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Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Great Bits in Mediocre Movies (Number 3 in a Series)

posted by on August 15 at 11:13 AM

On paper, 1991’s Chains of Gold pretty much fits the definition of the straight to video doldrums: Has-been actor (John Travolta, pre-Pulp Fiction rebirth), Casio-grade soundtrack, vaguely topical storyline (social worker faces off against flashy crack dealer who, in an admittedly nice touch, has a gator pit in his condo). Late in the movie, however, comes immortality, via a bravura sequence featuring three of the most amazingly painful stunts I’ve ever seen.

If anyone knows the whereabouts of the guy who did the bridge stunt (or, more likely, his next of kin), please contact me.

RSS icon Comments

1

That music is amazing. I actually have it play on cue when I'm making out on my couch... or when I'm running from an angry pimp in slow motion.

Posted by Rye | August 15, 2007 11:25 AM
2

Okay, that was a pretty incredible stunt.

That's the bummer about CGI. You never see people do crazy shit like that anymore.

Posted by Judah | August 15, 2007 11:29 AM
3

Crap, they got him anyway. Why the fuck did he keep running down the street, when once the bridge went up he could have run off in any direction without them knowing where he went?

And to Judah: You clearly haven't seen the Bourne Ultimatum, which has some insane non-CGI shit going on.

Posted by Matthew | August 15, 2007 11:37 AM
4

um the opening to the latest bond movie? tons of crazy-ass non-cgi shiat.

Posted by seattle98104 | August 15, 2007 11:46 AM
5
um the opening to the latest bond movie?

Not even. Nor in the Bourne Ultimatum. 'Cause, see, in both cases what you've got is stunt people doing things with a shitload of safety gear, then having the safety gear rubbed out with CGI afterwards. It changes the character of the stunt; alters the trajectory of falling bodies and removes the follow-through. Part of what makes that bridge stunt so awesome isn't just that the guy slams into the bridge; it's that he then turns the rebound into a pretty good dive.

I'd actually say that the most old-school of awesome stunt movies in the last 10 years is Ong Bak. There's clearly some wire scrubbing in there at various points, but when that dude jumps through the roll of barbed wire that's just raw athletic vim.

Posted by Judah | August 15, 2007 11:57 AM
6

forget james bond, check out the opening stunt-sequence to district b-13... amazing!!! you can tell i'm telling the truth based on the three exclaimation marks i used.

Posted by infrequent | August 15, 2007 11:59 AM
7

I'm gonna second District B-13 (Banlieu 13); the parkour stunts in that are pretty incredible.

And even in Casino Royale, they got a real practitioner of the art doing the running, so some of that gravity defiance is done without training wheels.

Posted by thelyamhound | August 15, 2007 1:27 PM

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