Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

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• In Samuel Taylor Coleridge's famous poem, "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", a ship encounters an albatross which the sailors believe brings the breeze and gives the ship good luck. The Mariner kills the albatross and he and the ship are cursed with bad luck. In the film, one of the seamen remarks to Maturin, the doctor, that a bird flying close to the HMS Surprise may be an albatross. A Royal Marine trying to kill this bird of good faith accidentally shoots Maturin, certainly an omen of bad luck for the crew.
• The first movie to ever film on the Galapagos Islands. Although, the scene where the crew is chasing marine iguanas was filmed in Baja California with regular green iguana which had been dyed black.
• When Capt. Jack Aubrey and his crew disguise their ship to lure in the French frigate "Acheron", the name of The Surprise is changed to "Syren", a play on the word "Siren", a sea nymph from Greek mythology, who lured sailors to their doom.
• A 50-gun HMS Surprise was at the shelling of Fort McHenry in Sept. 1814. This was the famous bombardment that resulted in Francis Scott Key writing "The Defence of Fort McHenry" later to become "The Star Spangled Banner".