Sci-Fi Movies That Pushed Things Too Far On Set
A lot of blood, sweat, and tears go into making a great sci-fi movie — and, every so often, a production comes along that takes things way too far.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00 A lot of blood, sweat, and tears go into making a great sci-fi movie, and every so often,
00:05 a production comes along that takes things way too far.
00:09 Fans rejoiced in the early 1980s at the news of a big-screen adaptation of The Twilight
00:13 Zone. Twilight Zone the movie brought together Steven Spielberg, John Landis, George Miller,
00:18 and Joe Dante, each of whom directed a segment of The Greater Whole. Three stories remade
00:22 episodes of Rod Serling's show, but Landis' portion, Time Out, was only partially based
00:26 on an original episode. It also led to one of Hollywood's worst on-set catastrophes.
00:31 This 1982 production was rife with questionable decisions. Renée Shin-Yi Chen and Mika Dinley,
00:36 the child stars in Time Out, worked illegally, as child labor laws forbade kids from working
00:41 late at night. Even worse, live ammunition was used for the segment's action sequences.
00:47 Disaster finally struck on the shoots last night. During one scene, Vic Morrow's character
00:51 was to rescue Shin-Yi Chen and Dinley's characters from an air raid. All three were supposed
00:55 to escape safely from a pursuing helicopter. However, on-set pyrotechnics caused the pilot
00:59 to lose control of his aircraft, and it crashed into the three actors, killing them instantly.
01:04 "It was all over. We just started spinning, went around in circles about one and a half
01:07 times or something, and crashed into the riverbed."
01:09 Landis and four other crew members were subsequently charged with involuntary manslaughter. Remarkably,
01:14 all five were later acquitted.
01:17 James Cameron's 1989 sci-fi classic The Abyss follows a group of petroleum engineers as
01:21 they assist Navy SEALs on a top-secret mission. As they plunge 2,000 feet underwater to reach
01:26 a nuclear sub, the team encounters aquatic aliens. How was all this filmed? Well, Cameron
01:31 located an abandoned nuclear power plant in South Carolina. The crew filled the primary
01:35 reactor containment vessel with 7.5 million gallons of water and used that for filming.
01:40 Cameron shot just under half the movie underwater, meaning the cast and crew had to undergo a
01:44 rigorous diving program. In addition to 70-hour work weeks, filming lasted a total of six
01:49 months.
01:50 The stars Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio later recalled their respective meltdowns,
01:54 with Harris telling Entertainment Weekly,
01:56 "We were guinea pigs."
01:57 The director nearly plunged into his own abyss during production, too. One day, the first
02:01 AD suddenly left the set while Cameron was working at the bottom of the tank. As he began
02:05 to run out of oxygen, Cameron removed his gear and attempted to surface. A safety diver
02:09 noticed his predicament and provided Cameron with a breathing regulator, but instead of
02:13 air, Cameron took in water. After the diver misunderstood the filmmaker's panic and refused
02:18 to let go, Cameron punched him in the face and swam to safety.
02:21 Charlize Theron is no stranger to performing physical feats. This South African-born star
02:26 did 98 percent of her own stunts seen in Atomic Blonde. Her turn as Andy in The Old Guard
02:30 was more than impressive, and she even survived the hellish production of Mad Max Fury Road.
02:36 Even before these roles, Theron was involved in an on-set accident that would have made
02:39 most actors swear off stunt work forever.
02:42 In 2005, director Karen Kusama adapted the beloved animated TV series Eon Flux to the
02:47 big screen. Theron played the titular character in the live-action sci-fi film, completing
02:51 most of the fight scenes herself. Shockingly, one backflip resulted in Theron landing on
02:55 her neck, almost paralyzing her. Production ceased for eight weeks while Theron recovered.
03:00 During a chat with News.com.au in 2017, Theron described her mishap as a "freak accident."
03:06 She explained,
03:07 "I had eight years of pain management, where I just couldn't get rid of the spasms and
03:10 the nerve damage."
03:11 Given Theron's continued stunt work over the years, her passion for her craft is evident.
03:16 At the very least, it's good to know that her mishap on Eon Flux didn't put her off.
03:20 Besides enduring themes and a hugely endearing cast, the Back to the Future franchise also
03:25 includes a number of high-tech gadgets, many of which require some intricate stunt work.
03:29 Back to the Future Part II introduced the series' iconic hoverboards, for example. Director
03:33 Robert Zemeckis hired a professional stunt team, including Cheryl Wheeler-Dixon, to perform
03:37 numerous airborne acrobatics for the second movie. The original stunt double, playing
03:41 Griff's female gang member, had backed out over safety concerns, prompting Wheeler-Dixon
03:44 to step in. For the hoverboard chase scene, Griff and his posse burst through the Hill
03:48 Valley Courthouse mall window, and it was this stunt that nearly killed Wheeler-Dixon.
03:52 "Hey, Scott!"
03:54 Four performers were wired to a crane that swung them through the window. Once inside,
03:58 a crew member would press a button to cut the wires, dropping them onto airbags. They
04:01 were strapped in and sent flying after a few last-minute, unrehearsed changes. Notably,
04:05 Greg Tippy, the special effects member responsible for pushing the button, changed his vantage
04:09 point.
04:10 As the scene unfolded, Wheeler-Dixon realized she had swerved off course and crashed into
04:15 a pillar. Tippy didn't see the accident, however, and pressed his button, and Wheeler-Dixon
04:19 crashed into the concrete. Despite suffering severe injuries, she survived. Her doctor
04:24 later told her that, had she fallen backwards, she might not have been so lucky.
04:28 You might assume that, after the horrific accident that left Cheryl Wheeler-Dixon hospitalized
04:32 in Back to the Future Part II, the crew for the trilogy's final installment would ensure
04:36 that everything ran smoothly. But you'd be wrong. In fact, this 1990s sci-fi western
04:42 almost claimed the life of its leading man.
04:44 Back to the Future Part III teleported Marty McFly to 1885 to save Doc Brown from a grisly
04:49 fate. Upon arriving, Biff Tannen's great-grandfather, Buford, attempts to hang our hero. While Doc
04:54 comes to the rescue in the movie, it was filmmaker Robert Zemeckis who saved Fox in this near-fatal
04:59 stunt. In Fox's memoir, Lucky Man, he remembers that he initially stood on a wooden box to
05:03 perform the trick for the close-up shot. Fox felt the method lacked realism, so he proposed
05:08 that he try the stunt without the box. Having practiced holding his hands between his neck
05:13 and the rope to allow room to breathe, Fox was ready for the real deal. The actor wrote,
05:17 "On the third, I miscalculated the positioning of my hand. Noose around my neck, dangling
05:22 from the gallows pole, my carotid artery was blocked, causing me briefly to pass out."
05:26 Luckily, Zemeckis saw Fox was unconscious and rushed to help him. Without the director's
05:30 quick intervention, Fox could have suffered a severe brain injury, or even been killed
05:34 outright.
05:36 Everyone knows that David Lynch's 1984 adaptation of Dune bombed.
05:39 "I must not fear. Fear is the mind killer."
05:43 Calling it a big failure in an interview years later, the filmmaker revealed his main takeaway
05:47 from the project when he said,
05:48 "Don't make a film if it can't be the film you want to make. It's a joke and a sick joke,
05:53 and it'll kill you."
05:54 While Lynch is still alive and well today, Dune certainly left actor Jurgen Proch now
05:58 with a few scars of the physical variety. In one scene, Prochnow's character, Duke Leto
06:02 Atreides, attempts to assassinate Baron Harkonnen using a tooth implant filled with poison gas.
06:07 Leto dies in the attempt, and the Baron escapes. Subsequently, the Duke's son, Paul, has a
06:12 vision of his father's death. The Baron tears Leto's cheek in the dream, releasing green
06:16 gas.
06:17 Prochnow had a fake cheek attached to a tube to achieve this special effect. An off-camera
06:20 crew member then pumped smoke that surfaced from the cheek. Testing on both a dummy and
06:24 Prochnow, everything appeared safe. When filming started and gas was emitted, however, Prochnow
06:29 jumped up and ran off-camera holding his smoking cheek. The makeup used over the fake cheek
06:34 wasn't sealed properly, allowing smoke and heat to build up before Macmillan ripped it
06:38 open. Prochnow sustained second and first-degree burns from the accident.
06:42 1995's Waterworld endured a nightmarish production. The Kevin Reynolds-directed flick originally
06:47 had a $65 million budget, which soared to $175 million during the shoot. While script
06:53 rewrites and production delays plagued the sci-fi set, Mother Nature emerged as the crew's
06:57 primary foe. You see, Waterworld unfolds in 2500, when every continent is submerged underwater.
07:03 It was, therefore, shot entirely on water.
07:06 The unpredictable weather caused many complications. In addition to relentless jellyfish stings,
07:10 much of the cast and crew suffered from seasickness, and Kevin Costner almost drowned when he was
07:14 strapped to a trimaran's mast for one scene. During a sudden storm, water violently pelted
07:19 the actor for half an hour while crew members looked on helplessly. Co-stars Gene Triplehorn
07:23 and Tina Mazzarino fared no better. They were hurled overboard when the bowsprit on their
07:27 trimaran snapped, prompting a rescue team to dive in after them. In 2009, Triplehorn
07:31 reflected, "In retrospect, I realize it made me reluctant about films."
07:36 Some folks couldn't even last that long. The assistant director, special effects designer,
07:40 and other crew members all agreed that this sinking ship wasn't worth their salt, and
07:43 promptly quit.
07:44 The forgotten Italian sci-fi film Hands of Steel easily falls into the "so bad it's good"
07:50 category. Directed by Sergio Martino and released in 1986, Hands of Steel stars Daniel Green
07:55 and John Saxon. In the movie, Earth is a wasteland, and an evil industrialist sends a cyborg to
08:00 kill the leader of an ecological faction. In what ends up being a cheap imitation of
08:04 The Terminator, we discover that our antihero has a heart after all.
08:07 Hands of Steel ranks as a fine Italian exploitation flick, but one marred by tragedy. Filming
08:12 near the Glen Canyon Dam in northern Arizona resulted in two fatalities. In one scene,
08:17 a helicopter shoots a machine gun at an actor on the Navajo Bridge, but the chopper with
08:20 actor Claudio Cassanelli in it hit the bridge. Falling 400 feet, both the pilot and Cassanelli
08:26 were killed.
08:27 James Cameron got his A-list break with The Terminator, so maybe a sequel was always inevitable.
08:32 "I'll be back."
08:34 Many would argue that the original boasts a tighter story, but Terminator 2 Judgment Day
08:38 made waves with its groundbreaking visual effects. In addition to the CGI, T2 featured
08:43 daring practical effects and stunt work. However, some of the film's most thrilling sequences
08:47 put its stars at risk. Linda Hamilton, who plays Sarah Connor, suffered permanent hearing
08:52 loss in one ear during production. Hamilton forgot her earplugs while shooting the hospital
08:56 elevator scene, and intense noise caused the actor to drop to the ground when the T-800
09:00 fired a gun. Hamilton also claimed that the film's heavy use of gunfire and noise even
09:04 left her with shell shock. Arnold Schwarzenegger faced challenges, too. For his now-legendary
09:08 shotgun twirl, Cameron and his crew crafted a modified prop gun with an enlarged lever.
09:13 At one point, though, Schwarzenegger accidentally picked up the wrong weapon, performed the
09:16 stunt, and nearly broke three fingers as a result.
09:20 Following the success of 1988's Bloodsport, Canon Films tapped Jean-Claude Van Damme to
09:24 star in Cyborg, their then-upcoming cyberpunk martial arts film. Described by Roger Ebert
09:28 as a low-budget mix of Escape from New York and The Road Warrior, the 1989 movie tanked.
09:33 The film proved so middling, in fact, that even its star found himself unimpressed, later
09:37 telling the Chicago Tribune that he is no fan of it.
09:40 The actor plays mercenary Gibson Rickenbacker, a man who is hired to transport cyborg Pearl
09:44 Prophet from New York to the CDC in Atlanta as she holds the cure for humanity. A martial
09:49 arts and kickboxing expert, the muscles from Russell's displayed his skills fighting baddies
09:53 in the movie. However, he also may have pushed things too far during one fight sequence.
09:57 In a scene where he fought a group of pirates, Van Damme accidentally struck stuntman Jackson
10:01 Pinckney with a prop knife. Pinckney lost sight in one eye, which led to his discharge
10:05 from the military. Subsequently, he sued Van Damme for $800,000 plus punitive damages.
10:11 Pinckney claimed Van Damme caused the accident by recklessly trying to make the fight as
10:14 realistic as possible. The action star denied this. He told the jury,
10:18 "I never meant to hurt anybody in my entire life. I felt very sorry. I felt mentally distraught."
10:24 Pinckney ultimately received $487,500 in damages.
10:28 [MUSIC]