10 Movie Mistakes Directors Refused To Fix Because The Acting Was Too Good
7. Jamie Lee Curtis Takes A Sexy Tumble - True Lies
The Mistake
James Cameron's True Lies may not be one of the filmmaker's most fondly remembered films, but it's still a ludicrously entertaining action-comedy with a wonderfully unexpected, Golden Globe-winning performance from Jamie Lee Curtis as Harry Tasker's (Arnold Schwarzenegger) wife Helen.
By far Curtis' most memorable scene in the movie sees her performing a striptease for a shadowy man who, unaware to her, is actually her husband.
Though 99% of Curtis' performance is disarmingly sexy, there's an hilarious moment where she slips off the bed post and falls over before quickly recovering.
This wasn't in any way scripted, with Curtis genuinely losing her grip and tumbling to the floor.
The Awesome Acting
Cameron very sensibly decided to keep the take in the movie because he felt that it added some comedy and realism to the scene.
Curtis' quick recovery allowed the take to be used, but best of all, her clumsiness reminds the audience that this is a regular, "boring" woman we're looking at who is totally out of her comfort zone stripping for some shady dude.
It's an accidental piece of character shading and one that works only because Curtis was so quick on her feet.