Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Another Hollywood gaffe? Dances with Wolves

Last night my wife and I decided to watch Dances With Wolves. Remember the scene where he arrives at the abandoned fort and is inspecting the quarters? He ejects a bird from the building and they show a quick closeup of it. I'd swear it's a Eurasian collared dove, that wasn't introduced into the US until about 20 or 30 years ago.

I don't recall the source, and can't confirm its accuracy, but I read somewhere that they had screened the movie for an audience of Lakotas, who had laughed at parts of it. Apparently Lakota is one of those languages which men and women speak differently, and some of the male actors were speaking like women.

Paul

Close,

Its a domestic ringneck dove (Streptotelia risoria), whose wild ancestors originated in North Africa IIRC.

The Eurasian Collared Dove (S. decaocto) orginated in India (again IIRC) as is technically a wild bird, even though ours originally escaped from a pet store in the Bahamas back in the '60's.

Domestic ringnecks are clueless birds, with absolute no chance of survival out on that movie set.

I dunno how many ringnecks were sacrificed before they got that scene right.

Birdwatcher

The film gaffe, as opposed to dumb mistakes, that had me rolling was in Open Range.

Near the end of the movie where Costner is more or less proposing to his sweetie all serious and cowboy like if you look in the background just in front of his horses nose you see this van driving down a road.

BCR

Damn Boggy, I have seen that movie 40-'leven times and never noticed that. I'll have to throw it in today.

Gee, Boggy, you got a good eye!

I've watched that movie several times and didn't notice that.

I'm sure looking for it now, !

It's ok guys I was concentrating on Annett Benning a lot too. She is a sweetie even if her politics do stink.

BCR

What role did Annette have in DWW? Mary McDonnell was Costners love interest in the movie. If you are talking about another movie I apologize.

Same thing in that movie "Buffalo Soldiers" One scene after their run in with Texas Rangers, white Ford F150 hauling-azz in deep background leaving one helluva dust trail! It was the dust that got my attention!

K

"It's ok guys I was concentrating on Annett Benning a lot too."

BCR, I might be missing the point, but if your referring to Costner's love interest in Dances with Wolves (stands with fist), that would be Mary Mcdonnell (see link below), not Annett Benning. I can see how you could confuse the two, as they look alike (both are HOT). -TomT

LINK:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001521/

Tom and Scott, I wasn't talking about DWW I was talking about the gaffe in Open Range, ok.

BCR

Is that it at 2:56 during the big first kiss?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En7fxpAxi-c

Sorry BCR, I thought I might have misunderstood you. -Tom

Another gaffe I saw was in "Gettysburg". Col. Chamberlain was walking down to address some Union soldiers who were rebelling, and the camera angle was such that you saw blue sky over his shoulder......and a big ol' contrail.

I commented that this briefing oughtta include the FO's push.

A contrail in the making also marred an old Western that I saw years ago.

Watching reruns of Gunsmoke and other old TV Westerns, I wonder how the film crews would've fared without plywood and those chintzy old Fitz plastic grips (stand-ins for antler grips) on their Colts. They're especially obvious in the Gunsmoke close-ups.

Tons of stuff in movies if you look for it. IIRC there�s a jet contrail in the sky in PT-109, set in WWII. In some Charles Bronson movie where he plays an Apache in the late 1800�s, he rides across a valley and there is an entire town with parking lots and vehicles in the background.

In DWW, watch the camera angles switch between Costner and Two Socks the first time he feeds the wolf some jerky. In one angle the fat end of the jerky is toward the wolf, switching angles the skinny end is pointing to the wolf.

Have seen the same thing several times when folks smoke cigarettes. One viewpoint, the cigarette is almost all gone, switch angles and suddenly the actor is smoking a full length cigarette.

I still want a 36 shot revolver, whether SA or DA Okay, I can see the director not bothering to show an actor actually reloading between camera takes, but when you can count a guy crank out 9 shots in a row, that�s a bit much�

You are right-tons of stuff-but there were lots of contrails over Germany and Japan in WWII.

That's true about the contrails from 4 engine bombers and jet fighters.

Maybe the director had a lone B-24 fly high overhead to add that bit of realism...

Wouldn't any escort fighter also leave a contail at those altitudes?

Actually it looked like two vehicles.

remember the mvie SHANE? The director has the ENTIRE set wait, sometimes for DAYS, for the clouds to set themselves up 'just right.'

Can't afford to pay liberal commies that much waiting for clouds these days, so go with what you got.


A few of my faves are the guys shooting Enfields in Zulu (some of the charges at the end) and in Spartacus there is the famous extra picture of a guy toting a spear and sheild...while wearing a watch. If you like Hitchcock's North by Northwest, in the scene at the gift shoppe they must have shot it several times, because when the bad guy puts his hand in his pocket to produce a pistol, a kid in the back ground clamps his hands over his ears. Last is Terminator 2 When the kid is discovering he has his own private terminator he draws the attention of some guys ina parking lot. Watch the 1911A1 .45 that Arnie is holding as they cut back and forth in the scene. In some the safety is up and in others down, and the hammer is back and forward, yet he never fires a shot

Geezz! And here I figured it was just Pat driving Nelly Belle.

I was watching Pearl Harbor the other day, and there was lot's in that movie that didn't stand up. One of the more obvious to me was during the attack as one of the Battleships (I think it was the Utah) was rolling over. It was showing a really good scene of the fore deck, ship is more than 90 degrees over and rolling, yet the anchor chains are arched upwards in the middle, and the anchors normaly heavy end down, are now heavy end up in the air.


Phil

I had a buddy who worked on Dances, and I hear the contrails just drove everyone batty, especially with 2nd unit "magic hour" shots. They would take hours to set up, have a gorgeous set-up and bam - jet fly's through the shot or near it and a contrail messed the whole thing up.

Nowadays they can just CGI that chit out.

"Dances" was still a gorgeous movie. Dean Semler is an incredible AD, and some say Director.. I had the privilege to do some day work on "City Slickers" and watching Dean and talking to him was a highlight of my industry days.

Two more from DWW:

When the cavalry gets ambushed at the river crossing, the SGT has a Colt 1860 Army in one scene, and an 1858 Remington in another.

Towards the end of the movie, one of the old Sioux has a pretty obvious set of thermal underwear under his buckskin shirt. While practical, I suspect it's not that authentic.

As long as it wasn't GoreTex.

Don't be silly, Griz. Only the Crows used GoreTex.

The gaffe that always drives me crazy is in Tombstone during the Gunfight at the OK Corral. Doc Holliday shoots that double barrel shotgun three times in a row. Once in the air to spook the horse, then twice at the bad guy.

One of my pet peeves is when they work the lever on a rifle to load it, talk a little, and work the lever again w/o a shell coming out. Must have a long magazine on the rifle and all the shells were up in the front?
Or when they swing open the cylinder on a revolver and give it a spin, and it clicks like a Colt SAA...love that one.

The Outlaw Josie Wales, where guys are gathering for a gunfight, and one yells, "gimme some more .30-30's!".

The movie was set after the Civil War, and the .30-30 wasn't invented for another 20+ years.

That's another biggie: using 92s and 94s way before 1892 or 1894.

After living with indigenous people I thought the whole movie was a corny gaffe. Total hollywood.

Among the most pathetic, for any gun-savvy folk, has to be in that lame brained Bourne Identity flick. (not the one from back in the 70's with Jaclyn Smith (ooh, la, la...) but the more currently released Bs)

When the script's hero Jason and his recently acquired border hopping twat finally arrive at his home address an assassin bursts through the window with a most interesting piece of hardware. Bang, bang, bang, it goes.... and goes.... and goes in what seems to be standard full automatic fire mode,.... until it runs out of ammo...
...at which point it goes "click, click, click, click, click..." as though there's some wound up spring or something that makes it all still work... irregardless of the fact that it's out of ammunition.
Maybe it's just me and they really do continue to fire without firepower... (???)
How should I know? Full auto fun isn't allowed for us regular folks...

Depending on what state you live in full auto is readily available. I occasionally see em for sale on the net here. just follow ATF rules and if you can legally buy a 22 you can own a fully automatic firearm. Pay $200 and pass go.

I was watching Quigley Down Under not long ago. Tom Selleck walks in to a corral in the middle of the day, they cut in for a close up with the sun setting over his shoulder, then back out and somehow the sun is directly over his head again.

Was watching something else the other day (no idea what), and a guy is getting ready to shoot the bad guy. Draws his Glock, yells some corny "Stop or I'll shoot" stuff, then, with the pistol extended in one hand, you hear the stereotypical click-CLICK of a hammer being thumbed back. That sound was enough to stop the bad guy in his tracks.

Hollywood was never known for accuracy. How many times have you heard tires screech on a dirt road? Happens all the time in Hollywood though. The list is endless.

I used to think the tires screeching in dirt was impossible. Then I went to a dirt track and watched the outlaws race. If the dirt is packed you can make tire noises but I will admit it is not that common.

There are two vehicles. Look at 2:48 and you can see the first one disappear behind the horses head and the second one (the van) comes into view.

Boy, you young pups have better eyes than I do. I don't see any van.

Its across the field right in front of the trees between Costner and the horse's head, moving toward the horse.

Thanks. Not saying it isn't there just these old cataract eyes can't see it on the computer screen at least.

It's there, Derby. I squinted real hard for both of us and I saw it.