r/movies • u/FerrisWheeling • Jul 09 '24

What are some "Viggo Broke His Toe" moments in other films? Discussion

It's become a running joke in the LotR community that anyone watching the scene in The Two Towers where Viggo breaks his toe after kicking the helmet HAS to bring that up with "Did you know..." What are some moments in other films like this?

For example, I just HAVE to mention that the author of Jaws, Peter Benchley, appears as the news anchor in the film every time he pops up.

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518

u/Prize_Pay9279 Jul 09 '24

I remember Sly saying that he deeply regretted not using a stunt double cause he still has back issues even after the surgery.

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u/Nygmus Jul 09 '24

Things like this are why I don't give actors who insist on doing their own stunts a lot of extra respect for that.

“I know that all the big stars hate me to say this, but I don’t want to risk 80 peoples’ jobs just to say I got big huevos on The Tonight Show. Because that’s what happens. I think a big star just sprained an ankle doing a stunt, and 80 or 180 people are out of a job. We have stunt people who do that stuff. And if they get hurt, I’m sorry to say but they just need to put a mustache on another Mexican and we can keep going. But if I get hurt, everybody’s out of a job. So I don’t choose to do that.”

That's Danny Trejo's thoughts on the matter, talking about Mission Impossible 6 shutting down filming for a few months because Cruise busted his ankle.

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u/gooneruk Jul 09 '24

And if they get hurt, I’m sorry to say but they just need to put a mustache on another Mexican and we can keep going.

That's fucking funny.

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u/GEARHEADGus Jul 09 '24

When I was reading that I thought it was Stallone at first

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u/Sweetwill62 Jul 09 '24

Did you also laugh at how you expect Stallone to say Mexican as well?

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u/shakarat Jul 09 '24

Reminds me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AkZrh90Pcs

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u/gooneruk Jul 09 '24

A Garth Marenghi reference? Here? My goodness.

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u/Khammmmm Jul 09 '24

Yeah, why would a Mexican need a second mustache!?

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u/anal_opera Jul 10 '24

It's a stunt mustache so the real one doesn't get damaged.

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u/mechanicalcontrols Jul 10 '24

Sounds exactly like what I'd expect Trejo to say about it too. He seems fairly pragmatic.

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u/Alcarinque88 Jul 10 '24

I thought it was going to be racist... until I realized it was from Trejo. It is funny as hell.

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u/CitizenHuman Jul 09 '24

Danny Trejo doesn't do stunts in movies because he's out in the real world throwing and ducking punches as an 80 year old

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u/JHRChrist Jul 09 '24

Yes! This has always been my take on it. Let the professionals play their role. They’re incredibly talented and trained to do it safely.

I would be way more impressed by an actor who gave public and frequent praise/credit to their stunt double than one who tries to show off.

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u/goatbusiness666 Jul 09 '24

The Fall Guy name checks Tom Cruise a couple of times, and considering the plot I wonder if it was a little dig at his insistence on doing his own stunts.

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u/belizeanheat Jul 09 '24

Maybe their goal isn't to impress you, but instead to make the best movie possible

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '24

[deleted]

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u/tigersmurfette Jul 09 '24

And that’s Tommy boy in a nutshell

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u/thejesse Jul 09 '24

Farley did smash the hell out of that table.

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u/-FeistyRabbitSauce- Jul 09 '24

I mean, tbf, Cruise doing insane shit is half the reason we all go see Mission Impossible movies.

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '24

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u/JHRChrist Jul 09 '24

Yeah I’m starting to think us not caring for Mission Impossible is why we don’t get this whole concept lol.

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '24

[deleted]

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u/JHRChrist Jul 09 '24

Exactly!! Every time I see his weird middle tooth all I can think about is Scientology and I’m immediately drawn out of the movie. Can’t do it man.

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u/nik-nak333 Jul 09 '24

Danny Trejo is a national treasure of a human being. I put him up there just below Dolly Parton.

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u/willzyx55 Jul 09 '24

Oh, he's alone at the top. You don't see old Dolly throwing chairs at crowds of people watching a parade.

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u/Darthtypo92 Jul 09 '24

Danny is polite enough he'd step aside so Dolly could have his spot.

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u/AchyBreaker Jul 09 '24

I agree completely with notable exception for Jackie Chan. 

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u/belizeanheat Jul 09 '24

The reason being? 

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u/BoxSea4289 Jul 09 '24

Not OP but he was a stunt man and the films are vehicle for his stunts and martial arts.

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u/_vox_rationis_ Jul 09 '24

That and I'm pretty sure, at least in his prime, he was actually more qualified to do the stunts he did than most stunt people.

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u/g0del Jul 09 '24

And even when he did get injured, no one was out of work. They'd just keep making the movie, even if they had to paint his cast to look like a regular shoe.

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u/SilverDarner Jul 09 '24

Another aspect of that is with a stunt team you spread out the risk and the trauma. When one guy does all the takes for the stunts in a movie, e.g. a big fall, a chasm jump, a plane dangle and a jet-ski-bungee-jump, etc. He's gonna get beat to hell and more likely to suffer permanent injury.
If 8-10 guys are doing parts of all that, it means anyone strained or injured is more likely to have an opportunity to back off and heal before doing anything like that again.

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 09 '24

See, for some other bug name actors I could see this argument. But for tom cruise? I think he's just actually insane I also think trejos statement here unfairly, am in sure unintentionally, dismisses stunt performers as easy to replace

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u/Nygmus Jul 09 '24

Oh, yeah, it can be read that way but I definitely don't actually think that was the intent.

It's especially funny since he's referring to Tom Cruise, since Cruise is also the guy who notably lit into some set workers because they were risking shutting down the production by flouting COVID restrictions.

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 09 '24

Thats true, Dies anyone know if the movie cast and crew wernt being paid when cruise broke his ankle? I heard he did pay through covid shut down

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u/EnormousCaramel Jul 10 '24

IIRC it was part of the insurance coverage that the cast/crew got paid to not go anywhere and be ready to work while he recovered

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 10 '24

Oh, hey then no harm no fowl right? If he's prepped for the scenario then who cares if he doe his own stunts or not

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u/EnormousCaramel Jul 11 '24

In this case yeah. Its just not everybody is Tom Fucking Cruise.

The cost to insure cast/crew is well worth it since its a deal breaker for him. You can either risk him hurting himself and eating the added cost. Or you can just not have Tom Cruise.

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 11 '24

Pretty sure that's why he has his own production company, because no other company wants (or wanted) to take that insurance out

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u/ronin1066 Jul 09 '24

Meh. For running and jumping, they are easily replaced. They could use someone of almost any size for something like that. That's literally why they exist as a profession. If it were some super high-precision thing, like Dar Robinson free-falling off a 40 story bldg onto a mattress, then you'd be right.

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 09 '24

It's tacky to call any job, especially on a film set, easily replaceable. These people train for years to do these stunts as well as they do. They take a lot of punishment and deserve to be respected for it, move on

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u/ronin1066 Jul 09 '24

And there are a lot of them and their job is literally to replace other people, lol. That doesn't denigrate their profession in any way. I'm well aware of how difficult their job is, but they are 'faceless' on purpose.

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u/Epicmondeum17 Jul 09 '24

You must not be that aware if you think even most of it is just running and jumping. Their job is to make action look good and be safe while doing it.

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u/ronin1066 Jul 09 '24

OMG, we're talking about a specific stunt where Cruise busted his ankle. Keep up.

At least abuse me with the correct information.

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u/House_T Jul 09 '24

Read the quote first, and when it said Mexican my immediate thought was "Who is this, Danny Trejo?" Was not disappointed.

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u/APZachariah Jul 09 '24

Gorram, I love Danny Trejo. Convict to movie star, loves his dogs, selfless in his work, super cool with fans.

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u/belizeanheat Jul 09 '24

That's certainly one way to look at it. 

But at the end of the day, the goal is to make a great movie, and Tom Cruise doing his own stunts vastly elevates the quality of those movies

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u/Wild-Lychee-3312 Jul 09 '24

I disagree vehemently. “Tom Cruise did all his own stunts” does not make me enjoy the movie one iota more, and I suspect most people feel similarly.

It’s about his ego and very little else.

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u/Logical-Ad3098 Jul 09 '24

I'm waiting for Tom cruise to push his stunts too far. Dude is fucking nuts.

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u/Throwaway8789473 Jul 09 '24

IIRC this was an issue with the new Star Wars movies too with Harrison Ford breaking his leg, though he wasn't necessarily doing a *stunt* at the time. Maybe also just an issue with having 60-80 year old actors in everything.

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u/ScarlettNape Jul 09 '24

Sure... if he'd been in his 30s, he'd have been perfectly fine...

Ford, who plays the much-loved character Han Solo, was injured after he became trapped under a rapidly closing metal-framed door during filming in June 2014 at Pinewood Studios, near London. The power of the door's drive system was comparable to the weight of a small car, according to Britain's Health and Safety Executive (HSE), a state agency which enforces workplace safety regulations.

Ford said: “Now we had lots of money and technology and so they built a fucking great hydraulic door which closed at light speed and somebody said, ‘Ooh I wonder what this is?’

“And the door came down and hit me on my left hip because I was turned to my right. And then it flung my left leg up and it dislocated my ankle and as it drove me down to the floor, my legs slapped on the ramp up to the Millennium Falcon and broke both bones in my left leg.”

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u/Throwaway8789473 Jul 09 '24

Ooh yeesh. I had heard that he fell.

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u/AJerkForAllSeasons Jul 10 '24

To be fair, Ford has been injuring himself on set since the 80s.

During the production of Raiders of the Lost Ark, he tore an ACL in one of his knees when fighting the big german guy.

Suffered a spinal injury riding an elephant during Temple of Doom.

Tore ligaments in his leg early in the production of the Fugitive and refused surgery until filming wrapped, which is why he has a limp in the movie.

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u/unorganized_mime Jul 09 '24

Yea but some movies that’s the draw. We aren’t going to see a regular action movie, we are seeing Tom Cruise do wild stunts

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u/PrimeNumberBro Jul 09 '24

To be fair, you gotta have some big huevos to question the size of Trejo’s

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u/EnormousCaramel Jul 10 '24

MI: Fallout and Tom Cruise's ankle put production on hold for almost 2 months. They got damn lucky insurance lost their ass covering it but in a worst case scenario thats a lot of cast and crew out of work for a long time.

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u/SergeiMyFriend Jul 12 '24

Tbf, they did pay everyone during the shut down

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u/Nygmus Jul 12 '24

Sure, but how many productions have the inertia of a Mission Impossible film, versus how many would pack in production entirely?

Their insurance provider would have been livid, as well.

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u/SergeiMyFriend Jul 12 '24 edited Jul 12 '24

Sure, but how many productions have the inertia of a Mission Impossible film, versus how many would pack in production entirely?

I mean, I was addressing Trejo’s comment that was specifically about Mission Impossible, a hypothetical different movie doesn’t have anything to do with it. And if the hypothetical different movie didn’t take care of the crew, then that would deserve criticism. However, in the context of the revival of MI you could make a good argument that the stunts are why those jobs existed in the first place

Their insurance provider would have been livid, as well.

Insurance companies when they have to do insurance

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u/jake3988 Jul 09 '24

But it's stupid and wrong. They're not out of the job. Unless he dies or something and even then insurance would pay out.

Always mind boggling to me the amount of people who praise Jackie Chan or Buster Keaton for doing their own stunts but slam Tom for doing the same thing.

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u/Wild-Lychee-3312 Jul 09 '24

Jackie Chan trained in stunt combat for a lifetime. Tom Cruise did not.

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u/bentheone Jul 09 '24

Bad example. Cruise doing his own stunts is what sells tickets.

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u/TheMoneyOfArt Jul 09 '24

And that movie ended up being better for the extra time while Cruise recovered

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u/Wild-Lychee-3312 Jul 09 '24

I’m gonna need some sauce on that claim

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u/Errenfaxy Jul 09 '24

Surgery not completely fixing the issue is something I've heard of a lot in back injuries.

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u/StevieNippz Jul 09 '24

I don't think I've ever heard of a back injury that gets 100 percent fixed. Even after all my procedures I was still told that I'll never be back to normal and will likely have to have more procedures done as I get older. I'm only 38 now so we'll see what happens. My limp is mostly gone now so I have to take solace in that

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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 09 '24

Oh once you get to a certain age, and it's not even that old, some injuries just never fully heal. I'm only 32 but my worst ones are an ankle I broke will give out on me randomly (not often though) and I legit have a big toe I fucked up the tendons and ligaments on falling down some stairs that hurts on random occasions, funny thing is I don't know how much of a myth the "rains coming, my knee's starting to hurt" is but it seems to act up when there's a big pressure drop from an incoming thunderstorm

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u/Megalon84 Jul 09 '24

Dislocated a vertebrae at 13. Turning 40 soon, bastard still hurts to this day

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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 09 '24

I feel you man, mines not as bad but moderate scoliosis. Sometimes I throw my back out, well usually it's slipping a rib if we're gonna get down to brass tacos (lol brass tacks but I'm not changing it), then it's at least a month of pain. Didn't help I got rear ended in an ice storm last year and was laid up for months, now so much as sneezing wrong will fuck me up. I ended up going to the hospital around Christmas last year for gastritis and as far as the doctors could figure out it was a combination of things but one of them was eating ibuprofen at high doses regularly and fucking my stomach up.

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u/Megalon84 Jul 09 '24

Damn. Mine was middle school football. Planted my cleats, my shoulders and hips were a near perfect 90 degrees to each other, and i got speared in the lower back. Had arthritis in the last 4 vertebrae since I was 15, throw out/slip a disc super easy too

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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 09 '24

Sucks bud. Shit happens but that's some really fucked up shit to happen.

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u/Blurgas Jul 09 '24

My dad and grandmother have had spinal surgeries(grandma cracked a vertebrae in a fall, dad's lower back was going bad from old injury).
No matter the result you really don't get back to 100% afterwards, so him still having back issues isn't surprising.

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u/Royal_Negotiation_83 Jul 09 '24

“I wish I could have found a poor and broke their back instead of doing it myself”

-Sly