22 unknown facts about the film “The Blues Brothers”: a record for broken cars and the cabbage that brought Dan Ackroyd and Carrie Fisher together (13 photos)

1980 American comedy film musical directed by John Landis. It stars Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi as brothers Elwood and Jake Blues, who revive their old blues band to raise money to save the orphanage where they grew up.





1. Belushi (Jake) and Ackroyd (Elwood), who were at the peak of their fame, arranged a tender between Universal and Paramount for the right to make a feature-length film about the Blues Brothers. At the same time, there was no script, no director, nothing - just a super popular show on Saturday Night Live, a musical group and a huge amount of plans. And another requirement for the budget - a cosmic $20 million, which eventually turned into... (see paragraph 22).



2. “Brothers” set an American cinema record for the number of broken cars – 103. Two years later, the record was broken by the film “The Ragman” (150 cars + plane, with a budget of less than $1 million). This “achievement” lasted for more than two decades until the release of The Matrix Reloaded (2003) (more than 300 cars were scrapped).

3. Permission to film in downtown Chicago cost $3.5 million plus $50 thousand, which Belushi and Ackroyd donated from their personal funds to a municipal charity fund.





4. The mall chase was filmed at Dixi Square Mall in suburban Chicago. More precisely, what was left of it after its closure in 1978. Filming finally finished off the building (the owners filed a lawsuit against Universal for $87 thousand for “returning the property in poor condition”): after many unsuccessful attempts to sell it, the center was destroyed in 2012 Now this place is a wasteland.

5. One day at dinner during the filming of the film, Carey Fisher (Jake's girlfriend) choked on Brussels sprouts and began to choke. Dan Ackroyd, who was sitting next to her, saved her with the Heimlich maneuver. A few days later they announced their engagement. However, the relationship did not last long - a few months later Fisher left for Paul Simon.



6. Meet John Landis in the cameo role of policeman La Fong (left). Who is La Phong? Insurance agent from the 1934 comedy. "This is a gift"? Cadet from the Star Trek universe? No, most likely, a stuntman who starred in two subsequent Landis films - An American Werewolf in London (1981) and Three Amigos (1986). But what did Landis mean by this?



7. The costume designers nicknamed John Belushi “The Black Hole.” The actor constantly lost his glasses, so for almost every new scene he had to get new ones.

7.1. And Dan Ackroyd called Belushi “The American Guest” behind his back. One day, the actor unexpectedly disappeared from the filming of one of the night scenes. In the houses nearby, only one window was on fire and Ackroyd decided to try his luck there. The owners who opened the door immediately understood the reason for the visit - Belushi really showed up unexpectedly, asked for milk and a sandwich, and then fell asleep.

8. The crowd at the Blues Brothers concert are real fans of the real Blues Brothers group.



9. What is the name of Henry Gibson's neo-fascist party? "American Socialist White People's Party", abbreviated as ASWPP, or, even more simply, "ass wipe". I will refrain from translation.

10. The crazy scene of the police chasing the brothers under a railway overpass was filmed on location and without acceleration. In two passages, the car's speed actually reached 190 km/h. All the pedestrians in these shots are stuntmen.

11. In the year of the thirtieth anniversary of The Blues Brothers, the Vatican's official newspaper L'Osservatore Romano not only warmly responded to the film, but called it a “Catholic classic.”



12. Dan Ackroyd recalled that cocaine for the film crew was paid directly from the film's budget. Like filming at an accelerated pace. John Belushi was very supportive of this topic, but it was because of cocaine that his acting “pace” suffered greatly (see paragraph 7.1.).

13. There were 13 blues cars in the film. Including the one that was created only to fall apart in the frame.

14. "John ♡ Deborah." This is an Easter egg from John Landis to his wife Debra Nudelman, who also happens to be the film's costume designer.



15. Cops Mount (Steve Williams) and Daniel (Armand Cerami) are named after Universal president Tom Mount and production director Sean Daniel, who provided support for one of Landis' first films, Menagerie (1978).

16. Policemen Mount and Daniel are hiding under a poster advertising the film “See you next Wednesday”. This name can be seen in many of the director's films. It goes back to 1966, when at the age of 16 John Landis wrote his first script, which was called...



16.1. Thank you very much for the comment under the post, which cast another semantic shadow on "See You Next Tuesday": this phrase could also be a mischievous prank by Landis - what comes from the first letters of each word?

17. In all of Landis' films, "Girl from Ipanema" plays in elevators. The Blues Brothers is no exception.

18. Do you recognize? This is Steven Spielberg :)



19. On the wall next to an advertisement for a Blues Brothers concert, the words “Rick Baker” can be seen. Rick Baker worked as a make-up artist on many of John Landis' films, including his first, The Banana Monster (1973).



20. The bluesmobile number is BDR-529. BDR is Dan Ackroyd's Black Diamond Riders motorcycle club in Toronto, and 529 is the number of the house on Jarvis Street where it is located.

21. At the very end of the closing credits, this frame appears on the screen. An invitation to the Universal Studios theme park is understandable, but who is Bubs? More precisely, “who is she”? This is Babs Jensen - a character from another Landis film, which has already been mentioned in vain in this post: “The Menagerie” (1978).



22. Budget - $27.5 million, box office receipts - $115.2 million.

22.1. The sequel to the film "Blues Brothers 2000" with a budget of $30 million, grossed only $32 million and a lot of negative reviews.