This section is not intended for generic trivia - defined here. It is only a placeholder for notable information not yet placed into other sections. When a point has been inserted elsewhere in the page, remove it.
Anderson; Milla Jovovich; Michelle Rodriguez; Jeremy Bolt
Jeremy Bolt appears three times in the film each as different Undead.[1]
The opening scene was one of the first filmed, and inspired Anderson to consult with VFX supervisor Richard Yuricich on creating a tunnel effect that would introduce the audience to the world.[1]
While also playing a scientist, Anna Bolt also appears in the opening kill scenes as one of the staff in the Office.[1]
The inspiration for the elevator scene was an experience Anderson had being in an elevator crash as a child.[1]
The elevator prop could only go up and down several feet. A breakaway floor was installed for the prop to protect actress Indra Ové if she were to hit her head.[1]
Milla Jovovich's agent was against her having any nude scenes during negotiations.[1]
Spence's letter appears differently when Alice sees it compared to the scene where he writes it.[1]
Due to the mansion's significance in WW2 and the Cold War, there is a minefield outside it.[1]
The Alexei-5000 train was based on the escape train from Resident Evil 2.[1]
Milla Jovovich describes her 'motivation' for doing the film as a present to her younger brother.[1]
Due to a misunderstanding by a designer, there were not enough crates to fill the Dining Hall B set. The solution was the move around the 12-15 crates into camera view for each take, and for the view from above a mix of CGI and cardboard cutouts were used.[1]
DoP did a lot of overhead shots to mimic the games, as well as shots of doors being opened. In many cases the same door was re-used for these shoots but re-dressed.[1]
The principal actors did not do any scenes until the second week of shooting as they were at boot camp. The first week instead prioritised the secondary actors, such as those in the opening kills.[1]
Milla Jovovich's first day of filming was the scenes of her being walking outside the Looking Glass House. The following day they did the laser trap scene.[1]
Colin Salmon had to re-do the sequence where he first walks into the laser room as Anderson wanted a good "commando" walk.[1]
In the laser room scene, Milla jokes that One and Rain's characters should be cloned so they can appear in later films.[1]
Colin's gun was re-used by Milla for the original ending sequence.[1]
The One death sequence was inspired by the 1997 movie, Cubed.[1]
Anderson wrote in a number of Alice in Wonderland references for the film and encouraged the actors to learn their roles based on characters in the novels. It was made less blatant in later drafts, though the use of "Alice" entering the Hive (Wonderland) through the Looking Glass House is kept. Spence is the Cheshire Cat because he is a wild card. J.D. was "Tweedle-Dum", Rain is "Tweedle-Dee". Kaplan was the White Rabbit as he was obsessed with time. Anderson forgets who the Mad Hatter is. Matt is the Caterpillar, which is why he is sat on a crate above the other cast members in the Dining Hall B scene.[1]
Most of the Undead were professional dancers who went through a boot camp to get a proper Undead walk.[1]
Jeremy Bolt had to go to boot camp, as he was one of the Undead.[1]
Jeremy Bolt had appeared in several other Anderson works, but was repeatedly cut out of scenes. This film was the first time he made a theatrical appearance.[1]
The Undead screen carrying an axe early on was able to dislocate his foot and pop his shoulder to give an appropriate walk.[1]
Because he played several Undead, Jeremy shaved his hair and got fitter so his characters would look distinct.[1]
In the Dining Hall B fight scene, the stuntman for the burning Undead was set alight some 25 times to get the scene right.[1]
Jeremy Bolt's three different Undead appear in the first Undead fight scene. He is killed twice by the Sanitation Team, and is later one of the Undead which bites J.D. and also bites Rain.[1]
The J.D. death scene is a reference to Day of the Dead.[1]
One of the stunt coordinators, Jaymes Butler, plays the security guard Undead Alice kicks when escaping from the Undead Dog.[1]
The One flashback sequence when Alice realises her power was not scripted but instead added during editing.[1]
Jovovich went through three months of training to do the dog jump kick.[1]
The slow motion shot of Alice first firing a handgun at the Dogs and focusing on the "Umbrella"-branded bullet was going to be cut out of the film.[1]
Anderson points out that Lisa Addison is killed by an "Alice in Wonderland" paperweight.[1]
The Licker and Dog sounds were created by the sound team after playing the games. In the case of the latter, the footsteps are heard before the dogs as happens in the games.[1]
To create the odd sounds near the Red Queen's chamber when being re-activated, wind was blown into the carcasses of chickens.[1]
The laser trap was inspired by a plastic hallway in Goya in Bordeaux which made the room highly reflective.[1]
Jeremy Bolt's girlfriend Janie appears as a Undead biting Kaplan's thigh in the tunnels. Anderson invited her to the shoot when she was meeting up with Bolt, who said they needed to "sex up the Undead". While they got her to put her cleavage on display, she looked too much like the other Undead when it was filmed.[1]
In the scene where Alice jumps from a falling pipe into Eric's arms, Alice wasn't allowed to perform the stunt due to the insurance costs. This was because of the risk the wires would bounce back and wrap around her neck when released.[1]
Joseph May's character, Dr. Blue, re-appears in the utility tunnels and tries to climb up to where Kaplan is, forcing his escape.[1]
Anderson's sister appears twice in the film, the latter instance as the Undead that bites Spence.[1]
When recording the scene where Alice is attacked by the Undead Spence, she actually hit him in the head with the prop ax. He screamed at her, and Anderson later received a complaint from his agent.[1]
The Alice/rabbit flashback was shot as separate sequences and edited together, including Milla by herself.[1]
Because of the sequence where Alice tries to take the handgun away from Spence and falls into the water, Milla made sure to keep herself wet between takes to maintain consistency. The water was repeatedly heated, but there was too much water and it stayed cold.[1]
At the ending as Alice and Matt go through the dining hall, the prop for the case was unavailable and they gave her a cardboard box instead.[1]
Jeremy Bolt played one of the Umbrella scientists, and is the last one punched down by Alice.[1]
Jovovich's production partner, "Chris", played one of the two doctors who work on Alice in the hospital. Chris is the one on the right.[1]
Jovovich designed the hospital gown, which Chris was opposed to.[1]
The Zombie who walks past Alice in the hospital is played by a prop guy. Jeremy wanted to play him but wasn't able to do the walk right.[1]
Alice uses a pin to get out of the hospital as a reference to the lockpick.[1]
Jeremy appeared on the "THE DEAD WALK" newspaper.[1]
DVD commentary with Paul W.S. Anderson and Richard Yuricich.[2]
The extra who plays Spence operating the claw was an expert in using these devices who had to be flown in as no one else could operate the controls.[2]
Anderson spots a continuity gag where the claw operator is wearing a mask when Spence shouldn't.[2]
The shot of the elevator shafts used a model, which was 25ft tall, designed to look 12 storeys at 1:4 scale. The elevators were miniatures, with the dust and wires in CG. The elevator interior was simply done by shaking the camera, rather than having it on a platform.[2]
Anderson had trouble directing the extras who were dying in the Office from Halon gas, as they were pressing too hard at the plastic door.[2]
When Ms. Black/Indra falls down with the elevator, a fake floor was added to cushion her impact due to the risk of injury.[2]
When Milla wakes up in the shower, the camera simply pulled out. During editing it was decided to make it rotate to "look classy".[2] To get her to look like she'd just woken up, a bright light was shone in her eyes to force her iris to contract.[2]
In the sequence where Alice opens the curtains, B-camera material from a carpark at dusk was used.[2]
The moving train and tunnel was a model which was 3ft long at 1:8 scale and ran on a 130ft track.[2] As the actors had to be seein climbing on a moving train, the German special effects crew made a 1:1 train prop made from wood around a metal chassis.[2]
The sequence where One explains who their employer is was done late in production.[2]
The 3D map shots were added in post-production due to concerns the audience wouldn't know where the cast are.[2]
In the flashback sequence where Milla remembers collapsing in the shower, there is a single frame of a crewmember with the clapper board. A camera assistant can also be seen in a shot of the bathtub.[2]
The fake city backdrop in The Hive is a view of San Francisco near the Transamerica building.[2]
Because the elevator shaft was a miniature, Pasquale had to be put on a scaffold 30ft tall so he could drop the flare down.[2]
The set consisting of the flooded lab and adjacent corridor was used for 3 and a half months, as it had to be used on the first week for the opening death scenes, and when the main cast are in the room towards the end of the shoot.[2] One of the first sequences done for this set was the lab workers moving around, as it was essential for the Alice flashback that it be clean. When Milla did the shoot for this same sequence it had already been flooded.[2]
Alice was originally to have a blue dress like Alice in Wonderland, but it was replaced with a red dress in the first week of filming while Jovovich was at boot camp.[2]
An anatomically-accurate headcast of Colin Salmon was produced by the miniatures crew, but to avoid an NC-17 the camera had to start moving away before everything could be seen.[2]
Michaela Dicker was kept around because of a need for the actors to keep in eye-level with the hologram.[2]
The water bursting out of the lab was super-imposed.[2]
Dining Hall B was shot in the basement of a hotel in Berlin.[2]
Each zombie extra had to go to bootcamp for one to two weeks. Some were choreographed to have broken legs.[2]
The Zombie Dog fight was the last scene filmed during principal photography. In the event the production was irrecoverably over-budget, this entire scene was the one to be abandoned.[2]
For close-ups of the dog faces it had to be done in CG.[2]
The dogs were popular on set, and crew would go visit them at lunch time at a section of the stage reserved for them.[2]
One of the dog trainers had a policy of personally replicating the dogs' stunts to determine if it was safe, and demanded he be able to break his head through sugar-glass before allowing the dog actor to do it.[2]
The utility tunnel was a set completely made for the shoot, rather than an existing location. It was designed to be claustrophobic so a Zombies will mass and be unavoidable.[2] For the sequence where Rain pours blood over the Zombies, they removed the top to fit a camera through, while the pipe-walking was using a hidden camera track.
The film was shot in 1.85:1. This was to both make the sets look more claustrophobic and so that the close-ups of characters would only show their faces.[2]
The shot of the Licker running on the wall which plays right after the cast leave the utility tunnels was the work of post-production. The corridor footage used 24 left-over frames of Michelle and Mila walking down a corridor. This equated to 1 second of footage, so the shot had the be slowed down.[2]
The Alice/rabbit flashback was shot as three separate sequences and edited together. [2]
The sequence with the actors in the flooded lab took 2 weeks. Milla had to leave the set between tests to warm herself in a bucket of water.[2]
Because Milla jumped into the water to grab the gun, she had to remain wet the rest of the shoot to maintain continuity. Due to the dress, she couldn't wear stunt pads so every stunt performed, no matter how minor, risked giving her bruises. By the end of the shoot, make-up was being applied to limit her injuries.[2]
The Licker was nicknamed "Clint", named after Clint Eastwood.[2]
In the sequence where Alice and Matt sit down after the dining room had to be altered in post because the film had a scratch through Milla's face.[2]
Eric was able to make his prosthetic injury jiggle when flexing his arm muscles, which enhanced the mutation take.[2]
Milla had to fall off the hospital bed five or six times to get the shot right.[2] They used a real operating theater and corridor of a hospital, and the lights and bed were real.[2]
Milla had to be persuaded to shave her head for the scene; her manager was opposed to it as it may harm her L'Oreal career.[2]
The Toronto tram's electrical wires had to be removed to let the camera pass up.[2]
A member of the production crew, nicknamed "Wesker", was involved in the leaking of photographs of Milla Jovovich and of set-design.[3] This led to at least one crewmember being fired, and a memo being distributed threatening action against other leakers.[4]
