10 Off-Screen Moments That Change How You See Movies Forever

1. Close Encounters Of The Third Kind - Clowns And Gorillas In Place Of Aliens

Pretty Woman
Columbia Pictures

While 1975's Jaws established Steven Spielberg as one of the hottest directors on the planet, following that movie up two years later with Close Encounters of the Third Kind only served to cement Spielberg's spot as one of the best in the business.

This classic sci-fi tale of a UFO encounter throwing a small Indiana town upside down is a phenomenal picture, with Spielberg reteaming with Richard Dreyfuss as the lead of this offering.

One of the other stars of the show in Close Encounters is Cary Guffy, the three-year-old who played Barry Guiler. Fearing how this youngster would react to seeing 'aliens', Spielberg concocted a quite genius plan to pull the right kind of emotion from Guffy.

To capture the rolling emotion of shock turning to awe-inspired happiness, two crew members were utilised offscreen.

With both initially hidden in boxes, this pair were donned in gorilla and clown outfits when they made their presence known. That sorted the initial surprise shown by the Barry character - and the subsequent removal of these gorilla and clown masks resulted in the heart-melting smile shown by the young fella.

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Lifts rubber and metal. Watches people flip in spandex and pretends to be other individuals from time to time...

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.