10 Things You Didn’t Know About In the Line of Fire

November 22nd will go down for millions of Americans as the most memorable and unforgettable day of their lives. People living in 1963 will tell you where they were that day. What the weather was like, what plans they had, and what their reaction was when they heard that President Kennedy had been shot. Like Pearl Harbor before it and the tragedy of 9/11, the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated is a day that forever changed the entire fabric of America. In the Line of Fire isn’t real life but it delves into what some of the repercussions of that day were for a man who fictionally had his life changed. While the film takes its time answering questions about the two main characters I am here to answer a few more that you didn’t know you had. This is 10 Things You Didn’t Know About In The Line of Fire.

1- Music: Ennio Morricone composed the music for the film. If that name rings a bell it’s because he composed the music for some of Eastwood’s all-time classic Westerns like A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

2- The Star: Clint Eastwood was on board the project before director Wolfgang Petersen was. Clint had seen Petersen’s 1991 film Shattered and asked that he be brought in to direct.

3- Real life: One of the big inspirations for the character was the actual Secret Service member who climbed onto the limo after JFK was shot. He would have a 60 Minutes interview years later and had a breakdown right there on camera.

4- USSS: Bob Snow was the former United States Secret Service agent who was the special adviser for the film. He was on set for most of the filming and helped the character move and act like they were actual agents.

5- A Real Man: Clint Eastwood was 63 years old during filming but he still did most of his own stunts for the film. Clint even played the piano in several scenes as he is a massive jazz fan and has played piano for many years.

6- Ginger: The red hair color that you see John Malkovich sporting in the film is his natural hair color.

7- Instinct: Wolfgang Peterson said that Clint didn’t really memorize many lines when he had dialogue heavy scenes. So while he was a one-take kind of guy for many of the scenes (everyone loved how Clint could embody the character’s mannerisms and movements so easily) he would need several attempts at scenes with more dialogue.

8- Phone Calls: They really wanted to make the phone calls between John and Clint look important visually. Both men were always there for the phone calls so they were able to play off of one another really well. One of the later calls in the film has Malkovich’s character getting angry and screaming at Clint over the phone. Clint didn’t know that John was going to deliver the lines like that and you can see in their performances that the scene feels more real.

9- Pow: Clint Eastwood chases Malkovich’s character over the rooftops and finally catches him only to need a helping hand from the man to not fall from his death from a building. Clint point a gun at his face and Malkovich puts it into his mouth. The scene was totally ad-libbed by the actor. Wolfgang Peterson told him to do something weird and that’s what he came up with.

10- The Pro: Everyone on set was in awe as Clint did the scene with Rene Russo where he talked about the JFK shooting and began to water up. They didn’t want to make a sound and ruin the scene as Eastwood wasn’t the type of actor at that time to cry in a scene. That take made it into the final cut of the film.