Throw It In/Film: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

* A few [[John Belushi]] moments in ''[[Animal House]]'' came about like this, particularly in the cafeteria scene. His trip through the buffet line was between takes, but when the crew saw they were told to keep rolling. Moments later, he improvised the "I'm a zit" gag, and the looks of surprise and disgust on the actors [[Enforced Method Acting|are genuine]].

* In the 1967 film, ''[[The Dirty Dozen]]''. [[Lee Marvin]]'s "Oh, they played an active part alright." line was completely unplanned, as was [[Ernest Borgnine]]'s reaction of spitting his drink on the floor and coughing.

** [[Leonardo DiCaprio]] telling [[Kate Winslet]] to get on the daybed in preparation for him sketching her nude portrait, saying "Get on the bed -- errr, couch!" According to the director's commentary, the original line had no reference to a bed, but DiCaprio's nervous flubbing of the line seemed just too perfect to leave out.

** When the ship is sinking and Rose comes to save Jack, when he jumps in the rising water, he says, "Shit, that's cold!" -- apparently, unscripted. Rose goes "GAAAAASP!" in the same scene. This was also [[Enforced Method Acting]], as the actors were told the tank of water would be warmer than it was.

** When Jack and Rose are hanging on for dear life about two minutes before the ship sinks, Rose says "Jack, this is where we first met!". Complete ad-lib, but it makes the scene that much sadder.

** Also an ad-lib was Jack's line as he is leaving the First Class dinner table: "Time for me to go back and row with the other slaves." [[James Cameron]] preferred it to the scripted line and left it in.

** ''[[Good Morning Vietnam]]'', ''[[What Dreams May Come]]'', and ''[[Patch Adams]]'' all feature examples of Williams ad-libbing.

** ''[[Mrs. Doubtfire]]'' has both in-character and out-of-character examples:

*** The movie starts with his character, a professional voice actor, quitting his job because they won't allow him to comment on the cartoon's message that [[Family-Unfriendly Aesop|if someone offers you a cigarette, you should take it.]]

** Much of the monologue in ''[[Good Will Hunting]]'' where Robin Williams' character is counseling Matt Damon on relationships was ad-libbed. This is particularly true in a bit where Williams is describing his dead wife and her tendency to be flatulent when sleeping, which is why Will responds by laughing almost hysterically -- Matt Damon himself [[Enforced Method Acting|had no idea what was coming]]. You can also see the camera shaking very slightly, and it's been reported that the cameraman too was laughing. His last words ("Son of a bitch, he stole my line") were also improvised. So was "Fuck you!" "You're the shepherd."

** During filming of ''[[The Birdcage]]'', [[Robin Williams]] and [[Nathan Lane]] were so thoroughly into ad-libbing and bouncing off one another that they were forced to promise they'd do one take exactly as scripted before they were allowed, in subsequent takes, to say whatever they wanted. Also, the scene where Robin Williams trips carrying the pot of soup was not supposed to happen, but how hilariously appropriate it was to the mood made it into the film. If you pay enough attention, [[Hank Azaria]] nearly loses it at Robin falling.

* ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'' and its sequels.

** In the trailer for ''Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest'', Will says to the other characters "I'm not leaving without Jack!" while getting on the ''Black Pearl''. When he sees that Jack is on the other side of the beach getting chased by a large group of natives, he says, "Never mind, let's go!" This line didn't make it into the movie (because they did indeed wait for Jack, more or less), but its creation was actually from a blooper where Bloom flubbed his line, and "Never mind, let's go!" was an effort to just keep going and say the line again without hesitation. This fact can be found on the ''Dead Man's Chest'' DVD commentary.

** All of Jack's jokes about Will supposedly being a eunuch were ad-libbed by [[Johnny Depp]]. Through the creators' approval of the first, he continued.

* ''[[District 9]]'': Many, if not all of Wikus' lines are improvised. When you consider how beautifully Sharlto Copely acts his part, this becomes really impressive food for thought.

* ''[[It's a Wonderful Life]]'' examples:

** There was much more dialogue in the scene where George and Mary are both talking to Sam over the phone -- but that long kiss was so much better than the dialogue Capra scripted that it got used instead. Technically, that might be "Throw It Out" as much as "Throw It In".

** In ''The Fellowship of the Ring'', [[Ian McKellen]] ''accidentally'' hit his head on the ceiling while entering Bilbo's residence. This was kept in the final cut as a joke. Bumping the hanging lanterns was scripted. His quick turn to his left, apparently to avoid the hanging lanterns... results in a painful whack into the low ceiling-strut as he does so, and this was ''not'' scripted. Ow...

** Also in the first film, during the final fight between Aragorn and the leader of the Uruk-Hai hunting party, the actor in the Uruk makeup was supposed to fake a head-butt to Viggo Mortensen. But the makeup evidently made it difficult for him to judge the distance, and ended up giving Mortensen a very real head-butt. The move, and Mortensen's very real pain, made it into the film.

*** One specific instance is described on the [[Limited Special Collectors' Ultimate Edition|special edition]] extra content, where they were about to shoot the Elves counter-attacking against the Uruks coming through the breach in the deeping wall. The actors playing the Elves were a little timid (probably their first shoot as Elvish warriors). At the time, there was a large group of stuntmen in Uruk costumes standing across the way, who began stomping their feet, beating their weapons against their chests, calling them names and even making obscene gestures at them. This quickly got the Elvish stunt-doubles riled up, and they in turn began posturing and drawing imaginary arrows at the Uruks. Then suddenly, to everyone's surprise, the director yelled "Cut!". Part of the footage got into the film, though they had to cut out parts with gestures and exclamations that were not... native to Middle Earth.

* In ''[[Rambo|First Blood]]'', protagonist John Rambo jumps off a cliff into a tree, then falls down, hitting branches on the way down, to hit the ground with a blood-curdling scream. That's because Stallone broke three ribs doing the stunt.

** Hannibal Lecter's famous hissing was completely improvised; indeed, was enough of a joke that the actors didn't expect it to be kept in the film. You'll notice that there's a nice long pause between "[[A Glass of Chianti|A nice Chianti]]" and the hiss, presumably so that it could be cut without damaging the line. The director decided it struck the right tone, after noticing [[Jodie Foster]] was quite genuinely creeped out.

** Hopkins improvised the bit where he briefly mocks Clarice's accent during his [[Hannibal Lecture]]; this overlaps with [[Enforced Method Acting]] because he did not inform Foster that he was going to do this, so the surprise on her face is genuine.

** There's also the part where Neo vomits after being told my Morpheus the truth of the Matrix. In the set, Keanu really vomited after something in his meal didn't agree with him.

* According to the director, much of the humor in ''[[Death at a Funeral]]'' was based on deliberately exploiting this trope. He explained that scenes would often be repeated until something funny went wrong, and then that take was used.

** The "You know how I know you're gay?" scene sprang from an improvisation about a completely different subject.

** The waxing scene: they didn't tell [[Steve Carell]] on the first rip that they were actually going to go through with it. Hence his expression, followed by some decidedly out-of-character swearing at the actor who just ripped ''half his chest hair off''. Those wincing looks and glances off-camera from his "buddies" are ''real.'' Carell also ad-libbed all the lines he yelled after each rip including "Kelly Clarkson!!" The script for this scene actually read: "Scream, swear, apologize," if memory serves.

** Groucho Marx ad-libbed frequently; many [[Marx Brothers]] movies have noticeable blips where the makers shaved off a few seconds to make room for things like the ''[[Animal Crackers]]'' speech which begins: "Pardon me for a second while I have a strange interlude."

** Some scripts simply had "[[Harpo Does Something Funny]]" because his improvisations were often better than what the writers could come up with.

** In ''[[Animal Crackers]]'' the actor playing the antagonist accidentally called Groucho by his own character's name. Both of them were able to improvise off it well enough that the take ended up in the film.

* The most famous example of all time, in ''[[Casablanca]]'':

{{quote|'''Rick:''' Here's lookin' at you, kid.}}

* ''[[Annie Hall]]'': the scene where Alvy sneezes, blowing away a boxful of his friend's $2000/oz cocaine ran much longer, but was cut back because the laughter from the audience made the rest of the dialog inaudible. The sneeze was real, and unrehearsed.

* ''[[Alien (franchise)|Aliens]]'': "Game over, man! Game over!"

* A example that has become a legendary scene: Indiana Jones [[Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?|shooting the swordsman]] in ''[[Raiders of the Lost Ark]]''. [[Harrison Ford]] had diarrhea problems and wasn't up to fight him with his whip as originally scripted. A version of the story exist that Ford improvised the scene while filming. A slightly more plausible version says that [[Steven Spielberg]] said sarcastically to Ford that the only way the scene could get shortened is if he just shot the guy. The crew began laughing at the idea and they worked it out. Another version of this story holds that Ford and most of the crew had gotten sick, and this was the last scene they needed to film in this location. Ford goes to Spielberg and says "Look, Indy wants to save the girl, right? He doesn't have time for this, so [[Combat Pragmatist|why not have Indy shoot the fucker?]]" And so he did. According to the ''Making of Indiana Jones'' book, they did manage to shoot a completed fight scene with the swordsman. There were two versions during the editing process. One cut with the fight with the Arab and one with Indy just shooting him, with [[George Lucas]] preferring the former and Spielberg the latter. They left it to a test screening to decide which to use. Indy shooting got the biggest laugh and was kept in.

* In ''[[Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade]]'', in response to Indy asking his father how he knew Elsa was a Nazi, Jones Sr. simply replies "She talks in her sleep." Sean Connery actually ad-libbed that line, and it was kept since it made the entire crew burst into laughter.

** ''[[The Empire Strikes Back]]'': Han's reply to Princess Leia saying that she loves him was originally supposed to be "I love you too," but Ford ad-libbed "I know," because he felt it to be more like the character. The director Irvin Kershner said they had ran through several different lines because the "I love you too" line felt too lovey-dovey for someone like the [[Loveable Rogue]] Han Solo, so eventually he just asked Ford to say what felt natural. Kershner loved the result -- "I know" was the final take, at least before lunch -- but George Lucas was afraid it was [[Mood Whiplash]]. Lucas was proven right when airing for a test audience -- but the audience also felt the line was [[Willing Suspension of Disbelief|classic Han Solo,]] so he agreed to leave it in.

** In ''[[A New Hope]]'' when Luke and Han were rescuing Leia disguised as stormtroopers and Han was forced to respond via radio to their commander, Ford intentionally did not memorize his lines and only briefly looked at what he was supposed to say. So while the scene as written is supposed to be Han improvising, "We're all fine here, thank you... How are you?" Ford played it panicked and grimacing at the last line. Again, it was good enough to keep, and provides a great bit of comic relief in the middle of a tense sequence. Harrison Ford just seems to be a magnet for these.

*** He pulled a similar stunt while filming ''[[The Fugitive (film)|The Fugitive]]'' (see details below).

** Jango Fett gets banged slightly by a descending ship door in ''[[Attack of the Clones]]'' in homage of the above, even though that scene is done in CGI.

*** The improvisation/script alteration was remarked on by [[Mark Hamill]] in an interview around the time of the film's release. Apparently [[Harrison Ford]] had covered his script with alterations so that he could say the lines his way, and this encouraged Mark to alter some of his own lines. The "prisoner transfer from Cellblock [[THX 1138|1138]]" was Mark's ad-lib (instead of a random string of numbers), which Lucas didn't originally want to use since it was a blatant [[Shout-Out]] to his earlier film, but got put in the final cut.

*** There is at least one instance of a "throw it in" in the new trilogy. Hayden Christensen and [[Natalie Portman]] improvised the dinner table scene in which Anakin mentions "[[Aggressive Negotiations]]". Apparently, Lucas didn't like the dialogue he had written for the scene, so he just told them to improvise. Portman later said that "it got inappropriate very quickly."

*** Also, in the same movie, the name of the benefactor of the Clone Army was intended to be Jedi Master Sido-Dias (who was a thinly-veiled disguise for Darth Sidious, and he was not even existent within the Jedi), but the scriptwriter made a typo (due to the d and f keys being right next to each other). George Lucas ultimately thought it was better, so they not only kept the typo as the actual name, they also rewrote the scene to reveal that Sifo Dyas had in fact died several years prior.

** Anthony Daniels' ''entire performance'' as C-3PO in the original movie. Lucas figured he would just overdub the dialogue to get the characterization he wanted, then changed his mind after several people, including [[Mel Blanc]], told him to go with Daniels' voice and interpretation.

** [[Alan Rickman]] plays [[Big Bad]] terrorist Hans Gruber. When he can't get information from a character, he shoots him in cold blood without a second thought. Later, he tells the rest of the terrified hostages, "I wanted this to be professional, efficient, adult, cooperative, not a lot to ask; sadly, your Mr. Takagi couldn't go along, so ''he won't be joining us for the rest of his life''." This line was an ad-lib by Rickman.

** He also ad-libbed the idea of eating some of the food from the party buffet while saying the line.

** It is even funnier because it broke the logic. That part was quite serious, until that line.

* In ''[[Monty Python's Life of Brian]]'', when Brian is telling everyone that they are all individuals, and they mindlessly repeat it, the one guy who goes "I'm not!" is an extra who just threw that out there on the spur of the moment. He got a pay raise to speaking actor.

** The "He hasn't got shit all over him" line was improvised.

** [[John Cleese]] has an improvised moment in the [[Burn the Witch]] scene; when asked why witches burn, the crowd is stumped. Cleese has the next line: "Because they're made of wood?" However, according to the DVD commentary with Eric Idle, he experimented with the timing between the question and the answer, even going so far as to start answering and then go back to thinking. Watch Eric Idle in this scene; towards the end of the pause he's biting down on his scythe to keep from laughing.

** The line, "There are [[Some Call Me... Tim|those who call me... Tim?]]" According to some versions of the story, the Enchanter did have a more appropriately mystical name, but Cleese forgot it while shooting.

** In general however, the Python troupe rarely used ad-libbing.

{{quote|"Don Corleone, I am honored and grateful that you have invited me to your daughter...'s wedding... on the day of your daughter's wedding. And I hope their first child be a masculine child. I pledge my ever-ending loyalty."}}

** Legend has it that Lenny Montana (who worked for the Colombo crime family) was one of the thugs sent down to the set to see how the movie portrayed the Mafia, and whether changes needed to be made to the script; one of their demands, for example, was that the word "Mafia" not be used. The actor playing Brasi had had a stroke, they needed a replacement, and Lenny got the part. He was a big fan of Marlon Brando, and flubbed the lines because he was so nervous about meeting him.

* The famous classical music from ''[[2001: A Space Odyssey]]'' was just supposed to be a placeholder used while they edited the movie. But [[Stanley Kubrick]] liked it so much that he kept it in as the movie's score.

* In the ''[[Armageddon]]'', [[Bruce Willis]] improvised the famous line: "The President of The United States just asked us to save the world... anyone want to say 'no?'" [[Michael Bay]] liked it so much he made sure they put it in the trailer.

* In ''[[Atonement]]'', director Joe Wright reveals in his commentary that the scene just before Robbie discovers the school girls massacre, at the point where he removes his helmet, the weather is cloudy. As he looks up the sky, the sunlight surprisingly shines and gets cloudy again the moment he put his head down.

* In ''[[The Hours]]'', when [[Meryl Streep]] goes to the sink and turns it on, the faucet explodes and shoots water up into the air; Meryl just went with it, and they kept the take.

** "[[Gonna Need More Trope|You're gonna need a bigger boat.]]" (both the book author and the screenwriter said they'd give an arm for writing such a line instead!)

** When the barrel whips over the front of the boat and knocks Brody's glasses off, it wasn't meant to get that close to Roy Scheider, and his reaction was at least partly natural.

* ''[[Austin Powers|Austin Powers in Goldmember]]'' examples:

** During the fountain scene, at one point Austin's, ahem, "stream" starts giving out intermittent splashes like a sprinkler. According to the DVD commentary, this was actually a result of the water cannon malfunctioning, but the directors found it so funny they left it in.

** Also, in one shot where in response to how to beat William, Adhemar's page says that "With a lance, on a horse..." "...he's unbeatable." This shot was actually the result of a cameraman not realizing he was supposed to be doing a close-up until right as the action began.

* [[Peter Sellers]]: according to IMDB, Inspector Clouseau's "rit of fealous jage" line in ''[[The Pink Panther|A Shot in the Dark]]'' was an actual slip of the tongue by Sellers. It was so Clouseau-esque, however, that Blake Edwards kept it in.

** General Turgidson's tumble in the War Room was unscripted and accidental.

* [[Malcolm McDowell]] claims Alex's use of the song "Singin' in the Rain" during the rape scene in ''[[A Clockwork Orange (film)|A Clockwork Orange]]'' was an improvisation on his part which Kubrick approved. During rehearsal, the scene had not been working as scripted, so Kubrick told McDowell to try dancing. While trying this, McDowell spontaneously began singing the song. Kubrick realized it worked and immediately left the set to call New York and secure the rights to the song.

* The crowd rushing the stage during the "Pinball Wizard" number in ''[[Tommy]]'' was not scripted, in one of the most spectacular "throw it ins" ever.

* In ''The Outsiders'', the scene where Dallas falls out of his chair while flirting with Cherry at the movies was an accident. You can see C. Thomas Howell briefly look at the camera.

* ''[[The Dark Knight Saga]]''

* The lineup scene in ''[[The Usual Suspects]]'' was scripted as a serious scene, but the actors didn't play it as such. Bryan Singer was initially pissed off about it, but ended up using some of the funniest takes in the final film. (so much that there's a take of everyone laughing) And in the scene where Redfoot the Fence flicks a cigarette into McManus' face, the reaction is entirely genuine: he was supposed to be aiming for the chest.

* In the French movie ''Il y a des jours et des lunes'', a priest who acts in amateur plays is at one point complimented on his acting skills. The actor playing the priest was supposed to answer with a joking "You're telling me you want to be my agent?" but flubbed the line into "You're telling me you want to be my apostle?" When he realized, he started laughing hysterically but tried to stay in character by apologizing and talking about Freudian slips and blasphemy before repeating the real line. The director decided to keep it because the slip was just too good.

** For his part, Shatner confirms in his book ''Star Trek Memories'' that he did, in fact, just miss the chair and fall on his ass by accident.

** Although the way Leonard Nimoy tells it in his autobiography ''I Am Spock'', that shot was really just Walter Koenig and Nichelle Nichols accosting random passers-by and asking them about "nuclear wessels". Sarakalo was apparently just passing by, listened, and gave the instructions, and it's ''that'' shot which remains in the film -- they made a contract with her afterwards. One genuine ad-lib in there is the impassive police officer being asked questions: he was a genuine police officer there to provide security, and his reactions were just recorded on film and got in there.

** The commentary notes that practically every scene had an ad-lib, not just by Bill Murray either. [[Rick Moranis]] also ad-libbed much of his dialogue, especially in the party scene, though he worked with the screenwriters to get a vague outline of what was needed.

* While he was writing ''[[Boogie Nights]]'', [[Paul Thomas Anderson]] accidentally mixed up two words while writing dialogue about Little Bill's cheating wife. He decided to leave it in, as Little Bill is angry when he says the line and [[Angrish|would have mixed the words up]].

* The scene with Thorton Melon's secretary taking notes for him in ''[[Back to School (film)|Back to School]]'' was supposed to show his son Jason sitting next to her looking disgusted, but the actor simply couldn't stop laughing at Edie McClurg's performance. They decided to leave it in since it works just as well that he is supposed to be laughing in frustrated disbelief instead.

** Also, "[[You Talkin' to Me?]]?"

* In the original 1962 ''[[The Manchurian Candidate (novel)|The Manchurian Candidate]]'', the scene where {{spoiler|Major Marco overrides Sgt. Shaw's brainwashing by showing him an entire deck of queen of diamonds}} has Major Marco slightly out of focus. Director John Frankenheimer later claimed to have heard theories this was done intentionally to show Marco from Shaw's hazy, brainwashed point of view. In fact, it was a technical glitch. They had tried to reshoot the scene with the camera in focus, but according to Frankenheimer, Frank Sinatra's performance was at its best in the first, out-of-focus take, and it deteriorated in take after take. In the end, they decided to use the take with the best performance, out of focus or no.

** It's also done occasionally to get more realism, such as the dialogue on the AWACS, which was improvised by the crew based on what they'd say in a combat situation like that (only without the giant robot scorpion...).

* In ''[[Kill Bill]]'', Daryl Hannah went off-script when she started screaming and flailing around in the trailer after the Bride vs. Elle battle. Apparently, Tarantino liked it.

* During the filming of the chariot race in ''[[Ben-Hur]]'', Charleton Heston's stunt double Joe Canutt almost flew out of the chariot when it jumped over a wrecked chariot, which was unintentional. The shot was left in with director William Wyler shooting a closeup of Heston climbing back into the cart. Reputedly, the crowd flooding the arena at the end of the chariot race was an unplanned move by enthusiastic extras.

* While filming ''[[Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song]]'', [[Melvin Van Peebles]] obtained a permit to set a car on fire for a scene he wanted to shoot that weekend. Unfortunately, he got the permit on a Friday, and the city hadn't filed it by the time shooting was scheduled. He did the scene anyway and when the fire department showed up, he filmed it and left it in the finished movie.

* During the graveyard scene in ''[[Zoolander]]'', right after Prewitt explains why male models are trained to be assassins, [[Ben Stiller]] completely forgot his line, and tried to wordlessly re-start the take by repeating his earlier line of "But why male models?", which prompted [[David Duchovny]] to run with it and hilariously reply, "...You serious? I just told you, like a minute ago."

{{quote|'''Rollo Lee:''' Oh, Wanda...!

'''Willa Weston:''' Willa.

* [[Urban Legend|According to legend]], [[Bela Lugosi]] was just beginning to learn English during filming of ''[[Dracula (1931 film)|Dracula]]''. He learned all his lines phonetically, and his odd mispronounciations have since become [[Vampire Vords|a very well-remembered part of the character]]. At least one reviewer has also noted they give the impression that Dracula isn't used to speaking at all.

** In reality, he had been in the USA for eight years by this point, and spoke the heavily accented but serviceable English he would for the rest of his life. However, it is entirely possible that two years earlier, when he took the role on Broadway, he was directed syllable-for-syllable and kept the strange results.

* In the final shot of ''[[Barton Fink]]'', the seagull diving into the water was unplanned.

** According to [[Wikipedia|The Other Wiki]], the line was originally "You're on TV now, girl!"

** Also, when Gerard and an extra are hanging around:

{{quote|'''Gerard:''' Newman, what are you doing?

* In the original ''[[Rocky (film)|Rocky]]'', loan shark Tony Gazzo is talking with Rocky about Rocky not breaking the thumbs of one of his clients, when he pulls out an inhaler in mid-sentence and uses it. This unscripted action happened because the man playing Gazzo actually had an asthma attack at that moment, and the director liked how it made the scene more authentic.

** The shot in which Rocky runs through through the market and someone throws him an apple was actually a member of the public trying to hit Sylvester Stallone as he was filming the scene, unbeknown to Stallone who at the time thought it was part of the filming. The director however liked the shot and kept it in the scene.

* Similarly, Matt Damon's story about his brothers in ''[[Saving Private Ryan]]'' was ad-libbed. Tom Hanks does almost exactly the same thing as Meg Ryan in the previous example -- watch his gaze flit off-camera for a second, then a slow nod. Is that "Captain Miller hears you, Private Ryan", or "Tom Hanks hears you, Steven Spielberg: run with it"?

* On the subject of [[Tom Hanks]] and Meg Ryan: In ''[[You've Got Mail]]'', there's a scene where the Tom Hanks character, holding balloons in one hand and a bagged goldfish in another, accidentally closes the door on the balloon strings. In an ad-lib, Hanks re-opened the door to free the balloons and joked to Ryan, "Good thing it wasn't the fish!"; it made the cut.

* In the classic ''[[Bringing Up Baby]]'', [[Cary Grant]]'s character Dr. David Huxley has lost his clothes and is forced to find whatever he can around Susan's aunt's house to wear home. Naturally, all that is available are a ridiculous pair of hunting boots and a woman's frilly nightgown. When Susan's aunt sees him, she angrily asks him why he's wearing those clothes; impatiently, Grant jumps in the air and shouts "Because I just went GAY all of the sudden!" Whether this was a reference to homosexuality or not is unclear, but it wasn't scripted in any case.

** It's 90% likely an intentional reference (also the first use of the term 'gay' to mean homosexual in a Hollywood movie): Note Huxley's next line is that he is "in the middle of 42nd street waiting for a bus"; at the time 42nd & Broadway was New York's seediest area, with lots of cruising homosexuals.

* According to multiple interviews by [[Gregory Peck]], the famous scene in ''[[Roman Holiday]]'' in which he pretended to have his hand bitten off by the Mouth of Truth was ad-libbed by him, with only the director being aware of it in advance. [[Audrey Hepburn]]'s scream and her relief laughter were genuine reactions. According to Peck, he borrowed the joke from Red Skelton.

* In ''[[Kramer vs. Kramer]]'', the last scene of the movie where Joanna ([[Meryl Streep]]) asks Ted Kramer ([[Dustin Hoffman]]) "How do I look" and he replies "You look terrific" took place before the filming was supposed to begin, apparently Robert Benton liked it more than the original scene, and left it in.

* [[Billy Wilder]] and I. A. L. Diamond struggled for days with the final dialogue between Jerry and Osgood in ''[[Some Like It Hot]]'', trying to think of an appropriate answer from Osgood when Jerry reveals he's a man. Unable to think of anything funny, they gave up and had Osgood say "Nobody's perfect." This has gone down in film history as one of the funniest punchlines and film endings ever. [[Billy Wilder]] even used the sentence as the title for his own autobiography. It's also on his gravestone.

* In ''[[Ghost Rider (film)|Ghost Rider]],'' the first scene with [[Nicolas Cage]] as Johnny Blaze, a professional daredevil, has him failing a jump. During the fall, the front wheel of his motorcycle smashes into his helmet, breaking the visor of the helmet. This was not intentional, and the stuntman really did take a tire to the face. However, when the stuntman saw the footage of the crash, he thought it looked good, so they decided to leave it intact.

* Many scenes in ''[[The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra]],'' including a malfunctioning spaceship door and Animala saying "click" aloud as she flips a switch, were deliberately left in on account of the [[Rule of Funny]].

* In the [[Blaxploitation]] parody ''[[Black Dynamite]]'', there is a scene where some men in black suits are shooting at Black Dynamite and a man in a large jelly doughnut costume from the car. As they pull up in the car and begin shooting, the car begins rolling away due to the fact that the actor ''forgot to enable the parking brake''. He got it eventually, but the shot was kept in due to the fact that it fit in with the rest of the movie's intentional "Throw it In"s.

* In ''[[Attack of the Killer Tomatoes]]'', the helicopter that they'd rented for the day crashed, and they caught it on film...so they added a line a about a tomato leaping at it.

** The actors just got out of the wreck, dusted themselves, and went right on with the scene.

{{quote|"Well, what do you think?"

* In ''[[Finding Neverland]]'', at the [[Clap Your Hands If You Believe]] part, the uptight Emma starts clapping fervently. The children were shocked in response, since the actress wasn't supposed to. It adds a lot to the scene.

* In ''[[The New Guy]]'', [[Real Life]] twins Jerry and Charlie O'Connell improvised [[It Makes Sense in Context|climbing on a swing-set to do upside-down crunches]], hence the [[Romantic False Lead|Romantic False Lead's]] very confused look.

* In ''[[The Wind and The Lion]]'', during one of Teddy Roosevelt's monologues, a horse lies down and rolls. In the commentary, the director notes that most filmmakers would have reshot the scene, but he kept it in for verisimilitude.

* A lot of dialogue in ''[[Dog Day Afternoon]]'' including [[Al Pacino]] yelling "Attica! Attica!" and John Cazale's response when Pacino asks him what country he wants to go after the robbery: "Montana."

* In the final battle of ''[[Terror Of Mechagodzilla]],'' there's a moment when (due to a nearby explosion) [[Godzilla]]'s back-spikes ''catch fire.'' You can bet they left ''that'' shot in.

* In the American ''[[Godzilla (film)|Godzilla]]'', there's an establishing shot of Manhattan from the south, in which an ominous bolt of lightning strikes one of the Twin Towers. It's totally real.

* In [[Orson Welles]]'s ''[[Touch of Evil]]'', a scene featured a shot of Welles smoking. A piece of paper accidentally blew by in front of Welles. It was kept in at his request.

* In ''[[Terminator]] 2: Judgment Day'', Sarah Connor, after breaking out of her cell, ambushes an orderly by whacking him out and inflicting cuts in the process. This was not acted: Linda Hamilton actually inflicted the orderly's actor with the injury as revenge, because he went too easy on her when she was being restrained in an earlier scene (causing [[James Cameron]] to re-shoot that scene several times, and she had to fall to her knees on a hard tile floor each time). It was kept in the final cut.

* ''[[True Lies]]'': [[Word of God]] says that Curtis's slip and fall during the stripper dance wasn't scripted, and you can even see Arnold jumping out of the chair to see if she's alright. She instead jumped right back up and continued the dance, with Arnold sitting back down quickly. Luckily, all of this is perfectly in character (Harry would obviously be concerned about his wife, and then hastily attempt to maintain [[The Masquerade]] when the show goes on) and it ends up as one of the funniest scenes of the movie.

* In ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (film)|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II]]'', Michelangelo accidentally drops a piece of his pizza into the canister of anti-mutagen. You can tell this was unscripted by the way Mikey immediately looks up at the camera with an [[Oh Crap]] expression on his face.

* In the 2002 [[The Caper|caper]] movie ''Stark Raving Mad'', when [[Seann William Scott|Ben]] is knocking out {{spoiler|the nightclub owner}} with a convenient bottle, they had several takes where the [[Soft Glass]] bottle didn't actually break -- but the actors were so dedicated to selling every take that they just had Ben shatter the bottle and knock the guy out with the ''second'' blow.

* ''[[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (film)|Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]]'' has a bit at the end of Ivan Ooze's rant about the horrible things inflicted on humanity he missed out on: "The Black Plague! The Spanish Inquisition! [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|The Brady Bunch Reunion!]]" That last one was ad-libbed by Paul Freeman.

* Literally the only explanation for the bulk of ''[[Pocket Ninjas]]''; many of the things going on, especially during supposed fight scenes, only make sense if you assume the actors were clowning around without realizing the cameras were rolling and the director (who may or may not have been drunk and high at the same time) decided that that was ''exactly'' what he wanted in his movie.

* Most of Elliot T. Jindrake's character in ''[[Max Keeble's Big Move]]'' was ad-libbed by [[Larry Miller]], wanting to portray him like the dean from ''[[Animal House]]''.

** Max Keeble's giggling when meeting Jenna at the middle school was a flub on [[Alex Linz]]'s part, but the creators liked it and put it in.

* In the roulette scene of ''[[Run Lola Run|Lola Rennt]]'', an initial take was filmed of the wheel spinning and the ball being dropped, with the intention of later editing it together with a staged shot of the ball landing on twenty to complete the scene and win her the money she needed. The ball landed on twenty in the first take.

* One day, during the filming of ''[[Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind]]'', the circus came to town. So they filmed a scene at the parade.

* ''[[Unknown Island]]'' When a horde of Ceratosaurs descend upon the heroes, who are throwing grenades at them, a little mistake made it in for the better. Because they were filming in mid-day in the desert with heavy rubber suits on. An explosion went off near one actor, who then promptly fainted from the heat. They kept it in the scene.

* ''[[Return of the Living Dead]]'' has one scene toward the end where {{spoiler|Frank immolates himself in the oven}}. This is because James Karen didn't want to shoot his final scene in the cold rain and instead suggested that Frank {{spoiler|commit suicide}} because he's a nice guy and didn't want to hurt anybody.