Indiana Jones Real Skills, Real Time

[hollywood1340]

Watching Anthony's bit on Extreme Marksman got me thinking. How about recreating all the greatest Indiana Jones whip stunts old school? Without the swinging of course. But no Spielbergian cut as the whip is used?
ROTLA
-The Gun Snatch
-Log Wrap
-Poker Snatch
-Cairo Work
TOD
-Tusk Wrap
-Trunk Wrap
-Neck Wrap
-Lamp Wrap
LC
-Leg Wrap
KOTCS
-Gun Snatch

Most us here could do 90% of this if not more. But to put it on "screen" as it were would make for a nice diversion, don'tcha think?
Comments? Questions?

[rjallen70]

Don't forget the waist wrap at the end of TOD.
Ron

[Hollowpond]

And the ROTLA "Jam the turks head into a tight spot and then get towed behind a truck"

[Greengo]

Also, the overhead light wrap from the rafters inside the Area 51 building. (KOTCS) And landing inside the truck by accident.

[Indiana County Jr.]

And somehow trying to stop your friend from floating into an "interdimensional rift"




Crack On!
Allen

[hollywood1340]

Right, but I wouldn't count jamming the turkshead for the RSRT Challeng.

[McFly]

This sounds like a fun challenge / idea! I may want to try these out and make a quick video of the attempts.

It might look something like this:

Followed by:

Also don't forget the cable wrap in LC, before he swings to get to Henry Sr.

Shane

[hollywood1340]

That's why I put it out there. I hope a few of us will post attempts!

[Canuck Digger]

Actually, when I was a kid first learning how to use a whip, the turn-and-snatch-the-gun from Raiders was something I practiced a lot, I practiced most of the tricks in that film I'm afraid (... and I gotta tell you, unless you're a complete dumdum with a gun, there is no way that trick can beat a bullet, especially if the pistol is already out of it's holster and already cocked, so don't count on it to save your life mate.

As far as the wraps and swinging goes, the main difficulty (asside from the whip not breaking as you're over a bottomless pit of course), is wrapping it so it doesn't come loose when you put weight on it, especially if it's on a smooth surface (I know, I tried).

The snatches are pretty basics given a minimum of precision. By the time I was 16, I could snatch a match with my 8 foot bullwhip and I was self-taught, so imagine if you have a real whip artist teaching you!

Same with the bodywraps.

Being dragged behind a truck with only the butt of the whip alone to hold your weight is a bit touchy though. Depending on the whip, it might work if you are not too heavy and if it's for a very short amount of time and if your body is flat on the ground (as opposed to dangling in mid-air). But again, I wouldn't count on it to save my life.

Basically, I think the only tricks I would put money on are the snatches and the body wraps. The rest is doubtful if you are a grown man. I'm closer to that german mecanic (Pat Roach...) in size than I am Indy, and there is no way I would trust a bullwhip to hold my weight with most of these stunts... I'd rather just get a good rope hehehe.
Cheers,

Franco

[PyramidBlaster]

I had the Quickdraw (the 'Barranca gun grab') in my old video from last year...I'll have to recreate it in a nicer fashion. Perhaps I'll try them all.....

[tomek9210]

Great idea I think.
Have you seen this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsRIXB9C ... annel_page ?
This cowhide bullwhip is made by Kiscien and the second one used in swinging scene is from triskellion.biz (german whipshop)
Cheers!

[hollywood1340]

I'd say seven of ten. I've always seen the first use of the whip as hitting the hand or wrapping the gun. The problems of wrapping the arm are seen. And the swinging WAS cool. Timewarp/Mythbusters

[tomek9210]

Yes, now everybody can see how looks cowhide bullwhip after swinging, sorry - swinging attempt I'm curious what happens if we will use roo whip. Will it break or no? What do you think?

[thefish]

That first shot with the whip taking out the gun that they determined was "False" is the same problem I have with Mythbusters...Just because the guy throwing the whip there, (who's form was all over the place, and it didn't look like the whip was rolling out incredibly cleanly,) couldn't do it, doesn't mean it wouldn't work. It's all part of this myth that I think needs busted that if a couple fairly clever guys with a video camera can get a show on TV, and they try something that doesn't work, it's instantly impossible, (I know, I know..."The Mythbusters" never claim that, and I don't in any way think that's their intent. In my limited interactions with Adam Savage, he seems to be a stand-up guy who is just happy to get PAID to go out and try all this cool stuff! But so often I hear, "But mythbusters disproved that!" which is utter bollocks!)

Stupid to throw a whip at a guy with a loaded gun? Well yeah, but when a guy with the intent of KILLING you has the thing cocked and pointed at you, what ELSE are you going to do? The whip is primarily effective as a "Suprise Attack." Indy uses it as such. Wise decision? Not really, and I'm sure not arguing the practical efficacy of using a whip as a defence against a guy with a gun. But like the old saying goes, if you're falling out of an airplane without a parachute...You might as well flap your arms and hope A LOT...

Plus, if you watch the movie, Barranca's hand isn't wrapped, it's hit...HARD. The gun doesn't go sailing out of Barranca's hand toward Indy, it gets dropped, and Barranca goes running off into the jungle clutching his hand.

You can take fingers off with a heavy whip like a Morgan. The energy transfer from that heavy mass in the butt end down that heavy thong can easily slice flesh, snap bones, and amputate digits. The slo-mo shot with the bag was @#$%. The thrower was putting NO force behind that throw at all. He hit it with about the same velocity that he smacked the guy who said, "Yeah, that hurt!" In recent conversations with my friend who knocked a twenty-five-cent piece sized hole in his forearm with a bullwhip, he told me that he didn't think the popper or fall ever touched him. He claims that it was the shockwave from the crack. I don't know if I buy this, but in a 2003 study by Doctors Tyler McMillan and Alan Goriely of the Mathematics department at the University of Arizona, Tuscon, they determined that the tip of a whip can theoretically accelerate to speeds in excess of 50,000 times that of the accelleration of gravity! So, don't give me that a person suddenly smacked with a whip won't drop a gun! They'll drop the gun, their jaw, and probably a load into their underwear.

Also, the guy in the video demonstration was telegraphing...A LOT...At first, he was doing the wrap with a circus crack. Then he switch to a flick when he was trying to cut the bag. The advantage of flick cracks is that they need little setup on their "Load Phase." Watch DeLongis's whip demo, the French "Indy IV" interview, and the Extreme Marksman clip. With a little practice, you can deploy that bullwhip faster than a gun, and once the whip is moving there's not much chance of dodging it.

As for swinging from a whip? Morgan's "American Classic" design was developed partially for Hollywood stuntmen. The wider, overlapping, (what I once called "unbevelled, until Bernardo Del Carpio showed me otherwise on David's and his own work,) strands were MEANT to take abuse that stunt men would have to put them through. That meant lots of wraps, and maybe even swinging from them. This is DIRECTLY mentioned on page 105 and 106 in the second edition of of Morgan's "Whips and Whip Making," in discussing the development of his 450 series bullwhip. Now, it IS doubtful that Mr. Morgan was actually saying that he made his whips to survive the stresses of repeatedly supporting the weight of a grown man. But they will do it. People have described it here. Kangaroo would be better in this than cow, as it will stretch...A LOT, and the braiding of leather has an advantage is that the stress on the leather is distributed, THEORETICALLY evenly over the length of the whip, (unlike a chain that is only as strong as it's weakest link, the strength of a braid is increased with the addition of strands...I believe that multiplies exponentially as well...I'm by no means a mathematician.) The problem them becomes that the leather might not be elastic enough to "bounce back" and remain useful as a whip.

But hey. The whips belong to production company prop departments, right? Not the actors, not the stunt men, not the directors, (OK, sometimes Stunt men, who often buy a lot of their own gear...And who can blame them...Train with what you're going to use. Know what you're going to use.) But if I handed you a $800 Morgan whip, and said, "I will pay you prevailing wage, and get you credits toward your SAG card to crack the end of this over that tree branch and climb to safety while I get it on film." What would YOU do? Say, "but what if it damages the whip?"

So yeah...You can do it with a ruggedly made bullwhip.

However, if you attempt to try it with one of mine, and I'll shoot you before you can crack the gun out of my hand.

Anyway, all the best and happy cracking.

[WhipDude]

TheFish! I agree! To add to it, I have wrapped the whip around the gun to pull it out of somebodies hand before. My friend was holding a airsoft gun and was not a junk lightweight plastic. He had a firm grip around the gun and it was rather heavy. I did manage to pull the gun out of his hand pretty quickly. I do agree though, he hit his hand and he dropped the gun, not actually wrap which is the misconception it seems.

What do you mean 50,000 speed? Go more in depth please?

Quarter sized hole in forearm? Where exactly at? When I think of a hole, I think completely through and not partially. I'd be interested in hearing more.

[Weston]

Well said Fish! I have no doubt my EM-Brand could handle my scrawny 165lbs for a brief time, I just don't have the heart to put it through that for anything less than a real emergency or well paying stunt gig. Hollywood1340, this is a fantastic challenge you've thrown down. It's going to take some time to get through all that, but I'd like to give it a go.

Weston

[JMObi]

Like the Fish, I think the waterside disarming scene in Raiders, though a theatrical introduction of the character of Indy Jones, is very plausible. That is why this opening scene is powerful.

Crazier and more unlikely things have happened in fights and confrontations. Surely, the fictional Jones is a plucky individual who appreciates some risk taking. If you like, he was a fool for a split second, but his foolishness paid off. He might have done the careful thing, or the obvious thing, and lost out. He also might have known that the other guy didn't have it in him to shoot him.

That is why it's good cinema. It is a snapshot of a moment of unlikely bravery, or foolishness, that paid off.

As for the technical reality of leather disarming someone of a metal weapon, or carrying heavy weight....it is a matter of recorded Australian history, whether myth or no, that a one Wentworth D'Arcy Uhr, an explorer and bush policeman of the northern territory about 120 years ago, knocked a gun from someone's hand with a stockwhip when it was pulled on him in an altercation (I don't know the book's title anymore but it was a history of the northern territory cattlemen and explorers, published in the late seventies). As mentioned in the thread above the logical thing to do would be to crack the whip at the gun holder's hand. A whip can break a thick bottle easily....

Regarding carrying of weight, I once helped out on a cattle muster where a beast would not get up off the ground. My boss tied a stockwhip to one of the horse's tails, the other end to the full grown cow, and the horse was encouraged to pull by my boss while me and another worker tried to help the cow to its feet. The whip didn't break. That is one instance in the real world of a whip being put to a utilitarian use as a weight bearing tool.

There was also the time that Jim helped Jessica up the face of the cliff with a stockwhip....oh darn, that was a movie...

[Marhala]

I think the problem with the swinging stunt is the whip itself. A bullwhip with an Australian construction such as Morgan's: many THIN layers of kangaroo (around 1mm in thickness), is at a disadvantage against abrassion and weight. On the other hand, if the whip were made with a thicker leather, it would hold your weight. I used to swing on a Mexican rawhide whip which only had a twisted core leaving the hand part, and the rest was a four plait. The whip resisted every time.

I think now we know: An American style whip with Australian construction (at least made of cowhide) won't stand such abuse. A whip made out of thick leather will... But what about a roo, one? Morgan brings up the anecdote of someone swinging from one of his whips, and it didn't break.

Now... what was that whip they used to pull the cow with? And what construction did it have?

[JMObi]

Ah, I remember it well (it wasn't mine, it was the other jackaroo's).

'twas a 4 plait redhide whip, fairly old. Cowhide.

[knibs7]

That first shot with the whip taking out the gun that they determined was "False" is the same problem I have with Mythbusters...Just because the guy throwing the whip there, (who's form was all over the place, and it didn't look like the whip was rolling out incredibly cleanly,) couldn't do it, doesn't mean it wouldn't work. It's all part of this myth that I think needs busted that if a couple fairly clever guys with a video camera can get a show on TV, and they try something that doesn't work, it's instantly impossible, (I know, I know..."The Mythbusters" never claim that, and I don't in any way think that's their intent. In my limited interactions with Adam Savage, he seems to be a stand-up guy who is just happy to get PAID to go out and try all this cool stuff! But so often I hear, "But mythbusters disproved that!" which is utter bollocks!)

Stupid to throw a whip at a guy with a loaded gun? Well yeah, but when a guy with the intent of KILLING you has the thing cocked and pointed at you, what ELSE are you going to do? The whip is primarily effective as a "Suprise Attack." Indy uses it as such. Wise decision? Not really, and I'm sure not arguing the practical efficacy of using a whip as a defence against a guy with a gun. But like the old saying goes, if you're falling out of an airplane without a parachute...You might as well flap your arms and hope A LOT...

Plus, if you watch the movie, Barranca's hand isn't wrapped, it's hit...HARD. The gun doesn't go sailing out of Barranca's hand toward Indy, it gets dropped, and Barranca goes running off into the jungle clutching his hand.

You can take fingers off with a heavy whip like a Morgan. The energy transfer from that heavy mass in the butt end down that heavy thong can easily slice flesh, snap bones, and amputate digits. The slo-mo shot with the bag was @#$%. The thrower was putting NO force behind that throw at all. He hit it with about the same velocity that he smacked the guy who said, "Yeah, that hurt!" In recent conversations with my friend who knocked a twenty-five-cent piece sized hole in his forearm with a bullwhip, he told me that he didn't think the popper or fall ever touched him. He claims that it was the shockwave from the crack. I don't know if I buy this, but in a 2003 study by Doctors Tyler McMillan and Alan Goriely of the Mathematics department at the University of Arizona, Tuscon, they determined that the tip of a whip can theoretically accelerate to speeds in excess of 50,000 times that of the accelleration of gravity! So, don't give me that a person suddenly smacked with a whip won't drop a gun! They'll drop the gun, their jaw, and probably a load into their underwear.

Also, the guy in the video demonstration was telegraphing...A LOT...At first, he was doing the wrap with a circus crack. Then he switch to a flick when he was trying to cut the bag. The advantage of flick cracks is that they need little setup on their "Load Phase." Watch DeLongis's whip demo, the French "Indy IV" interview, and the Extreme Marksman clip. With a little practice, you can deploy that bullwhip faster than a gun, and once the whip is moving there's not much chance of dodging it.

As for swinging from a whip? Morgan's "American Classic" design was developed partially for Hollywood stuntmen. The wider, overlapping, (what I once called "unbevelled, until Bernardo Del Carpio showed me otherwise on David's and his own work,) strands were MEANT to take abuse that stunt men would have to put them through. That meant lots of wraps, and maybe even swinging from them. This is DIRECTLY mentioned on page 105 and 106 in the second edition of of Morgan's "Whips and Whip Making," in discussing the development of his 450 series bullwhip. Now, it IS doubtful that Mr. Morgan was actually saying that he made his whips to survive the stresses of repeatedly supporting the weight of a grown man. But they will do it. People have described it here. Kangaroo would be better in this than cow, as it will stretch...A LOT, and the braiding of leather has an advantage is that the stress on the leather is distributed, THEORETICALLY evenly over the length of the whip, (unlike a chain that is only as strong as it's weakest link, the strength of a braid is increased with the addition of strands...I believe that multiplies exponentially as well...I'm by no means a mathematician.) The problem them becomes that the leather might not be elastic enough to "bounce back" and remain useful as a whip.

But hey. The whips belong to production company prop departments, right? Not the actors, not the stunt men, not the directors, (OK, sometimes Stunt men, who often buy a lot of their own gear...And who can blame them...Train with what you're going to use. Know what you're going to use.) But if I handed you a $800 Morgan whip, and said, "I will pay you prevailing wage, and get you credits toward your SAG card to crack the end of this over that tree branch and climb to safety while I get it on film." What would YOU do? Say, "but what if it damages the whip?"

So yeah...You can do it with a ruggedly made bullwhip.

However, if you attempt to try it with one of mine, and I'll shoot you before you can crack the gun out of my hand.

Anyway, all the best and happy cracking.

THANK YOU!!! I completely agree!! This guy has HORRIBLE form. I mean come on, is it really that hard to wrap your whip around something like a wooden beam? NOOOOO

Kyle

[Marhala]

And does anyone in here ever crack his whip by throwing it and jerking it back? I mean, it is part of the principle of multiple cracking, but not really for single cracks... Looks very amateurish to me

[Indiana County Jr.]

Marhala wrote

Looks very amateurish to me

Indeed I agree,
I was very much unimpressed by the display on the video. Honestly, just because a person on a "show" cannot do the stunt, does not mean that some of them cannot be done at all. If they had approched COW in the first place, I am sure they would have found many of us here who have tried many of the stunts (not the dangerous mind you.. ) and found some of them pliable, and might I add demonstrate a better display of technique than these guys!

Crack On!
Allen

[Canuck Digger]

Hey guys,
these are all very valid points.

Except one.

A stunt whip is not designed to be swung from. It's designed to withstand more scrapes, nicks and cuts than the then-average whip, that a film production is likely to inflict on a whip (dragging on the ground, used on sand, gravel or rocks..). A swinging whip (if I can call it that) is basically just a rock climbimb rope that has been plaited over to look like a whip and that extends beyond the whip itself so it can be secured to a solid anchor point. David Morgan never intended his whips to be used as ropes, that's why they make special ones for filming. Reading that he designed his whips as stunt whips does not mean they are made to be swung from.

This doesn't mean it wouldn't be able to support a certain amount of weight for a short period of time, but since it is not designed for that purpose, it's a gamble at best.

What a writer thinks up while writing a screenplay is one thing, and beyond being loosely plausible, it doesn't have to be exactly realistic, that's why we accept so many crazy situations as being OK in the context of a film (this is called suspenssion of disbelief), but that in real life, nobody would believe or be crazy enough to try, at least I hope not.

As for risking damage to a whip for a pay, I think you have the idea backward here. The fear isn't whether or not the whip will be damaged, the idea is that it just wouldn't be safe. That's the real issue, not a SAG pay. The days of Buster Keaton are long gone and today's stuntmen relly on sciences like physics and math, as well as specialized equipment to bring to a minimum the risks they take.

It's one thing to talk about the plausibility of such and such whip trick, as it pertains to the telling of a story. But when one starts getting into talk about the actual feasability of these tricks while willingly ignoring the tricks of modern filmmaking, then you're getting into an arena I find very dangerous and I'll tell you why. If you're an adult and you still think you can defend yourself against a gun with a whip, or swing from a tree over a chasm, then go ahead. I personally think that's just nuts, but hey you're an adult so who am I to say anything? The danger of encouraging such talks, which is why I always pipe in whenever things stray in this direction, is that this forum is open to all, even younger people. Those of you who have reached a certain age (if you're not sure what age that is, then you haven't gotten there yet), know that young men do not yet have a clear sense of their own mortality or of their own real limits, and are likely to try crazy things in the right context (I know I was like that, and so were all of my friends). THIS is why I'm a pain in the butt about this. I know you may not have intended to give the idea that it's OK to go and try these things, but all you really need to do to give the go-ahead to a youth is to leave a window, a mere sliver, of possibility, for them to be convinced THEY are the ONE to succeed. So all I'm saying is keep this in mind at all time whenever you start talking about what is possible and what isn't. I hope my comment does not offend anyone, because that is the last thing I want to do. I've just seen too many "fun" ideas go real, real bad...
Cheers,

Franco

[thefish]

As for risking damage to a whip for a pay, I think you have the idea backward here. The fear isn't whether or not the whip will be damaged, the idea is that it just wouldn't be safe. That's the real issue, not a SAG pay. The days of Buster Keaton are long gone and today's stuntmen relly on sciences like physics and math, as well as specialized equipment to bring to a minimum the risks they take.

I was in no way attempting to encourage anyone to go swinging from a bullwhip. I would hope by now that this forum would have made that ABUNDANTLY clear, and I don't think that's the impression I left. If it is, "Hey Kids! Go play in traffic!"

Truth of the matter is, the Australian-design bullwhip was not DESIGNED for the purpose of THREE-QUARTERS of the @#$% that we're currently using them for, so adding swinging from it into that, while ill-advised, doesn't make it any less invalid.

In any case. I am WELL aware of the damage of the whip not equalling the risk of danger to the actor. That's part of the reason the SAG was formed in the first place. To keep people from dying on set the way they did doing that insane garbage in DeMille's "The Ten Commandments." And on ANY production worth it's salt, there will be a studio legal team and insurance folks RIGHT THERE who will shut the whole show down if the production looks too dangerous, (this is why Jackie Chan doesn't make his own movies in the US. No one will insure him, and in this country, that means you're shut down. You can't hire skilled actors or technicians without insurance.)

I know a guy who in the old cowboy pictures was the Indian on horseback that would ride up on the cowboy and throw a tomahawk into his back. Underneath the cowboy actors shirt was a piece of wood. All they were relying on was the strength of that wood and the guy with the Tomahawk's skill, (that man was Kenneth "Che Che Whitecloud" Pierce, by the way...Don't believe me? Ask him.) Yes, those days are THANKFULLY gone. If you tried that on a set today, every "carded" union actor, technician, and creative services person would be obligated to walk without another word, (and who can blame them.) But the action sequences that we are talking about were based directly on those scenes, and many of those guys actually DID it!

I know you're not arguing that, Franco. But what I just get sick of is this impression we give that bullwhips are this fragile, delicate item.

"It won't hold your weight..."

"Don't use it on gravel/sand/dirt/pavement/asphalt/molten lava! You'll ruin it!"

"Don't let it get wet!"

"Don't feed it after midnight or we're DOOMED!"

I've got about 20 minutes of footage I've shot on video of two Guiness World Record Holding whip performers cracking good quality Kangaroo whips on asphalt, concrete, etc. (Chris Camp and Adam Winrich along with Paul Nolan, Gery Deer and many others during the Annie Oakley Days parade in Greenville, Ohio.) and if you've seen any footage from De Longis's Indalo Ranch, then you can see where he works is NOTHING but sand, grit and rock. I cracked a couple of those whips after that parade. They were fine, and De Longis's whips, while dusty, certainly don't look the worse for wear.

Is it good for them? No. It's not.

Should that type of use generally be avoided. No doubt, but they'll survive it...They might not make it to pass down to your great-great grandchildren, but they'll make it a LONG LONG time.

Same with swinging on one. If it was me, I'd be more concerned about breaking my neck than my whip.

Could the whip break? Well yeah...

Will it? Dunno.

Will it damage the whip? Definitely, especially over time.

Will you fall and potentially mortally wound yourself? Most likely.

So, for goodness sake, DON'T DO IT!