50 Fun Facts About R-Rated Movies

Which 2019 comic-book film became the first R-rated movie to gross over a billion dollars worldwide?

Joker also set box-office records for an October release and won Joaquin Phoenix the Best Actor Oscar.

Which Christopher Nolan film was the director's first to be rated R since Insomnia in 2002?

Oppenheimer earned its R for sexuality, nudity and language, a first for Nolan after two decades of PG-13 releases.

Which R-rated 1973 film about a possessed girl was the first horror nominee for Best Picture?

The Exorcist was nominated for ten Academy Awards in all and won two of them.

Which actress became a star as Vivian Ward in the R-rated romantic comedy Pretty Woman?

Julia Roberts earned her first Best Actress Oscar nomination for the role, and the film stayed Disney's top-grossing R-rated release for 34 years.

In the R-rated comedy The Hangover, which boxer's tiger turns up in the friends' Las Vegas suite?

Mike Tyson plays himself, and both he and the tiger were added in a rewrite after the studio had bought the script.

In the American film rating system launched in 1968, what does the letter R officially stand for?

Restricted means nobody under 17 gets in without a parent or adult guardian, though the scheme is voluntary and not enforced by law.

In the R-rated sci-fi hit The Matrix, which colour pill does Neo swallow to learn the truth?

Red is the pill that wakes Neo inside a mechanical pod in the real world, while the blue one would have sent him back to normal life.

Which R-rated Korean thriller became the first Best Picture winner not in English?

Parasite had already taken the Palme d'Or at Cannes, a double with Best Picture that no film had managed in over 60 years.

Which actor refused his Best Actor Oscar for the R-rated gangster epic The Godfather?

Marlon Brando boycotted the ceremony and sent the actress Sacheen Littlefeather to decline the award on his behalf.

Which masked killer stalks a babysitter in John Carpenter's R-rated 1978 horror classic Halloween?

Michael Myers hides behind a Captain Kirk mask that the crew bought for $1.98 at a Hollywood Boulevard costume shop.

Bill Skarsgård plays which shape-shifting clown in the R-rated 2017 horror blockbuster It?

Pennywise preys on seven outcast children in Derry, Maine, in a film that became the highest-grossing horror release on record.

Which actor won an Oscar as Hannibal Lecter in the R-rated thriller The Silence of the Lambs?

Anthony Hopkins shared in a rare sweep, as the film took all of the Big Five Oscars: picture, director, actor, actress and screenplay.

The R-rated war film Saving Private Ryan stages its opening battle on which D-Day beach in Normandy?

Omaha took four weeks, 1,500 background actors and $12 million to recreate, the most demanding scene of the whole shoot.

Russell Crowe won the Best Actor Oscar as the Roman general Maximus in which R-rated epic?

Gladiator also won Best Picture, with Joaquin Phoenix as Commodus, the emperor's son who murders his father to seize the throne.

Which director made the R-rated hits The Terminator and Aliens before turning to Titanic and Avatar?

James Cameron wrote The Terminator after a nightmare about an invincible robot hit-man sent from the future to kill him.

Brad Pitt plays the soap salesman Tyler Durden in which R-rated 1999 David Fincher film?

Fight Club is based on Chuck Palahniuk's 1996 novel, with Edward Norton as the unnamed narrator who starts the club with Durden.

Joe Pesci won an Oscar as a volatile gangster in which R-rated Martin Scorsese mob film?

Goodfellas was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and Pesci's supporting-actor prize was the one it won.

In the R-rated 1983 film Scarface, Tony Montana arrives in Miami as a refugee from which country?

Cuba is where Montana's story starts, as he reaches Florida in the 1980 Mariel boatlift and climbs to become a drug lord.

Which Saturday Night Live star co-wrote and starred in the R-rated comedy Bridesmaids?

Kristen Wiig wrote the script with Annie Mumolo, and the pair were nominated for the Best Original Screenplay Oscar.

Which Family Guy creator directed the R-rated comedy Ted and voiced its foul-mouthed teddy bear?

Seth MacFarlane made Ted his first feature as a director and performed the bear through motion capture as well as voice.

Which filmmaker behind two violent PG hits of 1984 proposed adding a new rating just below R?

Steven Spielberg directed Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and produced Gremlins, and the rating he suggested, PG-13, arrived that July.

The Oscar-nominated song Blame Canada comes from the R-rated 1999 film of which animated TV series?

South Park only got its R after the ratings board had sent the film back several times with an NC-17 for its profanity.

In the R-rated Best Picture winner Braveheart, Mel Gibson plays which medieval Scottish rebel?

William Wallace was a part Gibson took reluctantly, as he first meant only to direct and pictured Brad Pitt in the role.

Which actor plays the prison smuggler Ellis Redding in the R-rated drama The Shawshank Redemption?

Morgan Freeman was cast even though the source novella describes the character as an Irishman. The part earned him a Best Actor nomination.

Which British actor made a first big-screen appearance as Hans Gruber in the R-rated Die Hard?

Alan Rickman was already in his early forties and almost turned the part down, doubting an action film was the kind he wanted to make.

In the R-rated horror The Shining, the Torrance family spends a winter minding which Colorado hotel?

The Overlook is played in its establishing shots by Oregon's Timberline Lodge, which has no hedge maze of its own.

Which R-rated Quentin Tarantino film won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1994?

Pulp Fiction went on to seven Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, and won for its original screenplay.

In the R-rated comedy Superbad, Fogell's fake ID in the name McLovin comes from which US state?

Hawaii was not amused when the special edition DVD included a replica licence that closely resembled the state's real one.

RoboCop, a 1987 sci-fi hit first given an X rating before earning an R, is set in which city?

Detroit appears as a crime-ridden city of the near future, although the film was shot mainly in Dallas, Texas.

Which comedian turned director won a screenplay Oscar for the R-rated horror film Get Out?

Jordan Peele made Get Out as his directorial debut after years in sketch comedy, and it earned four Oscar nominations.

Charlize Theron plays Imperator Furiosa in which R-rated 2015 action film that won six Oscars?

Mad Max: Fury Road won six of its ten Oscar nominations, and Theron shaved her head to play the part.

Which actress plays the vengeful Bride in Quentin Tarantino's R-rated Kill Bill films?

Uma Thurman dreamed up the character with Tarantino years earlier, which is why the films credit the Bride to Q & U.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays a crooked stockbroker in which R-rated film that set a record for swearing?

The Wolf of Wall Street set a Guinness World Record for the most swearing in a motion picture. DiCaprio had bought the rights to the broker's memoir back in 2007.

Martin Scorsese's first directing Oscar came for The Departed, an R-rated film set in which city?

Boston replaces the Hong Kong of Infernal Affairs, the 2002 thriller that The Departed remakes with an Irish mob boss at its centre.

Sacha Baron Cohen's R-rated mockumentary Borat follows a fictional journalist from which country?

Kazakhstan first denounced the film, then in 2020 borrowed the character's catchphrase for an official tourism slogan.

In the Coen brothers' R-rated comedy The Big Lebowski, which cocktail is the Dude's drink of choice?

White Russian orders surged in popularity after the film came out in 1998, a revival the drink owes to Jeff Bridges's slacker hero.

Sylvester Stallone introduced the troubled Vietnam veteran John Rambo in which R-rated 1982 film?

First Blood adapts a 1972 novel by David Morrell, and its success launched the Rambo franchise of four sequels.

Which horror director, the creator of Freddy Krueger, also made the R-rated 1996 slasher Scream?

Wes Craven turned the project down several times, then trimmed its violence after a dispute with the ratings board over the R.

Which Best Picture winner starring Colin Firth was rated R because of its swearing?

The King's Speech later returned to American cinemas in a second cut with some of the profanity muted, which earned it a PG-13.

Which R-rated 2017 film with Hugh Jackman as an ageing Wolverine earned a screenplay Oscar nod?

Logan became the first live-action superhero film ever nominated for its writing, in the Best Adapted Screenplay category.

What leaked online in 2014 and persuaded 20th Century Fox to greenlight the R-rated Deadpool?

Test footage made on a low six-figure budget reached the internet, and star Ryan Reynolds later said he had leaked it himself.

The R-rated epic The Passion of the Christ is spoken in Latin, Hebrew and which other language?

Aramaic dialogue did not stop it becoming America's highest-grossing R-rated film, a record that stood for 20 years.

Which 1969 drama with Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight is the only X-rated film to win Best Picture?

Midnight Cowboy was first judged an R by the ratings board, took an X on its studio's own decision, and was rated R again for a 1971 reissue.

Which former Lyndon Johnson aide created Hollywood's film rating system, including the R, in 1968?

Jack Valenti left the president's staff in 1966 to head the Motion Picture Association of America, a job he then held for 38 years.

Which former drill instructor plays Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in the R-rated Full Metal Jacket?

R. Lee Ermey was first told he was not vicious enough for the part, then won it and wrote about half of his own dialogue.

The R-rated Vietnam War epic Apocalypse Now is loosely inspired by which Joseph Conrad novella?

Heart of Darkness is set in the Congo of the late 19th century, and the film moves its river journey to wartime Southeast Asia.

Which Kevin Smith comedy was rated NC-17 for its dialogue alone before an appeal won it an R?

Clerks was re-rated without a single cut after its distributor, Miramax, hired a celebrated civil liberties lawyer to appeal.

Which 2013 horror film about ghost hunters Ed and Lorraine Warren earned an R just for being scary?

The Conjuring had no particular scenes the ratings board could ask to be cut, its producer was told: the film was simply too frightening.

Which Kubrick film about the delinquent Alex swapped an X rating for an R after a brief re-edit?

A Clockwork Orange got its R when Kubrick replaced about 30 seconds of explicit material from two scenes, later in 1972.

Zack Snyder's R-rated 300 retells which ancient battle between Spartans and a vast Persian army?

Thermopylae reached the screen by way of Frank Miller's comic series, with Gerard Butler as the Spartan commander Leonidas.