20 Things You Somehow Missed In Napoleon Dynamite
10. Cow Killer
A huge amount of the events, characters, and plot points of Napoleon Dynamite are based on the real teenage experiences of the creative team. When Jared Hess' mother saw the movie she commented: “Well, that was a bunch of embarrassing family material.”
Most shockingly, the darkly comedic scene of cow slaughter is among those true-to-life incidents. Hess revealed:
"The cow being shot in front of the school bus—that actually happened. My mom and dad were raising a cow as a hobby, and it started to, like, charge and attack my mom, and we called an old farmer in our ward to come over and take care of it. He was hard of hearing and shot the cow in front of my little brother’s school bus as he was headed off to kindergarten."
Though the incident could have traumatised most, Hess' comedic spirit allowed him to turn it into one of the comedy's most talked about scenes.