25 Things You Didn’t Know About Se7en
17. Pitt Actually Did Get Injured Filming The Chase Scene
During the scene where Mills legs it after Doe in the rain, Pitt fell and put his arm through a car windscreen. Supposedly the injury to his hand was so severe that Fincher could see the white of the bone through the jagged hole in his flesh. Pitt still maintains this is the only time he’s ever seen Fincher “turn green”.
The injury required surgery, which would ordinarily delay shooting. However, in this case they worked the accident into the script, claiming that Doe had attacked Mills and hurt his arm.
Because, like most movies, the script wasn’t being shot in chronological order, any earlier scenes shot after the injury were treated to Brad Pitt’s classic ‘pocket acting’, where the injured hand was kept out of shot or in a pocket for the duration of the take.