Trivia for
The Brothers Grimm (2005) More at IMDbPro »

• Nicole Kidman and Anthony Hopkins were cast originally, but both had to bow out due to scheduling conflicts.
  
  
• Both Terry Gilliam and Matt Damon wanted to hire Samantha Morton for the female lead, but Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein vetoed this.
  
  
• Goran Bregovic was Terry Gilliam's original choice for composer. When Gilliam decided to go with a more traditional score, Bregovic was replaced by Dario Marianelli.
  
  
• Robin Williams was originally cast in the film, but pulled out of the project.
  
  
• Johnny Depp was originally set to star as Will Grimm.
  
  
• Cinematographer Nicola Pecorini was personally fired by Bob Weinstein.
  
  
• According to Terry Gilliam, Matt Damon took tango lessons in preparation for this film.
  
  
• The Weinstein brothers (Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein) came on board in 2004 when MGM suddenly pulled out the funding.
  
  
• In June 2004, a stalemate occurred between Bob Weinstein and Terry Gilliam over the final cut of the film. Terry Gilliam decided to place the film on hold for six months. He went on to do Tideland (2005) and came back to finish this feature in January 2005. In his version.
  
  
• The most expensive scene in the movie was cut because it occurred quite early on in the story and nothing would have been able to top it. This scene, available on DVD would have occurred on the brothers' first trip in the forest with Angelika. The party is attacked by a tree which grabs Angelika with a branch and swings her up in the air. The scene's special effects were almost completed before it was cut from the final version.
  
  
• The "hand forest" sequence in this film is an idea Terry Gilliam has had for almost 25 years. It was originally written for Time Bandits (1981) and almost used in Brazil (1985).
  
  
• Matt Damon and Heath Ledger were originally cast in opposite roles. They petitioned and switched their roles.
  
  
• Because of problems with the Writers Guild of America, Terry Gilliam and Tony Grisoni were not able to credit themselves as writers of the screenplay, despite the many changes they had made to Ehren Kruger's original script. They invented a credit for themselves as "Dress Pattern Makers" and thus were quoted as saying that the film was not necessarily made from a "screenplay" but from a "dress pattern".
  
  
• Many references to fairy tales (most recorded by the Grimms) are made, but they are slightly different from the actual tales: - Little Red Riding Hood is referred only by her red cape. - The heroic woodsman from "Little Red Riding Hood" is now an evil henchman. - Rapunzel is now an evil queen who locks herself in a tower to escape a plague rather than a princess imprisoned. - The Big Bad Wolf is now a large wolf rather than a diabolical personification. - The Gingerbread Man is now an incarnation of a mud monster. - Jack from Jack and The Beanstalk is changed to Jake to follow along with the brother's names. - "Hans" and "Greta" are the original forms of the diminutives "Hänsel and Gretel" (i.e. "little Hans and little Greta") . - Cinderella or the German form Aschenputtel is really the Grimm Brothers as they scrub the floors. The deleted scene in the DVD shows this better. - The evil queen is also the queen from Snow White in her chant about who's the fairest of them all. - All the girls' fingers are pricked as they fall into a deep sleep just like Sleeping Beauty. - As the Woodsman is preparing Sasha for the crypt, he places slippers on her feet, which turn into glass slippers, another reference to Cinderella. Also when Jake is drunk after defeating the mill witch he tell everyone a story of an imp who's name they had to guess, this is clearly a reference the story of Rumpelstiltskin.
  
  
• Historically, Jacob Grimm was older than his brother Wilhelm Grimm. Jacob was born in 1785 and Wilhelm in 1786.
  
  
• The Mirror Queen using the blood of young girls to restore her youth is based on the legend surrounding Countess Elizabeth Bathory, one of the first serial killers from the turn of the 17th century.
  
  
• For the scene in the torture chamber, Matt Damon was strung up by his waist but he could only stay up there for about a minute and a half because the rope was crushing his ribs which cut off his air supply.
  
  
• According to Matt Damon, Terry Gilliam had a prosthetic made for him, but the studio didn't want the actor to wear it.
  
  
• According to the director, Matt Damon's hair style was based on the British TV chef Jamie Oliver.
  
  
• The glass slippers are actually from Charles Perrault's French translation of Cinderella. The Grimm adaptation has the little Cinder girl wearing gold slippers, however the glass was a more recognizable fairy tale symbol.
  
  

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