8 Famous Movie Scenes You Didn't Know Were Stupidly Hard To Film

Stanley Kubrick might be the most renowned perfectionist among modern filmmakers, but he was hardly the first anal retentive director. No, that honor belongs to silent film legend Charlie Chaplin.

Chaplin was what one might refer to as a "master of all trades". Not only did he star in nearly 100 short and feature-length films, but for the majority of them he was also the writer, director, editor, stuntman and, later on, even the soundtrack composer. Maybe that's why he expected his actors to do their job -- their one job -- so perfectly.

At least, that's the only defense I can come up for as to why he insisted an actress repeat a line more than 300 times...in a silent movie.

City Lights is one of Chaplin's highest-regarded films, and his attention to detail is certainly part of what makes it so special. But one has to wonder why Virginia Cherrill, the actress who plays a blind flower girl and Chaplin's love interest, was asked to repeat the line "Flower, sir?" more times than Radiohead has performed their hit song "Creep" in concert.

Sure, Cherrill was as green as can be -- City Lights was her first legitimate role -- but was there really that much improvement between take #50 and take #300? All in all, this ultra-brief scene was attempted 342 times over the course of an entire year of production. Because if they'd been filmed back-to-back, Cherrill would have likely poisoned everyone on set.