10 Movies That Accidentally Filmed Things You Weren't Supposed To See

9. A Stray Cat Interrupts Ryan Gosling In The Middle Of A Scene (Half Nelson)

Half Nelson Ryan Gosling cat
ThinkFilm

Movie scenes that involve animals usually need to be planned out more than most, often with the help of a professional animal trainer - but not in this case.

The 2006 drama Half Nelson stars Ryan Gosling as Dan Dunne, a history teacher struggling with a drug addiction. Dan also owns a cat called Dave, and because this is one of the only meaningful connections in his life, it's absolutely heartbreaking when Dave passes away midway through the movie.

A short while later, Dan is talking with a local drug dealer, Frank (played by a baby-faced Anthony Mackie), when he spots a stray cat on the ground and decides to pick it up. At first, this might just seem like a clever bit of writing - after all, Dan has just lost his own feline friend, so it makes sense that he'd feel sympathetic towards a homeless one - but in reality, this was never supposed to happen.

The cat wasn't just a stray in the movie - it was also a stray in real life. But rather than shooing it away when it wandered into the scene, Gosling decided to pick it up instead, creating a rather profound moment for his character in the process.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!