It’s a Long Shot
Action movies have been known to employ all sorts of special effects to spice up their big scenes. Explosions, chases, gunfights, all are action movie staples, but most people are surprised to know that a lot of the things they see on the silver screen are a million to one chance to happen in real life. Ok maybe not in horror, fantasy, or sci-fi movies; I’m sure people have no problem remembering that we haven’t invented teleportation yet. No, I mean in more bare bones, gritty, down to life action movies like Die Hard or The Bourne Trilogy. There are tons of action movie staples that diverge a bit from reality like…
Shooting Out A Lock
No… not that kind of lock…
You have probably all seen it before, a protagonist busts in to a building, armed with a firearm, finds a locked door, and shoots it to gain entry, generally by kicking the door down. This, unfortunately, simply isn’t possible. Any small firearm will only put small dents in the door, and any large firearm would cause so much shrapnel that the protagonist would be in danger. Besides, doors can be kicked down easy enough if they are wooden, so most of this “shoot the lock” business is really just superfluous. Still if you can pull it off, it is impressive. Note that the door was made of metal to absorb the impact of the bullet.
The Car Jump
Yes stunt men have been able to do this in very controlled circumstances, but even then they end up totaling their car at the end of the jump, and this was a car specifically designed to survive impact. Real car jumps look more like this.
… and professional ones look like this
Car jumps generally take place during high speed chases, which is also unfortunate because the more speed you gain the more air you get and the more air you get the harder your land. Most car jumps over concrete in normal unmodified cars would result in broken wreckage, the frame simply couldn’t handle it.
Flaming Wreckage
It is not uncommon to see cars light on fire in movies. A bad crash, a bullet through the engine, or even an act of sabotage can cause a whole car to go up in flames. However, the truth of the matter is, even if your engine gets so hot that it lights on fire, the fire is contained and will take a very long time to spread to the rest of the car. Real car fires do happen and when they do they look something like this.
Yes oil and fuel are very flammable, but the majority of the car is made of metal, which doesn’t burn. Unless you are driving a car made of pure solid fuel, which by the way would be an interesting solution to the oil crisis and would produce more movie style car crashes (call me Honda), a car will smolder first before it bursts into flames.
The Fire Ball
On the subject of fire, everyone likes a good movie explosion. However, there are only a few types of explosions that create gigantic fireballs, and those are explosions that involve massive amounts of gasoline or other extremely flammable and combustible product. Contrary to popular belief it is not the fire of an explosion that does the most damage, it is the explosive force. This means if you were close by, jumping away from an explosion still might break your bones and litter you with shrapnel. Actual explosions are much more destructive, but the “fireball” lasts a much shorter time, and most of what you can see is shrapnel and dust.
Of course when a rocket fuel plant catches fire…. That is another story.
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