Coca-Cola approved the use of the Polar Bear ads for its product in the movie without having a full idea of what the movie was about; when the Board of Directors saw the finished product, they were furious.
During filming, Juliette Lewis actually broke Tom Sizemore's nose when she slammed Scagnetti's face into the wall.
Trent Reznor watched the film over 50 times to "get in the mood" for mixing the soundtrack.
Over 150 rattlesnakes, both real and fake, were used for the scene when Mickey and Mallory tread through the snake field. Initially there were concerns that the actors would being working too close to so many venomous snakes. But since the scene was filmed at night (when temperatures in the desert are significantly cooler), and since snakes (like all cold-blooded animals) are very sluggish in colder temperatures, most of the rattlesnakes slept through the filming of the scene.
The prison riot was filmed at Stateville Correctional Center in Joliet, Illinois. 80% of the prisoners there are there for violent crimes. For the first two of four weeks on location, the extras were actual inmates with rubber weapons. For the other two weeks, over 200 extras had to be brought in because the Stateville inmates had been placed on lockdown.
Robert Downey Jr. spent time with Australian TV shock-king Steve Dunleavy to prepare for the role of Wayne Gale, and when he came back with an Australian accent, the filmmakers decided to go with it and Gale became an Australian.
Quentin Tarantino claimed to hate the final version of the film, up until meeting Johnny Cash in an elevator once. Cash told Tarantino that both he and his wife June were fans of his and that they especially liked Natural Born Killers.
According to director Oliver Stone, actor Rodney Dangerfield didn't understand the film during shooting and didn't understand what Stone was trying to do by shooting such a dark subject as a father molesting his daughter in the style of a 1950s sitcom. As such, he found it very difficult to perform his part. However, Stone was delighted that when the film came out, Dangerfield's performance was hailed as one of the movie's strongest points.
During filming, director Oliver Stone would play African tribal music at full blast on the set, as a way of keeping a frantic mood.
The color green is used to indicate the sickness in Mickey's mind and shows up prominently several times during the film: the key lime pie at the diner, the green neon at the drugstore, the green room in the prison.
Director Oliver Stone calls the frequent cuts to black and white, where dialogue is often repeated with a slightly different intonation, "vertical cutting". Stone explains that the idea behind the technique is to create an outer moment (the color footage) and an inner moment (the black and white footage) at the same time. For example, he explains this in relation to the waitress in the opening scene (O-Lan Jones), who whilst taking Mickey's order in the 'outer' scene is actually flirting with him (or thinking about flirting with him) in the 'inner' scene. Also in the opening scene, when the cowboy ('James Gammon') refers to Mallory as "pussy", there is a flash cut to Mickey covered in blood; this is Mickey's 'inner' moment.
In an infamous incident after the film had been released, Oliver Stone and Time Warner were sued by Patsy Byers, with the support of author and film producer John Grisham. In March 1995, 18-year-old Sarah Edmondson and her boyfriend Benjamin Darras (also 18) allegedly dropped acid and watched 'Natural Born Killers'. Later that night, Sarah shot and paralyzed Byers, a store clerk in Ponchatoula, and Benjamin killed cotton gin manager William Savage in Hernando, Mississippi. John Grisham was a personal friend of Savage's, and after the murder, Grisham publicly accused Oliver Stone of being irresponsible in making the film, arguing that filmmakers should be held accountable for their work when it incites violent behavior. Byers decided to take legal action against Stone and the studio, and supported by Grisham, she used a "product liability" claim in the lawsuit, which argued that Stone had incited the teenagers to commit the crime. Initially, the case was dismissed in January 1997, on the grounds that filmmakers and production companies are protected by the First Amendment. However, in May 1998, the Intermediate Louisiana Court of Appeals overturned the lower court's decision, and the case went ahead. The attorneys for Byers' attempted to prove that Stone and Warner were culpable in the murder and in Byers injury because they had purposefully meant to incite violence by "distributing a film they knew, or should have known would cause and inspire people to commit crimes". All of Hollywood eagerly awaited the outcome of the trial, because if Stone was found guilty, it would mean a drastic reexamination of the industry practices and would carry all kinds of far reaching implications as regards the content of movies. However, in a landmark decision, Byers' action was thrown out of court in March 2001, and its dismissal was rubber-stamped by the Louisiana Court of Appeal in June 2002.
In the mess hall in the prison, a bald white man is staring at a black man, prompting the black man to try to attack him, before being intercepted by Warden McClusky (Tommy Lee Jones). The bald man was a real prisoner, who had been convicted of murdering his wife and children by beating them to death with a lead pipe. Oliver Stone gave him a featured role because he said the man's stoicism terrified him.
Woody Harrelson, in an interview, spoke about the rape scene between Mickey and the hostage he takes. He expressed his hope that Oliver Stone had not added any additional footage of the controversial part into the Director's Cut. He was promptly told on camera that Stone had indeed done so.
The story told on "American Maniacs" about Mickey killing a cop after asking him for directions is taken almost verbatim from a story made up by J. Edgar Hoover in the 1930s about bank robbers Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker to try to quash the public's growing favorable opinion of the pair. According to Hoover, Barrow approached an Oklahoma City officer, asked for directions and then blew his head off with a shotgun. The story fell apart, though, when questions were raised as to how, if the officer was alone when he was killed, Hoover could possibly have determined that it was Barrow who killed him, as there were no witnesses to the "murder."
Director of photography Robert Richardson hated the script and didn't want anything to do with the film, but director Oliver Stone used their close friendship to persuade him to accept the job. For numerous reasons, Richardson called shooting the film a "nightmare" and one of the worst experiences of his life. The story brought up bad memories from his childhood, leading to insomnia and a dependence on sleeping pills throughout the entire shoot. During location scouting, his wife Monona Wali nearly died from an illness (and they later came close to divorcing because of the film). While filming a difficult scene he broke his finger, and the replacement cameraman cut his eye. Near the end of shooting, his brother went into a coma. However, Richardson has said that all of these problems actually provided him with the creative energy he needed to shoot the film.
Michael Madsen was initially considered for the role of Mickey, but Warner Bros wanted somebody less intimidating, and with a softer persona, as they felt this might alleviate the brutality of the character somewhat.
The film features Rodney Dangerfield's first and only dramatic performance.
Oliver Stone has always maintained that the film is a satire on how serial killers are adored by the media for their horrific actions, and that those who claim the violence in the movie itself is a cause of societal violence have missed the point of the movie entirely.
When producers Jane Hamsher and Don Murphy first brought Quentin Tarantino's screenplay to Oliver Stone's attention, Stone's initial idea was to make a lighthearted all-action blockbuster. His previous film, Heaven & Earth (1993), had been a difficult shoot which had failed at the box office, and he saw 'Natural Born Killers' as a way to make a fun movie and play with genre conventions. As he puts it himself in Chaos Rising: The Storm Around 'Natural Born Killers' (2001), he planned to make "something Arnold Schwarzenegger would be proud of." As the project developed however, Stone found the movie getting deeper and deeper, and soon all hopes for a simple action spectacular were gone.
Oliver Stone says that his biggest regret about the film is the fact that he had to cut out most of actor Pruitt Taylor Vince's performance as the prison guard Kavanaugh. As filmed, Kavanaugh becomes a comic character, who Mickey uses as a shield whilst moving through the prison, and who ends up being shot 16 times by the time Mickey meets Warden McClusky (Tommy Lee Jones) at the stairs. In the finished version of the film, you don't actually see Kavanaugh being shot at all prior to the stairs. Stone says he was forced to cut much of this because the studio insisted that the movie be under two hours. Strangely however, the footage of Kavanaugh was not restored by Stone for his Director's Cut nor was it included as a deleted scene on the DVD.
According to director Oliver Stone, the use of TV commercials was an attempt to illustrate the comforting power such commercials have. Every commercial comes after a horrific moment or a flash cut of a demon, and Stone's idea was that commercials work to soothe people after they have been exposed to something extreme.
Oliver Stone wanted Juliette Lewis to bulk up for the role of Mallory so that she looked tougher, but Lewis refused, saying she wanted the character to look like a pushover, not like a female bodybuilder. In the end, Stone agreed, but he insisted she take kick-boxing lessons so that she looked credible when fighting.
When putting together the music for the film, Oliver Stone and soundtrack producer Trent Reznor both wanted to get Snoop Dogg involved, but Warner wouldn't allow it, as Dogg was on trial for murder at the time.
After Quentin Tarantino had written the script, he promised his friend Rand Vossler, a fellow clerk at Video Archives, the director's chair. The pair couldn't find funding, and eventually decided to shoot it guerrilla-style (i.e. without permits) on the streets of LA, on black & white 16 mm film stock. Shortly before production, Oliver Stone found the script and wanted to buy it. In exchange for giving up his directorial debut, Rand is credited as co-producer.
The idea for the image of the headless man came to Oliver Stone in a dream.
Steve Buscemi and Tim Roth were both offered the role of Wayne Gale and turned it down. Jane Hamsher claims in her book about the movie that they did so because Quentin Tarantino told them he would never cast either of them in any of his movies again if they took the role.
When Jack Scagnetti (Tom Sizemore) goes into Mallory's cell, and throughout this scene, you can read two different paragraphs above the door in the cell, and below Mallory, on the bedside. The one near the door reads: "Come let's away / to prison we two / alone will sing / like birds in a cage." This is from 'King Lear', a play written by William Shakespeare, as Lear and his daughter Cordelia are being taken away to prison. The other paragraph reads: "He is coming! He is coming! / Like a bridegroom from his room / Came the hero from his prison / To the scaffold and the doom." These lines are from the poem "The Execution Of Montrose" by William Edmondstoune Aytoun.
For the numerous scenes involving rear projection, the projected footage was shot prior to principal photography, then edited together, and projected live onto the stage, behind the live actors. For example, when Mallory drives past a building and flames are projected onto the wall, this was shot live using footage projected onto the facade of a real building.
This film contains almost 3,000 cuts. Most films have 600-700. Negative cutter Donah Bassett cut 4000 negative images into the film, the most complex job ever undertaken by a negative cutter.
Mickey Knox is named after actor Mickey Knox, who wrote the English dialog for The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) and Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), Quentin Tarantino's favourite westerns.
Tom Sizemore plays Detective Jack Scagnetti in this film. The name "Scagnetti" was also mentioned as the name of Mr. Blonde's parole officer in Reservoir Dogs (1992), also written by Quentin Tarantino.
Tommy Lee Jones has said that his over-the-top performance was partly inspired by Molière's play 'Le Bourgeois gentilhomme'; a satirical look at social climbing and the bizarre things people will do to achieve fame.
This was Quentin Tarantino's second feature length screenplay (his first was True Romance (1993)). The script was rewritten by director Oliver Stone, producer Richard Rutowski and screenwriter David Veloz prior to and during production. The finished film bears little resemblance to Tarantino's original script.
Republican Sen. Bob Dole publicly denounced the film for its promotion of violence--even though, as he was later forced to admit, he had never actually seen the film.
Director Oliver Stone met with singer Tori Amos and openly offered her the part of Mallory. Early in her career Amos had been pursing acting as well as singing. She was interested until he explained he also wanted to have her song "Me and a Gun" play during each scene where Mallory kills someone. The song is an a capella account of Amos' real life rape. In response Amos slapped him across the face and stormed out. Amos details this story in her autobiography "All These Years". She also references the incident in her hit song "A Sorta Fairytale," with the lyric: "Feel better with Oliver Stone until I almost smacked him; it seemed right that night."
Robert Downey Jr. (Wayne Gale) and Tom Sizemore (Jack Scagnetti) both later served time in prison for drug-related offenses.
The interview between Wayne Gale and Mickey was based upon Geraldo Rivera's interviews with Charles Manson and the infamous Mike Wallace interview with Manuel Noriega.
The scene where the police beat up Mickey and Mallory at the pharmacy was purposely shot as a spoof of the Rodney King incident.
Owen (Arliss Howard), the inmate that helps Mickey and Mallory out of the prison, is shown in the first scene. He is at a table reading a newspaper that reads "666 death". He is only shown for a second. He is also seen in the prison as Wayne Gale (Robert Downey Jr.) tells Warden McClusky (Tommy Lee Jones) how famous he could become; Owen is mopping the floor behind them as they walk past a cell.
According to a newspaper article seen (briefly) at approximately 27 minutes into the film, Mickey & Mallory's murder spree began on May 7, 1993.
Characters are loosely based on Charles Starkweather and Caril Fugate, a young Nebraska couple who in 1958 embarked on a mass murder spree across the Midwest that horrified the country. The characters in Terrence Malick's Badlands (1973) are also loosely based on Starkweather and Fugate.
The title card for the film is an homage to Roger Corman.
The bridge where Mickey and Mallory get married is the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge over the Rio Grande Gorge, outside of Taos, New Mexico.
The Drug Store scene was filmed in an Albuquerque building that was a real drug store that had closed just prior to filming. The original fixtures and pharmacy area were still in the store, making set up very easy. The sign above the door was added for the movie and was still there months after filming ended. The building is now a Hobby Lobby. 1000 green fluorescent bulbs were used to light the scene.
In late 1994 the film was banned from theatrical distribution in Ireland. The Irish Film Centre, which is a membership club and not subject to the same rules as public theaters, booked the film and had it scheduled to screen for a month long run in early 1995. The film censorship board threatened legal action if the film was shown, and it was withdrawn.
Mallory's line to Scagnetti about him being "so specific" when he asks her to pinch his nipple was improvised by actress Juliette Lewis on set.
In the UK, the film's video release was to be the same week that Thomas Hamilton walked into a primary school in the Scottish town of Dunblane and killed 16 children and a teacher before killing himself, shocking a nation unused to such gun crimes. Warner Brothers immediately went to the British Board of Film Classification to take another look at the certification granted the film. The BBFC however stood by their decision, so Warners took it upon themselves to withhold video release. Thus, when the film had its terrestrial TV premiere on the UK's channel five two years later, it became one of the few films to be broadcast on television without having a video release beforehand.
Scagnetti's (Tom Sizemore) story about how his mother was killed was based upon a real life incident involving one of America's first mass murderers, Charles Whitman, who did actually shoot people randomly from the University Tower in Austin, Texas, in 1966.
Deputy Sheriff Duncan Homolka's (Joe Grifasi) name is a reference to Karla Homolka who, with her husband Paul Bernardo, murdered two teenage girls and her own sister.
Gary Oldman and James Woods were considered for the role of Jack Scagnetti.
A scene featuring Denis Leary doing a crazed monologue was cut from the film. However, it can be found be on the Dvd.
During the scene where Micky and Mallory take a hostage to a motel room, the films Midnight Express (1978) and Scarface (1983) are showing on television. Oliver Stone wrote the screenplays to both films.
The unique look of the film was based upon Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde (1967), one of director Oliver Stone's favorite movies. In particular, Stone was influenced by the famous death scene, which used innovative editing techniques provided by multiple cameras shooting from different angles at different speeds. Stone had used similar, although considerably more restrained, techniques in his previous two films JFK (1991) and Heaven & Earth (1993), and would continue to employ these techniques for his next two films, Nixon (1995) and U Turn (1997).
Rodney Dangerfield and Robert Downey Jr. also co-starred in the college-party comedy Back to School (1986).
Mickey (Woody Harrelson) calls Mallory (Juliette Lewis) "Mal". In Spanish, "Mal" is the common word for "Evil".
The film was originally going to be shot in Panavision, as Oliver Stone's previous four films had been, but he decided that it should be framed in standard 1.85:1. The Panavision E-Series anamorphic lenses that had been reserved for the film were used to shoot The Pelican Brief (1993) instead.
Rosanna Arquette pursued the role of Mallory.
Chris Penn turned down the role of Jack Scagnetti in favour of True Romance (1993), which also written by Quentin Tarantino.
According to an early draft of the script, this movie was originally intended to be directed by Rand Vossler, until Oliver Stone came to the project and Vossler ended up being a co-producer. The story behind this change in directors was chronicled in the book "Killer Instinct" written by producer Jane Hamsher.
Joe Grifasi who plays Deputy Sheriff Duncan Homolka would later costar with Tommy Lee Jones again in Batman Forever (1995), with Jones as Two-Face and Grifasi as a hostage.
The wrestling match that Rodney Dangerfield is watching is from an episode of 'WWF Superstars'. The wrestlers involved are Chris Chavis, aka Tatanka (the native American wrestler), and Barry Hardy.
The song "Back in Baby's Arms" plays on the soundtrack at one point. That song also played in Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987), which also featured Edie McClurg in a brief role. She has a small role in Natural Born Killers (1994) as Mallory's mother.
The guns Mickey uses in the pharmacy are a Beretta 93R and a Wildey Magnum (the same gun is also featured in Death Wish 3 (1985)).
The film cast includes two Oscar winners: Tommy Lee Jones and Adrien Brody; and three Oscar nominees: Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis and Robert Downey Jr..
Principal photography took only 56 days to shoot, but the editing process went on for eleven months.
John Cusack turned down the role of Wayne Gale.
Included among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Schneider.
Whilst shooting the POV scene wherein Mallory runs into the wire mesh, director of photography Robert Richardson broke his finger and the replacement cameraman cut his eye. According to Oliver Stone, he wasn't too popular with the camera department on set that day.
Oliver Stone considered this to be his road film, specifically naming Bonnie and Clyde (1967) as a source of inspiration.
Cameo
Kathy Long: is the female police officer who beats up Mickey at the pharmacy.
Don Murphy: one of the jovial guards who gets shot and killed by Mickey when he begins his escape from prison after the interview with Wayne Gale there.
Hank Corwin: is the headless man in the living room.
Jane Hamsher: as a demon-like character during a hallucination sequence.
Richard Rutowski: a demon during the prison riot
Spoilers
During Mickey's escape from prison during the tornado, there is a shot where a convict falls under a galloping horse. This was completely genuine, as the stuntman really did lose his footing and fall under the horse. Fortunately, he was uninjured.
Oliver Stone's least favorite scene in the film is when Mickey overpowers the prison guards after the interview with Wayne Gale (Robert Downey Jr.) is terminated. Stone feels that the device of having Mickey distract the guards by telling a joke is too unrealistic.
When Scagnetti is speaking with the warden, he says something about being as big as Jack Ruby. Later, Scagnetti is shot to death on live television, like Lee Harvey Oswald.