine Warren."
10:58 The entire production process was marred with
11:00 strange occurrences early on, with weird
11:02 noises being heard when the screenwriters
11:04 were communicating over the phone with Lorraine Warren
11:06 and Vera Farmiga finding
11:08 claw marks on her laptop.
11:10 The strangeness continued on
11:12 the set of The Conjuring 2,
11:14 when curtains were caught moving on camera
11:16 without a draft in the room.
11:18 "Janet?"
11:20 Number 8. Beak and Switch.
11:26 The Birds.
11:28 [Birds squawking]
11:30 Alfred Hitchcock became infamous for his
11:34 behind-the-scenes antics and for how he
11:36 treated some actors over the years.
11:38 Actress Tippi Hedren, who made her
11:40 big-picture debut in The Birds,
11:42 has often gone on record to describe her time
11:44 with Hitchcock as abusive.
11:46 This is evident by the shocking
11:48 climactic attack of Hedren's character
11:50 by a swarm of birds.
11:52 [Birds squawking]
11:54 While she was promised that they
11:58 would use mechanical ones,
12:00 instead, tons of live birds
12:02 were thrown at her, in what she called
12:04 a "brutal and ugly
12:06 and relentless experience."
12:08 [Birds squawking]
12:10 Number 7.
12:14 A Haunted House and Then Some.
12:16 The Amityville Horror.
12:18 "Well, houses don't kill people.
12:20 People kill people."
12:22 Another famous horror film based on a supposedly
12:24 real-life haunting, you can bet that
12:26 some bizarre stuff happened on the set of
12:28 The Amityville Horror remake.
12:30 Not only did a dead body turn up
12:32 in the lake at the outdoor set, but also,
12:34 the real Kathy Lutz passed away
12:36 during production.
12:38 "It wasn't just a set.
12:40 We felt like there was a force."
12:42 Melissa George, who played Kathy
12:46 in the remake, has claimed that
12:48 many supernatural things happened during
12:50 filming. For example, just like
12:52 the real George Lutz, Ryan Reynolds
12:54 kept waking up at 3.15
12:56 a.m., the estimated
12:58 time the DeFeo murders occurred
13:00 in the Amityville house.
13:02 Number 6. It's Only A Movie.
13:04 The Last House on the Left.
13:06 "Yeah, they got their
13:08 cute little udders on." "You guys let's
13:10 the hell out of here. I'm gonna start screaming."
13:12 A brutal film about assault
13:14 and revenge, The Last House
13:16 on the Left famously used the tagline,
13:18 quote, "To avoid fainting,
13:20 keep repeating, it's only a movie."
13:22 However, the on-set reality
13:24 was quite brutal itself.
13:26 Actress Sandra Peabody was allegedly
13:28 so genuinely scared, she even
13:30 walked off set. Actors David Hess
13:32 and Mark Scheffler were reportedly
13:34 very abusive towards their female co-stars,
13:36 threatening to hurt or even kill
13:38 them off camera in order to get
13:40 a strong reaction. Hess also
13:42 experienced some real terror,
13:44 since he was chased by a real
13:46 chainsaw in the film's climax.
13:48 Number 5. Dealing With The Devil.
13:54 The Omen.
13:56 "In God's name, what are you talking about?"
13:58 "Your son, Mr. Thorne.
14:00 The son of the devil."
14:02 The Omen may deal with demons and the
14:04 Antichrist, but the production team
14:06 is considered one of the most cursed
14:08 film crews of all time.
14:10 Head-on collisions, Rottweilers
14:12 attacking trainers, multiple planes
14:14 being struck by lightning, and even
14:16 director Richard Donner's hotel being
14:18 bombed by the IRA, were
14:20 all challenges the crew had to deal
14:22 with. As if all that wasn't enough,
14:24 their special effects artist, John Richardson,
14:26 was seriously injured in a car
14:28 accident less than a year later,
14:30 while his assistant, who was sitting next to him,
14:32 was brutally cut in half.
14:34 Similar to a scene in
14:36 The Omen.
14:38 Number 4.
14:42 Mystery Baby. Eraserhead.
14:44 "Oh, you are sick."
14:48 Indie productions, as opposed to Hollywood
14:50 pictures, normally have much less coverage
14:52 and reports from behind the scenes.
14:54 And if David Lynch is the director,
14:56 then even more of the film's details will be
14:58 shrouded in mystery. Eraserhead
15:00 may be a big question mark to any movie
15:02 goers who discover it, but the biggest
15:04 mystery will always be how Lynch
15:06 created that mutant baby effect.
15:08 Many claim that he used and
15:10 wired up a real, preserved
15:12 lamb fetus. Decades later,
15:14 Lynch refuses to reveal
15:16 his secret, instead making comments
15:18 that raise more questions than answers.
15:20 "There's a baby.
15:22 It's at the hospital." "Mom!"
15:24 "And you're the father."
15:26 Number 3. Harrowing Hallucinations.
15:28 The End of Evangelion.
15:30 "I don't know where to find happiness."
15:32 "So you only find happiness
15:34 in your dreams." As one of the
15:36 trippiest and most surreal anime series
15:38 ever made, the cinematic conclusion
15:40 to Neon Genesis Evangelion
15:42 clearly does not shy away from nudity,
15:44 violence, or general controversy.
15:46 In fact, during one of the
15:48 many hallucinations in the film,
15:50 it's been rumored that the drawings shown are in fact
15:52 real drawings made by victims of
15:54 abuse. Whether this is true or not,
15:56 the sequence also includes real
15:58 death threats the director received for the
16:00 ending of the original series, as well
16:02 as pictures of his vandalized animation
16:04 studio. It's a chilling bit
16:06 of trivia that adds to an already
16:08 traumatic viewing experience.
16:10 "I thought if I came here,
16:12 I would find what I was looking for."
16:14 Number 2. No Special
16:16 Effects, No Problem. Men
16:18 Behind the Sun.
16:20 A movie about the real-life
16:22 torture and human experimentation
16:24 that occurred in a Japanese World War II
16:26 camp was always bound to cause
16:28 some controversy. However,
16:30 its disturbing nature not only stemmed
16:32 from its subject matter, but also
16:34 from how far the production went for the
16:36 sake of realism. Some of its highlights
16:38 are when they set real rats on fire,
16:40 and more famously used a real dead
16:42 body for the autopsy scene.
16:44 Real animals and dead bodies were
16:46 utilized for many of the effects, since
16:48 there was no mainstream special effects
16:50 industry where the movie was made at the time.
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17:10 Number 1. Welcome to the Jungle.
17:14 Cannibal Holocaust.
17:16 It's unbelievable. It's horrible.
17:18 One of the most famous post-production
17:20 scandals in all of film history,
17:22 Cannibal Holocaust took the documentary
17:24 style found footage angle a little
17:26 too far. So much so,
17:28 that director Ruggiero Deodato
17:30 was brought in front of a court on
17:32 murder accusations, and had to
17:34 get his actors to come out of hiding
17:36 to prove that he did not kill them.
17:38 But the creepiness doesn't end there,
17:40 as many still refuse to watch the film
17:42 because of the very fact that the
17:44 film is based on the very real animal
17:46 deaths caught on camera, including
17:48 a detailed butchering of a river turtle.
17:50 Butchering of a river turtle.
17:52 [Music]