Planning a Dangerous Shot

A dangerous shot is planned so that it looks risky and is as safe as possible. Stunt coordinators measure distances, test equipment, and rehearse movements before the camera rolls. The audience should see only the result.

These eight commentaries describe what that planning involved and where it was not enough. Some accounts are about near misses. Others are about decisions that came before the stunt: who performs it, how the crowd is trained, and how many times it is repeated.

§1 Calculations can be wrong

The Diamonds Are Forever commentary includes Guy Hamilton’s recollection of a dune buggy jump. The stunt was planned around a row of boxes the buggy was meant to clear.

The preparation was careful, and the result was still far outside the plan. The buggy was going much faster than the stunt allowed for. Nobody was hurt, but that outcome came from luck rather than from the plan.

The Nightmare on Elm Street commentary describes a stunt coordinator performing a backward fall onto a staircase.

The padding worked, but the cracked plywood shows how much force it absorbed. A stunt that goes as planned can still come closer to the limit of its protection than anyone expected. Checking the equipment after each take, not only before the first one, shows how much margin is left.

§2 Train everyone in the shot

Large action scenes put risk on people who are not stunt professionals. Mel Gibson describes how Braveheart prepared the extras for its battles.

Three weeks of training let the extras learn to aim a blow so it missed while looking like it connected. The commentary adds that the stunt team worked to keep excited extras from striking each other for real. The training also covered how the camera sees: because a single lens has no depth perception, a miss at the right angle reads on film as a hit.

Repeating the word “safety” can sound like a formality. On a set with many armed extras, it was a practical instruction that had to reach everyone.

§3 Protect the performer and hide the protection

Safety equipment often has to disappear in post-production. The Return of the King commentary describes a climb that looks easier on screen than it was.

The filmmakers chose protection first and dealt with its visibility afterward. Painting out wires adds work in post-production, but it keeps the actors safe on a steep slope.

The Tank Girl commentary describes a stunt done without that protection.

The speakers describe the shot with admiration and alarm. The scene works on screen, but the performer worked without the kind of protection the Return of the King climb used.

§4 Decide who performs the action

Many productions decide whether an actor performs the action or a double does. The Æon Flux commentary describes the case for using the actor.

When the lead performs the action, the camera can stay on her face through a fight and the audience never sees a substitution. Charlize Theron also describes the risk. She was injured early in production, not during a take.

The commentary describes an injured lead as one of the hardest situations a producer can face. An actor who performs her own action adds to the film, but she is also the one person the production cannot replace. Rehearsals carry the same risk as takes and need the same supervision.

Barry Sonnenfeld describes a compromise in Men in Black II.

The double performed the dangerous part of the movement, and a visual effect joined it to a shot of Tommy Lee Jones. The audience sees the actor complete the action without the actor taking the risk.

§5 Count the repetitions

A stunt that is safe once can become harmful when repeated. Tim Lucas describes a death scene in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

Each take was protected in the obvious way: the pistol fired blanks and the pillow was lined with metal. The reported harm came from the number of takes. Noise, impacts, and physical strain accumulate over a day of filming, so the number of repetitions belongs in the safety plan as much as the equipment.

§6 Questions before a dangerous shot

These accounts suggest five questions:

1. What happens if the numbers are wrong? The Diamonds Are Forever buggy landed 40 feet past its mark.
2. How much margin did the last take leave? The cracked plywood on A Nightmare on Elm Street showed how close a successful fall came to its limit.
3. Has everyone in the shot been trained? Braveheart spent three weeks teaching extras how to miss.
4. Who performs it, and what protects them in rehearsal? Æon Flux gained from its lead’s stunt work and faced a serious setback when she was hurt rehearsing.
5. How many times will it be repeated? The Good, the Bad and the Ugly protected each take but not the total.

The audience should feel the danger in a stunt. The commentaries show that the planning behind it has to assume that some part of the plan will fail.