Awesome, Dear Boy: Berry originally said that she did the film because she wanted the awesome experience of playing a woman beholden to no one. However, in an illustration that Hollywood acknowledges the power of this trope, it turned out that she was only saying this for publicity's sake; she later gave an interview saying that she mainly did it because she was under contract (thus beholden to people).
Box Office Bomb: It only brought back over $80 million of its over $100 million budget, making it a spectacularly expensive failure. Interestingly, it was the highest grossing female-led superhero film until Wonder Woman - not a tough competition, but still notable.
Creator's Apathy: There's an interview where one of the producers admitted they couldn't make sense of the clashing back stories of Selina Kyle's character — which has ranged from jewel thief to urban protector to dominatrix. So they decided to just throw it all in the waste bin and rip off The Crow (1994).
Director Pitof and his production designer Jean Rabasse disliked the film's plot and script. They had actually suggested another plot which they had thought up together, but execs rejected it for being supposedly "too artistic".
Halle Berry famously appeared at the Razzies to accept her award for "Worst Actress". The entire time, she was holding her Oscar for Monster's Ball in the other hand, publicly reminding people that she is usually a good actress; the movie was just THAT bad. Razzies founder John Wilson even remarked that after seeing this, he expects Berry to run for the Oscar again.
Halle Berry: First of all, I want to thank Warner Bros.. Thank you for putting me in a piece of shit, God-awful movie. [...] It was just what my career needed.
In addition to Berry, the film also became a big shame for co-writer John Rogers.
This also happened with one of the film's VFX vendors, Tippett Studio, who actually went out of their way to point out that the only effects they did in the film were the cats. They've since furthered their distance from the film by not even making any mention of it on their site.
Creator Killer: This film, and the process of making it, killed whatever hopes its director, Jean-Christophe "Pitof" Comar, might've had as a frontline director. Even back in Europe, Pitof has only directed one more film since, and it's a TV movie. To make matters worse, he was a successful and respected special effects supervisors prior and after the success of his Vidocq, he burned all the bridges to that industry, too, when going for a Hollywood deal.
Patience and Laurel have a conversation about George's scheme. It was left intact in the novelization.
An alternate ending has Patience go with Tom. This was left intact in the video game.
Divorced Installment: The film was originally a spinoff from Batman Returns, and would have followed Selina Kyle (intended to be played once again by Michelle Pfeiffer) as she supposedly took on a new enemy during a stay at a resort. The script was written by Daniel Waters and completed in 1995 (ironically, on the same day Batman Forever was released), but both Tim Burton and Pfeiffer dropped out soon after and the film was stuck in Development Hell for years.
Hostility on the Set: According to insiders, Sharon Stone was difficult to work with for this film, among other reasons because she personally disliked Benjamin Bratt (she would later veto his casting from Basic Instinct 2 claiming he was a bad actor). While shooting a scene, Stone's mobile phone rang, and she nonchalantly interrupted the scene to take the call.
No Stunt Double: Berry did several of her stunts herself, especially regarding her whip play, which she trained extensively to be able to use. In another of the stunts, she suffered an accident during a chase scene and had to be briefly hospitalized.
As often noted on the web, the film bears a striking resemblance to The Crow (1994). In fact, the movie's first trailer was alleged to have the same narration script as The Crow's own trailer, only changing the respective animal.
The sexual tension-filled basketball game between Patience and the detective was lifted verbatim from Daredevil.
Patience's cat-fueled resurrection as Catwoman is taken directly from Batman Returns.
Screwed by the Lawyers: According to one of the writers, "insane legal issues" prevented Selina Kyle being the main character.
After finding success playing Storm in the first two films of the X-Men Film Series, winning an Oscar for Monster's Ball, and even appearing in the James Bond film Die Another Day, this film derailed Halle Berry's run as a star. This went to the point that reports regarding her involvement in the third X-Men film X-Men: The Last Stand went from her being so confident in her star power that she threatened to leave the film unless she was paid more money to her appearing but being paid less for her role this time round.
The film was also the beginning of the end for Sharon Stone's time in the upper tiers of stars, not helped by the negative reception of Basic Instinct 2 shortly after.
Stillborn Franchise: Halle Berry had signed for a sequel, but after all the bad reviews, development on the sequel was quickly squashed. This also made her available for the third X-Men film, X-Men: The Last Stand; she rejoined that series, but allegedly was paid less for her role that go round. The film also managed the impressive feat of killing off another, unrelated series before it could even really begin; a film starring Berry's Die Another Day character Jinx had been in development for the previous two years, but the critical and commercial failure of this film killed that one too.
Trend Killer: The failure of this film killed off the idea of the Action Girl in Hollywood cinema for quite a long time. Later big-budget Hollywood relegated them to secondary roles as love interests or fanservice characters. The massive success of The Hunger Games franchise brought it back, while the success of Wonder Woman (2017) solidified the viability of female-led action films as major blockbusters.
Ashley Judd and Nicole Kidman were originally considered to play Patience, and the character's surname was originally Price.
An early draft of the script had Patience becoming Catwoman to avenge her mother's death.
The Comic-Book Adaptation was based on an earlier script for the movie, deviating from the final film a few places. The biggest alteration is that Tom discovers that Patience is Catwoman much earlier, finding her mask and letting her know his discovery just after their love-making scene, incidentally excising the infamous handwriting subplot. The ending is also different in that instead of Patience leaving him to live on independently as Catwoman, the two decide to stay together.
Originally, "Outrageous" from Britney Spears was supposed to be the single from the movie. However, Britney injured her knee while filming the music video. With no video to promote the single, they instead used "Scandalous" by Mis-Teeq.
The scrappedDirect to Video animated spinoff film would've had Patience meeting Selina along with delving deeper in the Egyptian mythology of the film.
Misc. trivia for the film:
This movie managed to become the second comic book movie and the first superhero-themed one to win the Worst Picture Razzie; 2015's Fantastic Four (2015), the infamous attempted reboot of the namesake franchise, became the second superhero film and third comic-book movie 11 years later. The other comic-book movie with a Worst Picture Razzie is 1986's Howard the Duck.
to accept her award for "Worst Actress". The entire time, she was holding her Oscar for Monster's Ball in the other hand, publicly reminding people that she is usually a good actress; the movie was just THAT bad. Razzies founder John Wilson even remarked that after seeing this, he expects Berry to run for the Oscar again.Halle Berry: First of all, I want to thank Warner Bros.. Thank you for putting me in a piece of shit, God-awful movie. [...] It was just what my career needed.