Over the years, movie sets have been troubled by all kinds of issues, from accidental deaths
to devastating fires to vicious animal attacks. But were these films cursed — or just unlucky?
Stanley Kubrick was never known to be an easygoing director, but he really turned
up the heat on The Shining. And while some cast members actually enjoyed making the film,
Shelley Duvall was a different story. Kubrick tortured the actress by keeping her isolated
from the rest of the cast and crew and constantly berating her. Worst of all,
he forced her to perform the hugely intense and draining bat scene 127 times. Unsurprisingly,
this ended up driving Duvall towards a breakdown. After The Shining, Duvall largely retired from
acting, and some wonder if Kubrick's bullying put an early end to her Hollywood career.
However, Duvall's terrible treatment wasn't the only tragedy to befall the movie.
Later in the shoot, a massive fire broke out and destroyed two sound stages, one of which
was the set for that infamous "bat scene." They never found out what started the 11-alarm fire
that was so destructive. Was it faulty equipment, human error… or the work of a certain caretaker?
Even before Twilight Zone: The Movie hit theaters in 1983, it was already one of the most infamous
movies ever made, largely thanks to director John Landis. The movie was split up into four parts,
each helmed by separate directors, and Landis was in charge of a segment called
"Time Out," which follows a bigot played by Vic Morrow. This prejudiced protagonist
is sent to different periods of history, in which he magically morphs into the victims
of discrimination, thus getting a taste of his own racist medicine.
Eventually, Morrow's character winds up in Vietnam, where he tries to
save two Vietnamese children while an enemy helicopter looms overhead. To get the scene,
Landis broke child labor laws by shooting in the middle of the night and letting the kids get near
a number of explosions and pyrotechnic effects. Even though Landis was warned about the dangers,
he went ahead with the scene anyway, allowing the helicopter to fly too close to the explosions.
Tragically, as Morrow carried the children across a river, the chopper was hit by a fiery blast,
and it crashed into the river, landing on top of the actors. All three of them were killed.
This horrible tragedy brought about a number of lawsuits and criminal charges
against the director, but despite his blatant defiance of safety,
Landis was acquitted of accidental manslaughter. The families of Morrow
and the children sued the production, and each case was settled out of court.
Sure, Apocalypse Now is one of the greatest movies ever made, but shooting the film was an absolute
nightmare. The weather was horrible, Martin Sheen had to replace Harvey Keitel after two weeks,
and the cast and crew were constantly battling tropical diseases. On top of that,
the set was just far too realistic. The place was strewn with dead rats and filth,
and the set designer planned on using actual dead bodies as props. Thankfully,
film's producers weren't having it and ordered the corpses hauled off-set.
Making things more complicated, Marlon Brando was obscenely overweight during filming,
didn't know the script, demanded to be shot only in shadow, and wanted to improvise
basically everything. As for Martin Sheen, he had a heart attack, and director Francis Ford
Coppola suffered a seizure… before having a nervous breakdown and allegedly threatening
suicide three times. Luckily, the film was a huge success, cementing Coppola as an all-time legend.
"Smells like… victory."
You wouldn't expect a childhood classic to be the scene of a number of horrifying accidents,
but The Wizard of Oz wasn't always magical on set. The film got off to a bad start when Buddy Ebsen,
the original Tin Man, had to be replaced after the aluminum dust from his makeup coated his lungs,
forcing him to sit in an oxygen tent for two weeks to recover.
And though it wasn't quite as dangerous, Bert Lahr, the Cowardly Lion,
had to wear a 90-pound costume made of real lion skin in 100 degree heat.
Margaret Hamilton, the Wicked Witch, suffered worst of all. Her costume caught on fire after
a stunt went wrong, giving the actress second- and third-degree burns. Complicating things further,
her green makeup was copper-based, which could've made her injuries even worse, so it all had to be
removed with alcohol before she could get proper treatment. Things got even more troublesome
when Hamilton's stunt double suffered burns and scarring on her legs from a surprise explosion.
Several flying monkeys were hurt when their flying wires snapped, and Toto was
injured when an extra stepped on her paw. It's amazing anyone ever made it out of Oz at all.
Looks like God did not approve of the casting of His Son. Jim Caviezel played Jesus in
The Passion of the Christ, and the actor ended up with a lung infection, pneumonia,
and hypothermia during the shoot. His makeup gave him skin infections too, and he generally didn't
enjoy having to wear a crown of thorns on his head while carrying around a 150-pound cross.
But the very worst misfortune came during the Sermon on the Mount. As they were about
to film the scene, Caviezel was straight-up struck by lightning. He later remembered:
"People started screaming,
and they said I had fire on both sides of my head and a light around me."
Crazier still, assistant director Jan Michelini was also struck by lightning
at the same time… having already been struck earlier on in the shoot. Maybe
the Almighty just isn't a fan of Mel Gibson movies.
James Cameron has made many successful blockbusters over the years, but The
Abyss isn't one of them. Earning just $54 million domestically on a $70 million budget,
the failure must have stung even worse considering the shoot was filled with nearly fatal accidents.
The main set of The Abyss was filmed inside an abandoned nuclear reactor — and although there
was no radioactive material on-site, the cast and crew spent hours filming underwater. And it
wasn't fun. For example, Ed Harris filmed a scene in which his helmet fills with water while being
dragged 30 feet down into a tank. When he couldn't hold his breath any longer, a diver waiting nearby
would give him a regulator. Not surprisingly, he nearly drowned during one of his takes.
"Out of breath, no air, and I'm going 'oh, this is great.'"
Scarier still, Cameron got so wrapped up in filming at one point that his oxygen tank ran
out. The director tried to use the underwater PA to call for help, but the nearby cinematographer
couldn't hear him. This gets even worse when you realize Cameron was in a 7.5 million-gallon tank,
35 feet below, trapped in heavy equipment. He managed to get free of the gear, and as he began
swimming to the top, a diver tried to give him some air. Unfortunately, this backup regulator was
broken. Naturally, Cameron tried to break free, but the diver thought he was panicking, so he
continued forcing the regulator in the director's mouth. Only by punching the man that came to save
him and frantically swimming toward the light did James Cameron live to see another day.
The Crow is perhaps best known for the tragic death of its star, Brandon Lee. The son of the
legendary Bruce Lee, Brandon was killed by a lead tip of a dummy bullet that was lodged in the prop
gun. When the blank went off, it shot the tip into Lee's abdomen; he died in hospital 12 hours later.
The fact that Brandon died young and under strange circumstances, just like his father,
set off rumors about the film being cursed. Some also claim Lee's death made the final
cut — but in reality, that footage has been locked away and seen by only a few.
Though nothing else of that magnitude happened during shooting on The Crow, the set was
anything but happy even before the accident. Working through weeks of night shoots with
constant fake rain, the cast and crew were always freezing, and pretty much everyone got sick.
After Lee's passing, however, the cast and crew worked hard to finish
the film so everyone could appreciate the young actor's talent and dedication.
Still one of the scariest movies of all time,
it's not surprising that a bunch of weird stuff happened on the set of The Exorcist.
For example, actor Jack MacGowran plays a character who's thrown down a flight of stairs,
and Ellen Burstyn's character finds out about his death via an assistant director of the film within
the film. In real life, MacGowran suddenly died of the flu, and according to Burstyn,
she heard about his passing from her real-life assistant director. Cue the creepy music.
Of course, this is just the tip of the demonically-possessed iceberg, and MacGowran
was just one of several deaths connected to the film. Max von Sydow's brother died while the
veteran actor was filming, and actress Vasiliki Maliaros passed away before the film was released.
Also, a mysterious fire burned the sets down, causing a two-month delay in shooting.
Stranger still, director William Friedkin discussed the film on The Barry Gray Show,
and the next day, Barry Gray was allegedly hit by a car.
With all that, it's no wonder the crew started to think the real devil was at work.
Noel Marshall was the executive producer on The Exorcist, and it seems like the movie's
demonic curse followed him for quite awhile. A few years after his infamous possession flick,
Marshall and his then-wife, Tippi Hedren, came up with a wild idea for a film.
Since Hedren was known for her fondness of animals and even kept lions as pets for her two children,
the couple thought it would be a great idea to make a movie with a bunch of killer cats.
As you've probably guessed, this didn't go well. The lions were all fine, but the humans took quite
a beating. A staggering 70 people were injured while making the film, including Melanie Griffith,
Hedren's daughter, who needed 100 stitches and facial reconstructive surgery thanks to one
particular feline friend. Cinematographer Jan de Bont had most of his scalp removed by a lion too,
and Marshall was attacked so often that he ended up hospitalized for gangrene.
"He's crazy. He was crazy."
Oh, and Hedren got gangrene,
too — something she only realized when visiting Marshall in the hospital.
And, after all that trouble, the film grossed only $2 million at the box office. That's gotta hurt.
Dealing with the devil is a dangerous game, and The Omen is possibly the most cursed film
of all. Producer Harvey Bernhard felt the film might be risky even at the time, and later said:
"The devil was at work, and he didn't want that film made."
Before the shoot began, Gregory Peck's son took his own life. Shortly afterward, two planes
carrying cast and crew were reportedly struck by lightning, and things got especially creepy when
the trainer in charge of the baboons was killed by a tiger a day after the monkey attack sequence.
Despite all this weirdness, the film was released in the UK to critical acclaim.
But a few months later, a special effects artist who worked on the decapitation scene
was involved in a terrible car wreck, and while he survived, his passenger didn't. In fact,
she was decapitated. According to some unverified accounts of the accident,
it even took place near the town of Ommen, right by a sign that read, "66.6 kilometers."
On top of all that, stuntman Alf Joint was injured while working on World War
II film soon after performing a jump on The Omen. Even the 2006 remake wasn't safe from
Satan's handiwork. According to director John Moore, all the footage of a scene
in which Damien's true nature is revealed mysteriously disappeared. Moore later said:
"Occasionally, you lose a shot. Maybe a roll. We lost 13,500 feet of film."
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