10 Horror Movie Props You Didn't Know Were Reused
1. Gwyneth Paltrow's Severed Se7en Head Was Used In Contagion
One of the all-time great scenes that so many of us think we've seen but haven't, is the sight of Gwyneth Paltrow's severed head in a box at the close of David Fincher's Se7en.
At that close, Kevin Spacey's John Doe goads and torments Brad Pitt's Detective Mills. Insinuating that the head of Mills' wife Tracey (Paltrow) is in a box that gets delivered to the scene, Doe proclaims how she begged for her life and the life of her unborn child that Mills had yet to be told about.
Morgan Freeman's Detective Lieutenant Somerset sees what's in the box, yet we the audience don't ever get to see Tracey's head. Well, at least not in Se7en, that is.
Fincher's 1995 movie did originally plan to show Tracey's severed head in the box, and so a model of Paltrow's decapitated head was actually made. And while that model didn't make it into Se7en, it was used in 2011's Contagion.
In that Steven Soderbergh effort, Paltrow's Beth is the first big-name casualty of a mystery virus that is taking over the globe. When an autopsy is performed on Beth, the production made use of the fake Gwyneth Paltrow head that had been made for Se7en all those years prior.