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All the nude scenes depicting Emmeline include a body double. Brooke Shields always had to have hair glued to her chest for the other scenes.
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It was the director's original concept to have the two grown characters play the entire film in the nude, which scared off many actors (including Jennifer Jason Leigh, who was the first choice for the female lead.) After Leigh passed on the project, the producers offered Diane Lane and Willie Atkins the film after screen-testing them together in Mexico, where Lane was shooting a western...but the pair discussed the nudity together after the crew left and called a few days later to say they wouldn't do the film, either. With shooting set to begin in a matter of days, the desperate director agreed to let Shields make the film predominantly clothed, with a body double employed for the nude scenes. With that settled, the casting director returned to the thousands of audition tapes they'd made over the course of a year, and decided Christopher Atkins would be alright if he permed his hair to look more "savage."
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Brooke's original body double broke her back, the replacement body double for Brooke Shields was originally hired to catch or train dolphins, she was the right body-type, so she was used as a nude double.
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Kelly Preston, Linda Blair, Jodie Foster, Tatum O'Neal, Michelle Pfeiffer, Daryl Hannah, and Rosanna Arquette all auditioned for the role of Emmeline.
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Because of the belief that the "heroic man is supposed to be taller than the woman", Brooke Shields spent much of this movie walking in trenches dug into the beach. This was due to the fact that, despite being only 14 (compared to Christopher Atkins' 18 years), Brooke Shields was already 5'10", dwarfing Chris Atkins height of 5'6". Years later, they would appear on an awards show, this time she standing her full adult height of 6', prompting his comment of "it's like having the 'Statue of Liberty' standing beside me".
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This film is listed among The 100 Most Amusingly Bad Movies Ever Made in Golden Raspberry Award founder John Wilson's book THE OFFICIAL RAZZIE® MOVIE GUIDE.
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Melissa Sue Anderson, Kim Basinger, Ellen Barkin, Justine Bateman, Delta Burke, Jamie Lee Curtis, Bridget Fonda, Melanie Griffith, Anjelica Huston, Kay Lenz, Mariel Hemingway, Kristy McNichol, Amy Irving, and Sarah Jessica Parker were all considered for the role of Emmeline.
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Sean Young tried to audition five times for Randal Kleiser for the part of Emmeline that went to Brooke Shields.
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Christopher Reeve auditioned for the role of Richard but turned it down due to his commitment with Superman II.
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Carrie Fisher turned down the role of Emmeline due to her commitment with Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back.
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Dana Plato turned down the role of Emmeline due to her commitment with the TV series Diff'rent Strokes.
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Jennifer Jason Leigh was the original choice for Emmeline but her father Vic Morrow made the role turned down.
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Richard Gere turned down the lead male role. Ironically, the lead male role is called Richard.
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After seeing the movie, John Gibbons, a herpetologist (reptile scientist) at the University of the South Pacific, realized that the iguanas that appeared in the film were a distinct species that had never been seen or documented by scientists before. Afterwards, Gibbons visited Nanuya Levu, the Fiji Island where the movie was made, and named the species the Fiji Crested Iguana.
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