Hollywood gun myths

Posted in Pistols by with 15 Comments
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Cracked.com has a list of the top five Hollywood gun myths. The list seems to be written by someone who knows guns.

Myth #3 is “Bulletproof Vests Are Magical Force Fields”. While myth annoys me, the “A Bulletproof Vest Being Hit Will Knock You Back Six Feet” annoys me even more.

The effect of a .45 ACP on a person wearing a bulletproof vest … according to The Phantom

This is what really happens.

Over at View From The Porch, Tam discusses Counter Strike inspired gun myths.

[ Many thanks to Caleb for emailing me the link. ]

Steve Johnson

Founder and Dictator-In-Chief of TFB. A passionate gun owner, a shooting enthusiast and totally tacti-uncool. Favorite first date location: any gun range. Steve can be contacted here.

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  • Tuulos

    Here’s a nice video that shows what happen when you are shot if you are expecting it.

    http://noolmusic.com/youtube_live/man_shot_at_point-blank_range_w_308_rifle_then44_magnum.php

  • MrSatyre

    “The list seems to be written by someone who knows guns.”

    Except that he incorrectly states that gunpowder “explodes”. It doesn’t it burns very rapidly, which creates the pressure build up which expels the round from the shell casing (and hence the loud bang). Just like in the old Westerns and pirate films, a line of gunpowder simply burns. The sealed enclosures of the barrels they lead to were what caused the resulting explosion.

    • MrBurns

      Yes, but then again a fast burning process generating heat and pressure is called, hmmmm, could it be…. an explosion? Of course gunpowder explodes. Not like a grenade, not like a nuclear warhead, but it does. There are different kinds of explosions but if gunpowder didn’t explode, what good would it be? I mean, just emitting heat would leave you with a nice warm bullet sitting in your gun atop a bullet, maybe being fired off a few yards by the generated smoke. But that is about it.

      The speed of the burning process is what makes the difference between “incinerate” and “explode”. Please only smartass around if you know what you talk about.

  • Rijoenpial

    well,

    I kinda disagree with the silencer bit: some videos of the SCAR and the FS2000, for instance, show it:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiUuWT8jpJg

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1-mZQNTlek&NR=1 (see first comment below explaining about the reason why we hear the echo)

    another one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1-mZQNTlek&NR=1

    And there are many more, I’m sure…

    About the neverending bullets, that’s a no-brainer for someone who understands guns and how the operate, but the ‘bulletproof-vest guy usually being blown away’ movie routine is usually done with a shotgun at point blank range… he will definitely feel it, even with a vest… So, it could be believable…

    Now, we all tend to forget that movies do ‘exaggerate reality for entertainment purposes’… That’s why they are called ‘movies’…Otherwise, they would be called ‘documentaries’… Some movies ridicule it, others try to come closer to reality or as close as possible to enable the believability of the premise…

    I don’t worry much about Rambo having a machine gun spewing bullets for 5 minutes because it was all done for dramatic effect… The people who have fired the SCAR and the Bushmaster ACR know that these weapons don’t work as they do in Modern Warfare 2, for instance… The AK has no recoil whatsoever, and the FAL doesn’t just shoot single shots… The Bushmaster on full auto would kick like a mule and so would the SCAR…maybe a bit less, given the SCAR’s lower firing rate…But to make the game fun, they are lightened up…

    That’s the same in movies: the often times dull, boring reality is replaced by a far more thrilling fake one… That is why we have ‘suspension fo disbelief’, a vital requirement for embracing movies and videogames ‘enhanced’ reality…

    Cheers!

  • Rijoenpial

    Sorry, I made a mistake regarding the Ak bit on the Modern Warfare 2 remark: I meant to say the AK has much more recoil than the game version, and not that the AK has no recoil whatsoever! Sorry about that, guys!

    Cheers!

  • guy

    Pfft. Obviously the guy getting hit with .45 ACP should be on fire as he’s knocked through the wall. Amateurs.

  • J Star

    The suppressor part isn’t well researched. Yes, if you fire normal ammunition through a suppressor, it isn’t too quiet. This is why we have sub-sonic ammunition. If the writers had bothered to do more than 2 seconds of research, they would have found hundreds of You Tube videos of suppressed sub-sonic ammo that *gasp* does sound quite similar to the way they make it sound in the movies.

  • Lance

    Yeah I find it funny that they show there actor killing people all around then go out and demmand they ban gun in america.

  • Kyle E. Coyote

    Yeah, Cracked it top notch. Funny as hell, and generally pro-gun… asking for anything else would be getting greedy.

  • Piers

    Actually, a lot of people have become wise to some of the standard cliches of firearms in film and movies (among ALL sorts of other details as well). This website explains a lot of details. There’s LOTS about how film and TV deal with firearms!

    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HomePage

  • jdun1911

    You need a good decibel and noise level meter to find out the exact amount of noise a suppressor output. Youtube video is less than ideal to find out the decibel level.

    For example: Gem-tech reduce the decibel by 32 in an AR15 (out of 140+).

    http://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?p=309675

  • Red

    @MrSatyre
    @Rijoenpial

    I totally agree. First all the author claims to know guns but the whole article he called Cartridges, Bullets!! Now in my gun club if some one were to say bullets, you would be immeditally corrected. Also he doesn’t think of sub sonic ammo for the silencer bit. Ive seen a AK silenced with sub sonic ammo that produced only the metal of the action, and the round hitting metal.

  • W

    “Yeah I find it funny that they show there actor killing people all around then go out and demmand they ban gun in america.”

    yeah like these people http://www.nraila.org/issues/factsheets/read.aspx?id=15

    haha :) isn’t irony hilarious?

    lets go down this list: alec baldwin, sean connery, matt damon, jodie foster, martin sheen, sylvester stallone, etc, etc, ad nauseam.

  • Simon_the_Brit

    For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

  • Nick

    I cannot help but find the Noisy Cricket quite accurate scientifically. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTqxFIpc1j4