Hidden Details and Secrets You Probably Missed In “Forrest Gump”

Forrest Gump is an iconic American movie that you’ve most likely seen or heard of. Since its 1994 release, this comedy-drama has captivated millions around the world. The movie tells the story of Forrest Gump – played by Tom Hanks – a slow-witted yet kind-hearted man from Alabama who witnesses and unknowingly influences several historical events in the 20th century.

Several well-known actors turned down the opportunity to play Forrest Gump. Tom Hanks accepted the role after John Travolta, Bill Murray, and Chevy Chase declined to do so. Travolta declined the role so he could star in Quentin Tarantino’s dark comedy crime movie Pulp Fiction, for which he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.

Tom Hanks personified Gump’s character wonderfully, and it’s a good thing that he was chosen for this role. Not only was he allowed to be in the cast of an award-winning movie, but it also paved the way for him to become a dramatic actor. This role marked a major turning point in Hanks’ acting career.

Tom Hanks won Best Actor at the 67th Academy Awards for his role in Forrest Gump. The movie also won five other Academy Awards that same year: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Visual Effects, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Film Editing.

Sally Field, who played Forrest Gump’s mother in the movie, is just ten years older than Tom Hanks. She was made to look older than she actually was with the help of a gray wig and some makeup. Interestingly, the two previously starred in the 1988 comedy-drama Punchline, where Field played Hanks’ love interest.

If you’re hoping to see Forrest Gump’s childhood home on your next trip to Alabama, you’ll be disappointed. The house that was used in the movie – a large, old southern farmhouse – was built in South Carolina, and it was completely demolished after filming had ended. 

Instead of receiving a salary, Tom Hanks agreed to a share of the movie’s earnings. This turned out to be a wise decision for Hanks, given that the movie raked in more than $677 million at the box office.

Haley Joel Osment was a child actor who appeared in numerous dramas and thrillers in the 1990s, including the 1999 psychological thriller The Sixth Sense. Osment made his acting debut at age six in Forrest Gump, where he played Forrest Gump, Jr.

Ever noticed how Forrest always had his eyes closed in every picture taken of him throughout the movie? The reason this keeps happening has something to do with Hanks and the director wanting to create a convincing character with odd quirks and habits. Hanks wanted to convey someone who was focusing way too hard on being “normal.”

Quite often, actors need a body double for physically demanding scenes. While it’s not always easy to match the actors, the industry usually finds a way. Luckily, the Forrest Gump crew did not have to look very far for a suitable double for Hanks. For many of the running scenes, Tom Hanks’ younger brother Jim was his body double.

One of the movie’s most iconic lines – “My name is Forrest Gump. People call me Forrest Gump.” – wasn’t even in the script. The line was ad-libbed by Hanks, and Robert Zemeckis loved it so much that he decided to keep it in the movie. Forrest says this line in the scene where he meets Bubba for the first time.

One lucky tourist from Atlanta got a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to star in what would become one of America’s most beloved movies. The tourist played the reporter who interviewed Forrest when he visited Washington DC to receive his Medal of Honor.

The scene where Forrest receives his Medal of Honor looks quite realistic. This is because the creators used real footage of American soldier Sammy L. Davis receiving his Medal of Honor from President Lyndon B. Johnson. Hanks’ head was superimposed over that of Davis.

Robin Wright received critical acclaim for her role as Jenny Curran – Forrest’s childhood friend and love interest – receiving Golden Globe Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards nominations for Best Supporting Actress. Other actresses who turned down the role of Jenny include Demi Moore, Jodie Foster, and Nicole Kidman.

One of the things that director Robert Zemeckis struggled with was figuring out Forrest’s accent. It wasn’t until he heard the young actor Michael Conner Humphreys speak that he knew exactly how Forrest should sound like. Humphreys played the young Forrest Gump.

While in Washington DC, Forrest meets an activist named Abbie Hoffman, who invites him to an anti-war protest to speak about his experience fighting in Vietnam. However, protesters couldn’t hear what Forrest was saying as his microphone had been unplugged.

Following the movie’s success, Winston Groom – the author of the novel that the movie is based on – decided to write a sequel called Gump and Co. The sequel’s text contains grammatical and typographical errors to remind readers of Forrest’s lack of intelligence and education.

In the movie, we see Forrest in different stages of his life. We first see him as a child, then as a teenager, and finally as an adult. You may have noticed Forrest wearing a blue checkered shirt in different scenes throughout the movie. There’s a perfectly good reason for that.

The running scene in Forrest Gump was inspired by a true story. In 1982, a 16-year-old named Louis Michael Figueroa promised a ten-year-old cancer patient that he would run across the US for him. He then set out from New Jersey to San Francisco, raising funds along the way for the American Cancer Society.

Among those who turned down the opportunity to play Gump’s friend Bubba Blue were Ice Cube and Dave Chappelle. Ice Cube reportedly rejected the offer as he didn’t want to play a dumb character, while Chappelle didn’t think that the movie would be successful.

The movie begins with a feather drifting through the air and landing before Forrest’s feet. Fans of the movie have interpreted this scene in many ways. To some, the feather symbolizes Forest’s compassionate and wandering nature.

While Mykelti Williamson was fortunate to get cast as Bubba, he would, unfortunately, struggle with being typecast after Forrest Gump. Many people in Hollywood also didn’t realize that Williamson’s lip deformity in the movie wasn’t real.

Robin Wright was feeling quite sick while filming the scene in which Jenny performs at a nightclub in Nashville, Tennessee. Filming this scene took 24 hours to complete. To make matters worse, she had to perform topless.

The bench that Forrest sits on in the movie is just as iconic as the movie itself. The bench scenes were filmed at Chippewa Square, one of the busiest downtown squares in Savannah, Georgia. Four fiberglass benches were used during production.

Gary Sinise, who played Lieutenant Dan Taylor, is not an amputee in real life. In the movie, he is initially shown as an able-bodied person. He later loses both of his legs in Vietnam. Special effects were used to erase his legs.

Robin Wright wasn’t the only cast member who filmed their scenes while sick. Tom Hanks had the flu while filming the football scene. Unfortunately for the actor, a tight filming schedule meant that he had no other option but to show up on set.

The movie featured a total of six songs by the rock band The Doors. Robert Zemeckis was a huge fan of the band and believed that their sound evoked the wild feeling of the era quite well. He was right – the movie wouldn’t have been the same without their music.

The scene in which Forrest is sitting outside the principal’s office while waiting for his mother was inspired by Norman Rockwell’s painting “Girl With Black Eye.” The painting first appeared on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 23rd, 1953.

The Forrest Gump movie differed substantially from the novel. In the movie, Forrest is more naive, passive, and impulsive. In the book, he is more self-aware, saying in the book’s opening that he is treated poorly by others because they think he’s stupid.

Tom Hanks’ daughter Elizabeth and Robert Zemeckis’ son Alexander both appeared in the movie. They were among the schoolchildren who made fun of Forrest on the bus. Elizabeth, also known as EA Hanks, has since become a writer – she previously worked as a staffer at Vanity Fair and as an associate editor at The Huffington Post.

In the movie, Jenny famously dies of illness, which breaks Forrest’s heart. There has been a lot of conversation around Jenny’s true cause of death since the movie came out since the directors never said definitively what it was.

Jenny’s last name was never said out loud in the movie, but if you pay close attention, you’ll know that her last name is Curran. You’ll see her last name written on the envelope that Forrest sent her while he was in Vietnam.

Tom Hanks agreed to star in the movie after reading the script for just an hour and a half. According to producer Steve Starkey, they sent the script to Hanks because they believed he was the only one who could play the role. After reading the script, Hanks called and said, “I’m in!”

Tom Hanks agreed to star in Forrest Gump as long as the movie was as historically accurate as possible. The movie includes several real-life events that took place in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, like the March Against the Vietnam War and the Watergate Scandal.

Savannah, Georgia served as the backdrop of many of the movie’s most memorable scenes. Many of the movie’s war scenes were shot on Hunting Island, 15 miles east of Beaufort in South Carolina. These days, Hunting Island is one of South Carolina’s most-visited state parks.

Forrest Gump has many emotional scenes throughout the movie. Apparently, Tom Hanks would frequently shed tears during filming. Tom Hanks himself admitted to crying while filming the scene where Lieutenant Dan introduces his wife to Forrest for the first time.

Comedian Dave Chappelle once joked on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart that he didn’t like the movie because Forrest Gump, a man with a below-average IQ, was a much better actor than he was. Chappelle reportedly has an IQ of 185.

Despite raking in $678 million at the box office, the movie was not a financial success. It was seen as a “successful failure,” largely due to production costs, marketing costs, distributors’ and exhibitors’ hefty fees, and the vast sums paid to the lead actor and director.

When the casting team held an open casting call for the role of young Forrest, they went in not knowing exactly what they were searching for. All they knew was that they needed a young Tom Hanks “with light eyes and a quirky disposition.” They surely found all that in Michael Conner Humphreys.

After Forrest is certified as an All-American football player, he travels to Washington DC to meet President John F. Kennedy. At the White House, Forrest helps himself to fifteen Dr Peppers. When it was his turn to be congratulated by JFK, all he could say was, “I gotta pee!”

Forrest Gump wasn’t originally a Paramount Pictures project. The rights to this movie had been owned by Warner Bros., but the studio decided to not move forward with the project due to fears that audiences would no longer be interested in it following the success of 1988’s Rain Man, whose main character was a man with a mental disability.

All of the songs in the movie’s 32-song soundtrack were by American artists. Among the artists that were featured on the soundtrack include Elvis Presley, Aretha Franklin, the Beach Boys, the Doors, Simon & Garfunkel, and The Doobie Brothers.