Top 10 Craziest Uses of a Naked Body Double

Many fanboys of this medieval raunch-comedy were stoked to see Natalie Portman strip down by a lake, but don’t be fooled so easily. While a good chunk of the footage used was Portman, the shot of her diving into the lake was in fact a double named Caroline Davis. Turns out, Portman was fine taking her clothes off on camera. What she would not stand for, however, was diving into the icy cold lake. And so, by a twist of Hollywood magic, the Portman lookalike was used for the diving shot.

With the release of 2007’s “Grindhouse,” fans were treated to a rather steamy trailer for the yet unmade exploitation film “Machete,” which featured two naked ladies getting intimate with Danny Trejo in a pool. Upon the movie’s release, those same fans got even more excited upon learning that Lindsay Lohan would be playing one of the nude pool partiers. Alas, Lohan was not comfortable with the shoot, and so a double was used. The craziest thing about this is that the double doesn’t really even look like her! We don’t mind being fooled– we just sometimes wish filmmakers could put some more effort into it. Since this is a self-aware B movie, though, maybe that’s the point.

Actors are a finicky bunch, and can refuse certain things in the script for a variety of reasons. This one, though, we kind of understand! When it came time for Katy Mixon to flash her breasts to an ecstatic Danny McBride in the HBO comedy “Eastbound & Down,” she asked to have a double used for the shot of her baring it all. Her reason? She didn’t like the idea of her dad seeing her nude on television. Thinking about our parents seeing us naked, to Katy we say: fair enough.

This magical epic had no shortage of special effects, but in spite of all the CGI heavy uses of movie magic, the moment that really fooled us was the simplest. It’s the classic scene where the stoic warrior is wounded, and is nursed back to health by the stunning fair maiden. Yeah, you know where this is going. Things get hot and heavy between Henry Cavill and his co-star, Freida Pinto. When it comes time for her to bare all, Pinto used a butt double for the shot. Cavill was obviously in on the ruse, but given the look on his face, it doesn’t look like he minds.

Jack Black is given the magical ability to see women for their inner beauty after the titular Shallow Hal is found to be, well, shallow. Not that he’s a supermodel himself, but whatever. This of course winds up with him finding his true love in Gwyneth Paltrow’s character. When she strips down for him in the hilarious and romantic scene, Paltrow, feeling self conscious, requested a double. The great irony is of course the fact that in a movie about shallowness, judgment, and finding inner beauty, Paltrow herself supposedly was not confident in her looks, but we’ll let you read into that one on your own.

Challenging is a word that can perfectly describe Lars von Trier’s films, both for the audience and the actors involved. When it came time for von Trier to tackle a daring film on the intricacies of sexuality, the film called for characters to participate not only in nudity, but full-on sexual acts. Alongside actors like Shia LaBeouf, Charlotte Gainsbourg used a mix of body doubles and CGI to create graphic sex scenes. In some shots, Gainsbourg’s face was digitally placed over the face of an adult actress who performed acts of penetration on camera.

#4: Vera Farmiga “Up in the Air” (2009)

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Most ladies would jump at any chance to play George Clooney’s love interest. Vera Farmiga got the chance to do just that, but when it came time to shoot, things weren’t all smooth sailing. Before filming began, Farmiga had just given birth to a child, and was still self-conscious about her body. So in a steamy scene where she walks nude from the bathroom to the bed, a body double was cleverly shot from behind to fake it. It’s a pretty quick shot, and would have been tough for most viewers to notice, but probably saved a lot of awkwardness on set.

Make no mistake, a film where two audacious bachelors crash wedding in order to get laid has no shortage of nude scenes. But when A-Lister Isla Fisher came on set to film her bondage scene with Vince Vaughn, she wasn’t down with the idea. In the scene, Fisher’s young nymphomaniac character wakes up Vaughn by rubbing her breasts on his face, before tying him down. Fisher requested a body double, stating that she felt that in a comedy film, a female character showing her breasts made her a sex object, and would ultimately hold her back from being seen as a funny character for the rest of the movie.

In an attempt to *ahem* “change up” the body swapping trope in this 2011 comedy, the filmmakers turned the raunch factor up to 11. This meant lots of nudity. While Olivia Wilde had a rather steamy scene with Ryan Reynolds in which her nipples were digitally added in after for a rather gratuitous nip-slip, Leslie Mann took up the mantle of baring all. Well, sort of… For the breast-feeding scene, as well as that steamy shot where she walks to the bathroom before dropping the mother of all deuces, digital effects were used to place her face on a body double. Before we strip down our top pick here are a few honorable mentions: Angelina Jolie “Wanted”(2008) Keira Knightley “Domino” (2005) Mila Kunis “Friends with Benefits”(2011)

Many consider HBO’s titan of a hit show to be hyper violent soft-core porn. Given the plentiness of both boobs and beheadings, it’s kind of hard to argue with that. Emilia Clarke and Carice van Houten aside, few of the main cast members have fully stripped down. During Cersei Lannister’s walk of atonement, Lena Headey’s face was digitally placed over a body double to create the effect of the once proud queen facing unimaginable cruelty. The show’s renowned for it’s special effects, so we won’t hold it against you if you were fooled. Do you agree with our list? What do you think is the craziest use of a naked body double? For more revealing Top 10s published every day, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.