Trivia: The "kitchen utensil" scene between Bill Murray and PJ Soles was completely improvised.
Trivia: Throughout the film there are several references to a character named Horseflesh, (such as "Horseflesh would never get us into this mess"). Despite the character being credited at the end of the movie he's never properly shown onscreen. There's a paragraph devoted to him in the published "Time Bandits" screenplay: "The trouble is quite frankly that if Horseflesh had been in it he would have made seven dwarves, and we'd have libel suits from Disney and all sorts of things. But we liked the name, so he remains the mystery dwarf." According to the interview with Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam on the extras DVD (produced in 2002), Terry Gilliam states that Horseflesh is the dwarf seen with Evil, though it isn't mentioned who he is; in the original script he had quite a few lines, but they were cut, eg "The map! Evil one, the very map I promised you, is yours" (from script excerpt shown on DVD).
Trivia: During the rosebush/tree chopping scene, Faye Dunaway is chopping the tree, except when you see the close up. During the close up (when the tree falls), it is actually the films director Frank Perry chopping the tree.
Trivia: Scanners is identified as having the first known media depiction of psychic activity directly or indirectly causing nosebleed. This concept has since become widespread in movies, television, and comic books/graphic novels.
Trivia: When Betty and Ollie are talking in their office (and Ralph and Macy come in), look carefully at the table all the way to the left. There's an issue of Time Magazine that says "Cult Classics," with a picture of The Rocky Horror Picture Show's famous red lips. (That film was the predecessor to Shock Treatment).
Trivia: During Evelyn's silent movie shoot on the beach, there's a brief close-up of a scruffy pirate. He's played by Jack Nicholson in an uncredited cameo.
Trivia: Sylvester Stallone broke one of his fingers in an attempt to save a penalty from Pele.
Trivia: Producer/screenwriter/director John Boorman deliberately chose renowned stage actors Nicol Williamson and Helen Mirren to play the sorcerer Merlin and the sorceress Morgana, knowing very well that Williamson and Mirren hated each other in real life (because of a disastrous stage production of Macbeth they worked on, years earlier). Boorman anticipated real friction, tension and anger between the two actors, which was the effect he wanted onscreen. On the contrary, the experience of working together in "Excalibur" completely changed Nicol Williamson and Helen Mirren into the best of friends.
Trivia: One year prior to this, Tom Savini worked on the special effects for the first Friday the 13th film. Savini was approached to return for the second film but turned it down as he felt it shouldn't have a sequel and disliked the idea of Jason being revealed to still be alive and becoming the new killer. He elected to work on this film instead.
Trivia: The poster, which shows a guy getting stabbed through the mouth with a shish kebab, talks about a few of the kills that happen in the movie; however, it gets a couple of the victims' names wrong. It says, "John will never eat shish kebab again. Steven will never ride a motorcycle again." In reality, in the movie, Steven is the guy who is killed with a shish kebab, while the guy who is killed with his motorcycle is named Etienne.
Trivia: John Waters' first film to receive an R-rating. All of his prior films were either released unrated, or were rated X.
Trivia: This was the only Brady reunion movie/TV show to feature the full original cast. Each of the girls was replaced by a different actress in all other reunions. The Brady Bunch Variety Hour (1976) had a different "Jan", A Very Brady Christmas (1988) had a different "Cindy", and The Bradys (1990) had a different "Marcia."
Trivia: Henry Fonda won the Best Actor Academy Award for his role of Norman Thayer. At the age of 76, Fonda became the oldest winner in the Best Actor category in Academy history (his record was broken in 2021 by Anthony Hopkins, who won at 83).
Trivia: Maureen Stapleton won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Emma Goldman, even though she only has nine minutes of screen time.
