October 27, 2021

"In the movies, the prep is everything. You also need time to clean, inspect and repair guns. You need time to fix old clocks."

"In period films, you are sometimes using antiques. But here, there was absolutely no time to prepare, and that gave me a bad feeling." 


That's at Fox News, which, I see, is generating a lot of "Rust" stories. There's also 
"'Rust' shooting left film locals 'rolling their eyes' at alleged lack of safety measures: 'Just unthinkable'/One local moviemaker hopes to see change in safety guidelines so 'the death of Halyna was not in vain.'" The text — though not the headline — makes a strong pitch for the labor union, International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE):
[Santa Fe Community College School of Art and Design dean Dr. Jim Wysong said:] "Immediately before this happened, IATSE narrowly avoided a strike over some of the very kinds of concerns that have been raised over working hours and working conditions, which can contribute to accidents happening.... So there was certainly a lot of buzz about that issue. And then, of course, this tragedy occurred, which kind of underscored some of the concerns that the union was raising about the impact of working conditions on safety.... The union does a great job already on stressing safety. I mean, they're really big on it... In fact, that's one of the things that sometimes creates the tensions when especially on independent productions, they choose not to use union personnel.... I think that building on what the union has done, building on what the curricula of different schools, including ours – what we're doing – moving to something that is more, if not universal that has some well-established standards that are recognized in the industry, across the country and elsewhere – I think that's an important thing.... But ironically, what drives everything ultimately comes down to money and if you're going to get insurance to be able to operate, I think that the underwriters are going to have a lot to say about this. And so maybe that will be how people are forced to come to have some standards in terms of the training.... So, we'll see but I hope that something comes out of this and that the death of Halyna was not in vain that and there will be a legacy of an improvement in safety."

Workplace safety matters, and movie-making happens in the real world. The manufactures like to tell us that they are making "dreams," but movies aren't made like dreams. 

There is still a strong interest in being able to make low-budget movies, and that may be at odds with new standards. How much self-interested overreaching will be done in the name of Halyna Hutchins? 

71 comments:

rehajm said...

Cover for Alec and now the unions. No fault will be found. An ‘accident’…

tim maguire said...

Low budget movies pretty much have to be talky movies. Action movies will always be expensive unless they're done through computer graphics, which even today look like computer graphics if they're done on the cheap.

Alec Baldwin has done action movies, he's been on sets with guns that get fired. There's no excuse for him not knowing that he's cut too many corners.

Enigma said...

California = overreach = unintended consequences = major net negatives.

California's very very very tight laws drove movie productions to other locations that lacked experience or relevant regulations. This is the sad story of California, which decades ago regulated movies in such a way that filmmakers simply left. Jackie Chan could never have created his classic martial arts action films in California.

Not coincidentally, this is the general story of California's politics. Let voters choose random fantasy laws with direct-vote initiated in every election. Spend unplanned billions on a failed bullet train that now goes from nowhere to nowhere. Drive nuclear power out and then rely on coal and natural gas from other areas. Create boutique gasoline formulas that cost $1 more per gallon than anywhere else in the country, and that lead to shortages. Demand health warning labels on all sorts of marginally relevant products, and that become international jokes. Prevent forest management (i.e., cutting trees) and thereby cause more intense annual forest fires. Drive all local manufacturing out so that it occurs in polluted and unregulated places like China and India (buy then buy the same stuff from a "greenwashed" and hypocritical vendor...Nike...Apple).

Drive gun safety and training organizations out because understanding how to check for a loaded gun means one supports guns. Still, reward Harvey Weinstein for decades as he produces graphically violent Tarantino films, abuses women, and "fights the NRA." Create head-in-the-sand conditions so that a tunnel-vision-afflicted utopian Hollywood star commits negligent homicide.

California's utopians are gonna live in their fantasy worlds. Hollywood "stars" are gonna live in their fantasy worlds. This is a symptom of much deeper dysfunction.

tim in vermont said...

IATSE narrowly avoided a strike over some of the very kinds of concerns that have been raised over working hours and working conditions, which can contribute to accidents happening...


All aboard! We are gonna ride this baby for all she's worth!

Tank said...

Geez what a bunch of baloney this is. It takes a few seconds and zero dollars to practice good gun safety rules. Each person who handles a gun should follow them.

Scot Adams raised the same question Tank did: why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?

Chuck said...

It’s the actor who lampooned Trump on SNL. Of course Fox is going to run the story nonstop. Their audience loves it. The hate factor is so strong.

Dan from Madison said...

Tank at 6.33 AM pretty much nailed it. All guns are always loaded.

gilbar said...

Tank asked ...
why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?


Why can't they learn the first rule of guns?
Never point a gun at something you don't want to shoot?

Even IF they're going to fire a gun directly at a camera... There is No need for a Person to be behind the camera

Temujin said...

All of this talk seems so lame. A young woman with family was killed, a man was shot. We're hyping unions? This is basic stuff. To compare the handling of a gun with fixing a clock- as both equals in time and priority- is absurd. Anyone who has been trained in handling guns knows first about safety. You don't get a permit to carry without taking courses and those courses first and foremost stress safety. And given that a gun in the hands of an untrained person can kill- you would think that prop, above all others, would be a priority and require a specifically trained person to oversee them.

Further, guns on set should not be used in any way other than how they are used in the film, and no one should be touching them except those using them in the film, and they have to be trained on how to use them. So there is no question about this, as there is no margin for error. The story is that there were people target shooting with these guns before this took place? Who was target shooting? Who allowed them access to the guns?

The answer is not unions. They have nothing at all to do with this. You don't need a union to make right decisions.

I would look at who the producer is (Alec Baldwin and others) and lay this on them. And just for the record: Hollywood is very much against guns and gun users. It's long been a joke about Americans who love their guns. Well...the vast majority of Americans who use guns are trained on how to use guns and know how to safely use them. Perhaps amateurs should not be allowed near a gun? Do you think?

Amadeus 48 said...

I really think the facts here are going to be important, and right now we have a very rudimentary and selective knowledge of the facts, mixed together with a lot of opinion, much of it centered on what a putz Alec Baldwin is perceived to be.

The one opinion that I am sure of is that Alec Baldwin would never have wanted to hurt Halyna Hutchins in any way, intentionally, unintentionally, or carelessly.

As to the union rules, I am too familiar with crews walking off the job at the McCormick Place convention center because some non-union person plugged a lamp into a wall socket. The union rules are fine, but you will pay and pay.

Roger Sweeny said...

Why not just use fake guns? Like fancy water pistols? No chance of anyone getting hurt and no need for extra employees or procedures.

Fernandinande said...

One time Monk was investigating an on-stage murder where an actress had apparently stabbed an actor with a real knife rather than using a fake knife and it turned out that someone had put peanut butter on an apple the guy was supposed to eat on stage which made him collapse from anaphylactic shock during the stabbing scene and after he fell they called for a doctor from the audience and a fake doctor in cahoots with the understudy came up and stabbed the guy then hid the knife so it looked like the actress had stabbed him.

I bet that's what happened to Baldwin.

Owen said...

Enigma @ 6:19: That is a brilliant beat-down.

Re Prof. A’s question, “How much self-interested overreaching will be done in the name of Halyna Hutchins?” My guess is, “A lot.” If the nation could be turned inside out for months by the death of a career criminal overdosing on fentanyl, why settle for less when a truly innocent woman is gunned down by an arrogant penny pinching fool?

There is a commensalism here: among unions, legislators, litigators and insurance underwriters. Their interests largely align to drive a Safety Culture. Much of what results is good. But as with all things, the law of diminishing returns and the law of unintended consequences are always at work.

In hindsight it is obvious that an obsession with safety is warranted —and almost costless— when filming a gunfight. You don’t need a union to tell you that.

tim maguire said...

Tank said...Scot Adams raised the same question Tank did: why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?

I think it's trickier than this question suggests. The gun doesn't just have to look real when being held, it has to look real when being fired. Which means there has to be an explosion in the barrel more or less just like the one that pushes out a bullet. That "fake" explosion is going to create a whole lot of pressure that has to go somewhere if it's to look convincing.

Pettifogger said...

Tank: re inventing a special-purpose gun just for theatrical productions. How much would it cost to develop and produce such things and how many would you sell a year at what price?

Countless movies are made with real guns without incident. And countless ordinary people fire real guns with live ammunition every day without incident. All it takes is basic competence and respect for the weapon.

Idiot proofing has its limits.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

I'm interested in technical questions about how movies are made. In response to Tank: surely it is possible to have a realistic "looking" gun that doesn't fire at all, or can't shoot projectiles of any kind? A starter pistol? I guess one answer is that there is an element of "realism" in movies, as hard as that might be to believe. Take "ambient noise." We learn about Foley sound effects: they can pretty much add any noise they want to a movie, at a precise point in the action. They can make one person's footsteps ridiculously loud, and then at other times people can climb up and down old stairs with no creaking or other noises. I just read the other day that when there is a conversation in a noisy club in a movie, filming requires nothing loud in the background at all--dancers may be dancing to silence. Especially now with synthesizers and computers, why do they even need "sound" equipment during filming? Why not fake everything? I gather the answer is that ambient noise brings a quality that cannot be faked. Actors probably dub their own lines in a recording studio, but it is still somehow helpful to "capture" the sound they make speaking in a room, or outdoors.

Car crashes, gun fights: there is a way for people, not only experts, to tell whether something real is going on.

Googling fatalities in movie production, I got a bunch of "accidents," many of them non-fatal.

Sherlock Jr. (1924). While hanging from a water tower, Buster Keaton pulled a rope that released water from the tower, knocking him to the ground. In the scene, he stood and ran into the distance. During a routine physical examination 11 years later, an X-ray revealed that Keaton's neck had been fractured.

Hell's Angels (1930). Three pilots were killed during the filming. Producer-director Howard Hughes was badly injured when he personally piloted a low-altitude aerial maneuver after the professional stunt men informed him it could not be done safely or successfully. They were proven right when Hughes crashed and suffered severe head injuries. Hughes underwent plastic surgery to undo the damage to his face, but his left cheekbone could not be repaired.

Oh Yea said...

How expensive and how hard it is to ban any live ammunition from anywhere near the film site? Proper precautions are obvious when you treat the gun like a potential deadly weapon and not a "prop" or toy for plinking.

JRoberts said...

It will be called "pilot error" and no survivors (or "important people") will be held responsible.

Koot Katmandu said...

Not following this close. However, the bottom line to me is who ever pulled the trigger is really responsible. From what I have read it was a real gun. When ever you pick up a real gun you ensure it is safe and unloaded. You never aim or point the gun at anything you do not intend to shoot or get hit if the gun did discharge.

MikeR said...

The Fox News article was very confusing? As others have said, guns should not be a safety issue on set. No bullets. The article almost sounded like they go out and buy a bunch of guns, then check that they aren't loaded. Or not. Ridiculous.

MikeR said...

@Tank "Geez what a bunch of baloney this is. It takes a few seconds and zero dollars to practice good gun safety rules. Each person who handles a gun should follow them." Not one article I've seen has addressed this: Is a movie set a place where actors customarily follow gun safety rules, or do they never think about it and it is assumed by all that there are no real guns and bullets there?
If the latter, one may argue with the system but it isn't the actor's fault.

Tom T. said...

If it's true that people were using prop guns for live-fire target practice in the off hours, issues like "prep" and "crew size" become essentially irrelevant.

Big Mike said...

why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?

And I have the same answer I gave Tank: they’re called starter pistols and are used in track meets all over the world.

But the real answer is, because it’s cheaper to have a rule that no live ammunition is allowed anywhere on the set.

rhhardin said...

The gun is supposed to be loaded. Just with blanks.

rcocean said...

Sorry, but what is so hard about making sure a gun is safe? This seems to be something any intelligent person could learn how to do in a day. Bullets, Guns. Not a lot of variables. How easy it is, is shown by the fact that literally a 5,000 movies with Guns have been made in the last 100 years, and the number of people shot can be counted on two hands.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Scot Adams raised the same question Tank did: why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?

Because then they can’t play with real guns. They LIVE playing with real guns! Occams razor man.

Laslo Spatula said...

Thank goodness the script didn't call for Alec to have a machine gun.

Who knows how many could have been killed.

I am Laslo.

Laslo Spatula said...

Somehow they managed to make all the Star Wars films without any crew getting killed by a 'hot' laser gun.

Maybe talk to them for advice.

I am Laslo.

Laslo Spatula said...

The plus side is that the movie didn't have any helicopter accidents.

Vic Morrow would be glad about that.

I am Laslo.

Laslo Spatula said...

Killing someone on set is probably the only one of the Ten Commandments that an actor doesn't routinely break.

Also: Cats & Dogs is a 2001 comedy film with the voices of Alec Baldwin and Charlton Heston.

Maybe Alec could've learned a few things from Moses about guns.

I am Laslo.

Howard said...

Baldwin has lived his life in perfect harmony to have a huge tragic hubristic crescendo event. The story has it all, of course Fox is going to wring out every advertising dollar possible. If they didn't, it would violate their fiduciary duty to shareholders.

If the democrat party was smart, they would cut out his beating heart out and roll it down the pyramid steps to the screaming crowd below.

Instead they cover his ass at the expense of the midterm election.

Bruce Hayden said...

“Why not just use fake guns? Like fancy water pistols? No chance of anyone getting hurt and no need for extra employees or procedures”

I think that it was yesterday’s Baldwin article that seemed to have been written by his defenders, and they claimed that they weren’t actually shooting Baldwin at the time, but rather he needed the gun to “block” a scene. While they may need accurate looking (and thus often real) guns when filming, this admission that Baldwin was blocking (practicing for) a shot (of the movie, and not of the two people) strongly suggests that he shouldn’t have had the real gun in his hot grubby paws at that time. All he probably really needed at that exact time, given those assumptions, was something of about the same size that he could draw from his holster and pretend to fire. And if they needed something more realistic, they could have just acquired a similar gun, and plugged the barrel, or something.

Assuming those facts, my theory right now is that most guys, at least, enjoy playing with guns, and working with an inert piece of plastic, or even an almost working replica, isn’t as much fun as the real thing. Just isn’t. Baldwin, ever the Prima Donna wanted the real thing. Unfortunately he was the boss too, and the newly hired nonunion film crew came with a newly hired nonunion prop master. And when Baldwin asked for the real gun, they weren’t in a position to tell him no.

We shall see.

Aggie said...

In the bad old days they used live ammunition while filming, including with Thompson submachine guns, which are notoriously difficult to control on full-auto.

The rules are simple and effective. Gun safety is not complicated, and safety hygiene on the set is not difficult - you just have to follow well-established rules.

All of this was imminently avoidable. Baldwin, as the Producer, was in overall control of the set, the schedule and the budget. So his responsibility and accountability extends far past the incident, and well into the root causes. He is done.

A side note, geez, I saw a clip of Baldwin recently talking on his blog. He looks like a full time lush, puffy eyes, bloated face, stumbling on his sentences, facial tics and mannerisms. I wonder (assuming this is the case) if this will start to enter the conversation. Puts his past brushes with aggressive interactions in a different light.

Iman said...

“ It’s the actor who lampooned Trump on SNL. Of course Fox is going to run the story nonstop. Their audience loves it. The hate factor is so strong.”

The light is dim in this one.

Iman said...

On the bright side, Alec Baldwin has gone another 24 hours without shooting anyone.

That’s real, measurable progress.

Tom T. said...

The plus side is that the movie didn't have any helicopter accidents.

If only Vic Morrow had taken a few minutes to check over that helicopter himself...

Temujin said...

Amadeus 48: "As to the union rules, I am too familiar with crews walking off the job at the McCormick Place convention center because some non-union person plugged a lamp into a wall socket. The union rules are fine, but you will pay and pay."

I had to chuckle at this one. I used to rep a company that refused to do anymore shows in Chicago (McCormick Place) or Las Vegas (anywhere) because of union pricing and restrictions on anybody outside of the union doing anything to help themselves. Not to mention the 30 minutes on/15 minutes off with a lot of pairs walking around in between not doing anything.

Iman said...

This is allegedly the young lady who had the responsibility of weapons laid on her…

https://twitter.com/ElijahSchaffer/status/1452178812058226688?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1452178812058226688%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Famericandigest.org%2F

Achilles said...

Everything in these articles trying to cover for Baldwin blames systems and lack of unions and low budgets.

There is zero talk about individual responsibility.

All Baldwin had to do was CLEAR THE FUCKING GUN when he picked it up.

Every responsible gun owner will tell you the same thing. It is not hard for us. We are responsible people in general and we take care of ourselves. When we fuck up it is our fault and we do our best to own up to it.

A free society requires citizens to be able to take care of themselves.

Leftists like Baldwin and Chuck and Howard cannot abide a free society. They must have systems and policing and control.

When they fuck up they want the system to take the blame.

They should go live in a place with other serfs and lords and gtfo of our country.

Bruce Hayden said...

“I think it's trickier than this question suggests. The gun doesn't just have to look real when being held, it has to look real when being fired. Which means there has to be an explosion in the barrel more or less just like the one that pushes out a bullet. That "fake" explosion is going to create a whole lot of pressure that has to go somewhere if it's to look convincing.”

But yesterday, their story was that Baldwin was “blocking” a shot, which apparently is one level of practicing. For that, they don’t really need the accurate looking gun with the accurate sounding bangs, etc.

“Tank: re inventing a special-purpose gun just for theatrical productions. How much would it cost to develop and produce such things and how many would you sell a year at what price?”

The obvious answer to that is to buy a similar gun, then make it permanently inoperable. For, example, a gunsmith could permanently plug the barrel, making it no longer a “firearm” regulated by the ATF. I think with revolvers, I would plug the cylinders too, preventing them from loading real rounds in there. Semiautomatics may even be easier, with easily replaceable barrels. Just buy an extra barrel (for popular guns, probably still less than $200 - always good to have a spare), plug it all the way back, so a round won’t seat, paint it red, and install. May even be better to just use your handy 3D printer to build a solid piece shaped like a barrel, but without a hole down the middle. Make it out of red plastic, or some such. Of course, with popular semiautomatics like Glocks, the cost of a blue or red replica, with a comparable trigger feel, is roughly the cost of that spare barrel. There is a decent market for these fake guns and fake gun parts, because there are a lot of things that can be practiced without the danger of a real gun.

Joe Smith said...

There are maybe only two 'name' actors in Hollywood that are pro 2nd amendment (both past their prime), yet the industry keeps cranking out movie after movie with heavy gun violence.

Have you ever seen any of the 'John Wick' movies?

Holy cow...I am pro-choice on guns, but that is a slaughter-fest.

So pious. So hypocritical.

Welcome to Hollywood!

Paul said...

Folks.. google 'Ray Liotta and Jeffrey Wright movie gun scenes'... and you will find out actors are SUPPOSED to be part of the checks to see if the guns are loaded/unloaded!!!!

Or read it here!

https://www.winknews.com/2021/10/26/stars-stunned-by-mismanaged-set-in-fatal-prop-gun-shooting/

Edmund said...

From what has been said in the press, a lot went wrong on this shoot.
- the camera crew were dissatisfied with safety on the set because of previous incidents, including gun misfires
- the camera crew was replaced that morning with non-union workers
- the armorer apparently left several guns out on her cart and was not around for the scene
- the first assistant director (who is in charge of safety) took one of the guns, gave it to Baldwin, and announced "cold gun" (i.e. it had no live rounds in it)
- during rehearsal, the gun went off. Baldwin may have been doing what he was supposed to do in the actual shot
- the armorer was inexperienced and had had a safety violation on her previous film
- the 1st AD is reported to have had complaints about abusive behavior and safety violations from previous films
- they may have been using some of the prop guns for target shooting earlier in the day or the day before
- blanks and real ammo were found on the set, loose and not in secured storage

A few other observations:
- the budget for the film ($7 million) was probably not enough to have gunshots added in later via CGI, so they used the cheaper option of real guns and blanks. There are sfx houses that specialize in adding the smoke and flame. You can see that in films where the guns fire, but the slide doesn't move.
- there are some terms used on set that don't mean the same as people might expect. "Live round" includes blanks and real ammo. "Prop gun" can mean a real gun, a gun modified to shoot blanks, or a replica; prop means that the actors handle it on screen.
- the armorer is supposed to be on set when guns are handed off to the actors. They are supposed to verify the contents of the weapon with the actor and when handing it off to announce "hot gun" or "cold gun". If the actor tries to verify the contents after that, the armorer is supposed to take the gun back and repeat the verification and handoff.
- real bullets have been used in productions in the past, but they tend not to be any more. Things were tightened up after Brandon Lee died on set. More and more films are going to adding the smoke and flame with CGI. A family member was on a film that was going the CGI route and used replica weapons. When filming a scene where an actor was shooting an automatic rifle, he had to add pretend recoil. He also decided to add machine gun noises - they had to cut and ask him not to do that as his lips were moving.

wildswan said...

Gun safety? Rules are for the little people, Baldwin thought, and shot one of them.

Achilles said...

Laslo Spatula said...

Thank goodness the script didn't call for Alec to have a machine gun.

Who knows how many could have been killed.

I am Laslo.


Automatic weapons are hard to aim and control.

A semi-auto AR-15 is much deadlier in the hands of 99% of the population than an automatic AR-15. More prone to error though. But you will dump the mag in less than 3 seconds. Most people just can't aim fast enough to make that deadly and think holding the trigger down is how you do it.

It isn't.

Automatic weapons are not as big a deal as people make them out to be.

gilbar said...

i suspect, that a Lot of you out there have been to firing ranges
i suspect, that Some of you out there have been on movie sets
i GUESS, that at least One of you, has been to Both

Speaking as someone that has Never been on a set, and Seldom goes to ranges;
it Sure seems to me; that one of those, has a LOT more discipline than the other.
Input Anyone?

Michael K said...

The story has it all, of course Fox is going to wring out every advertising dollar possible. If they didn't, it would violate their fiduciary duty to shareholders.

Sort of like Trump and CNN except the CNN story is true.

Geoff Matthews said...

I'm baffled by the term 'in vain'. She didn't die for any cause. So what does her death mean?
If you don't want this type of death to happen again, that's understandable. But if nothing changes, she didn't die in vain.

robother said...

I think of all the low budget oaters that Hollywood cranked out for 50 years on big screens and TV, the millions of shots fired from rifles and pistols, by cavalry and Indians, in close range face-offs, and no accidental fatalities. But everyone on those sets had some common sense about guns. I doubt any one on those sets would've thought loading prop guns with live ammo to shoot at tin cans during breaks in shooting was a cool thing to do.

Ray - SoCal said...

From the NY Post, same armorer Neal Zoromski to the LA Times:

Veteran prop master turned down ‘Rust’ gig over ‘massive red flags’

I would not be surprised if he has union backing for his media campaign.

From the article:

Days after he turned down the job, Hannah Gutierrez Reed — a 24-year-old ex-model who’d only been armorer once before — announced she’d gotten the job as the “property key assistant/armorer,” the paper said.


And “You never have a prop assistant double as the armorer,” Zoromski said. “Those are two really big jobs.”

Wilbur said...

Try googling "replica firearms".

Ray - SoCal said...

Alec Baldwin obviously has an emergency management PR Firm whitewashing what happened, and spinning it so he has no fault.

The widower of the victim is a lawyer, of a Democratic aligned firm. Alec Baldwin is Democratic Royalty. And the media is Democratic Sympathy.

And the local DA for Santa Fe, Mary Carmack-Altwies, LGBT, Far Left, I read was Soros backed. So I doubt much will happen to Alec Baldwin, Democratic Royalty, for criminal charges, no matter what New Mexico law says.

rehajm said...

Somehow they managed to make all the Star Wars films without any crew getting killed by a 'hot' laser gun.

Poor Stormtrooper marksmanship helped more than the resistance!

Narayanan said...

we know Mr Baldwin is rich and lives luxuriously.

is he also living uxoriously ? wife is half his age

could that explain his outbursts outside home?!

(increasing my word power attempt)

Chris Lopes said...

"When ever you pick up a real gun you ensure it is safe and unloaded. You never aim or point the gun at anything you do not intend to shoot or get hit if the gun did discharge."

^This^ No matter how careless everyone else was (and reports suggest they were VERY careless), the person with the gun in his hand (Alex Baldwin) is responsible for the safe use of it. The rule about every gun assumed to be loaded is there because people make mistakes. Baldwin was the last line of defense against those mistakes.

stlcdr said...

Tank said...
Geez what a bunch of baloney this is. It takes a few seconds and zero dollars to practice good gun safety rules. Each person who handles a gun should follow them.

Scot Adams raised the same question Tank did: why can't they invent a realistic looking gun that does not shoot bullets to use in movies?

10/27/21, 6:33 AM


The gun safety rules are - tragically - simple. It's a shame there isn't a national organization that promotes these rules...

With today's technology it would be quite easy to turn a fully functional gun, with a solenoid and battery into a non-functioning firearm with the effective weight and recoil of a loaded gun, firing.

Of course, you still have the issue of intermingling real firearms with those non-functional ones: and we are back to the rules of gun safety.

Narr said...

Olivier's list of accidental injuries on set was substantial. I'm sure it's online somewhere, but probably no record of the injuries he gave.

The trigger-puller is responsible. Everyone with common sense knows that, and everything else is BS.

As for FOX milking it, they do that with all the stories the MSDNC want to embargo, and I'm not that interested in the details anyway, since

the trigger-puller is responsible.

Maynard said...

Thanks Laslo.

You make this sometimes tedious blog more entertaining.

Michael said...

A decent bet that not a single person involved in that film, including the armorer (LOL), support’s gun rights of any kind. They would all, to a person, be in favor of gun control or confiscation. And with such fervent beliefs there is no reason to learn a single thing about safety. Funny and sad.

Joe Smith said...

'- there are some terms used on set that don't mean the same as people might expect. "Live round" includes blanks and real ammo. "Prop gun" can mean a real gun, a gun modified to shoot blanks, or a replica; prop means that the actors handle it on screen.'

Exactly this...people keep saying 'prop gun' as if it's not an actual gun capable of firing actual bullets.

In a movie or on stage, when an actor picks up a book, or a candlestick, or telephone, those objects are props. They are usually also 'real' things.

Iman said...

Watch the vid in the link I posted at 10:35 AM… see the real Hannah Gutierrez Reed. She seems an odd choice for the job, but I’ve never worked in Hollyweird, so what do I know…

Tom T. said...

it Sure seems to me; that one of those, has a LOT more discipline than the other.

For one thing, only one of those is supposed to have any live ammunition.

Jim at said...

It’s the actor who lampooned Trump on SNL. - Fuckhead

Yeah. That's the only reason we're criticizing the asshole. Has nothing to do with his decades of sneering, snarling attacks on gun owners.

Nope. Must be Trump.

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

This is all distraction.

Baldwin was handed a firearm and he did not check to see if it was loaded.

If someone told me a gun was unloaded and I then pointed at someone and shit them I would be charged with manslaughter.

That's all this is. A firearm is a weapon,not a prop, and Baldwin used it exactly as it was designed to be used. He aimed it, pulled the trigger, and then weapon fired a bullet. The bullet worked as designed, too, unfortunately.

This isn't an NTSB investigation where the process is on trial. There was one failure by one person. Using a weapon is inherently.dangerous.

tim in vermont said...

The difference is that if this were Clint Eastwood or Jon Voight, the right would be saying the same thing, just with less glee, but Chuck would switch his position in a heartbeat.

Sorry, but glee on the right does not excuse Baldwin's negligence.

tim in vermont said...

Go on the internet movie firearms database sometime if you wonder why they don't manufacture fake "realistic guns." I am currently streaming a movie called The Survivors, its an "anti gun" movie, and my god, there are a lot of guns in it. The gun shop scene had a lot of real guns being pointed at people. They want fresh guns. If they used fake guns, it would be like the 555 numbers in movies.

Chris Lopes said...

"It’s the actor who lampooned Trump on SNL."

Actually I thought his Trump stuff was quite funny, along with his work on 30 Rock. I also liked his performance in "The Hunt For Red October". Baldwin is a very talented actor.

That being said, he pointed a gun (he did not check) at a follow human being and pulled the trigger. The result of that action is that said follow human being is no longer among the living. Baldwin's actions are the direct cause of her death. Whether you like him or not, that is what happened.

Joe Smith said...

'Baldwin is a very talented actor.'

Give the devil his due, the man can act.

But he's also a world-class jerk, so there's that...

Readering said...

I'm a Western fan. Just watched Pale Rider from 1985. They sure fired off a lot of realistic revolvers. Explosives too. Something tells me Eastwood didn't allow for target shooting between scenes.

Skippy Tisdale said...

"The hate factor is so strong."

The projection is strong in this one.

Skippy Tisdale said...

"Baldwin has lived his life in perfect harmony"

What on earth does that even mean?