Babe used 48 pigs to complete filming, says George Miller

If you’ve ever watched Mad Max: Fury Road director George Miller’s IMDb, you’ll know it has an eclectic — some might say chaotic — list of films. There are two films by Susan Sarandon aimed at adults, four Mad Max films, and then – the children’s films Happy Feet and Babe: Pig in the City.

In addition to directing the Babe sequel, Miller also co-wrote the screenplay for the first Babe, which was released in 1995. to act in the film.

According to a 1995 Entertainment Weekly article, “Because pigs are bred to grow very large very quickly, the production team could only use each Large White Yorkshire (purebred was necessary because their physical attributes could be predicted) during a three-week window for actual filming, so every three weeks 6 pigs were bred, resulting in 48 pigs, 46 of which saw at least a few seconds of screen time. had to be rigorously indoctrinated by animal trainer Karl Lewis Miller (no relation) during the five months of filming.

The film was populated entirely by young women (some things in Hollywood never change); “Although the film deliberately kept Babe’s gender unspecified, due to all the ground-level and behind-the-scenes filming that had to be done, only female piggies were used. (The private parts of the male piggies proved a little too visible.) The pigs were filmed when they were between 16 and 18 weeks old and 18 inches tall.

Miller’s filmography will only get more chaotic with the release of Three Thousand Years of Longing, in which Idris Elba plays a genius and Tilda Swinton is the one who granted three wishes.

If you’re a Babe fan, check out our guide to the best family movies.