The first scene I thought of was when Clemenza had Michael test fire the gun in the basement before the hit on Sollozo. I distinctly remember the ringing sound that immediately followed and Michael exclaiming, “Marrone, my ears!”
Are there ANY movies that *accurately* represent the noise of a gunshot and peoples' reaction to it?
Second the bank robbery shootout in Heat. Not only is the sound superb, they use realistic reloading, shoot-and-move tactics and wounding/collateral effects. Speaking of which, Collateral was also excellent.
Michael Mann seems to have a good grasp of real world firearm use.
I remember that they had actual ISPC pistol champion Jim Zubiena play a hitman in an episode of Miami Vice.
In “Cop Land” a character intentionally fires a gun near the “good ear” of the partially deaf character played Sylvester Stallone to further damage his hearing.
A couple of older examples…
I saw an interview with Warren Beatty about Bonnie and Clyde. He was a big fan of Shane, which had particularly loud and shocking sounding gunfire. He talked to director George Stevens about how he managed it, and tried to duplicate the effect in B&C.
Apparently too successfully. At the film’s premiere, Beatty was really upset that the gunfire didn’t POP as he expected, and afterward went back into the projection booth. There was the projectionist, all proud that he had “saved” the premiere. While previewing the film, the projectionist thought the exceptionally loud gunfire was some kind of defect in the soundtrack, so he took careful notes about when the “problem” appeared. During the premiere, every time there was gunfire, the guy cranked the sound way down in the theater and back up again immediately after.
That’s probably only because the recoil from a large bore rifle is distracting. Large bore (i.e. not 22) rifles are LOUD- more so than a pistol.
Shotguns are loud, but it’s very dependent on where you are. If you’re firing, they’re not that loud, but if you’re in that cone of sound that comes out the front, we’re talking instant ear-ringing loud.
Was it my imagination or did all the handguns in The Deer Hunter sound like cannons? I know they’re loud, but they don’t all sound like thunder.
Assuming you are still attached to your ears.
I think too many movie theater patrons complained when the theaters played gunfire at a realistic 120-140 db.
The movie Heat portrayed gunfire pretty realistically. It may not have litterally been as loud as real gunfire (see above) but it did echo in the city streets as if it was really freakin loud.
I would nominate Children of Men for being more realistic with guns and explosions than is typical.
Also in that show there’s the scene where Gigi Cestone shoots Philly Parisi inside the car and blows his brain all over the driver’s side window. Gigi is obviously in pain from the noise.
Another movie I can think of off the top of my head for loud gunfire is Sharky’s Machine, one of two non-cheesy Burt Reynolds movies. Deliverance being the other but with virtually no gunplay.
And then what happened?
There’s also Boris the Blade putting in earplugs while in Sol & Vinny’s pawn shop just before he shoots Franky Four Fingers in the head. The one covered in a tea cozy.
But this effect is also somewhat ignored later in the film when Bullet Tooth Tony shoots up the bar, and when Cousin Avi shoots up Sol & Vinny’s pawn shop trying to kill the dog.
But Snatch and Heat were the two I was coming in to mention.
Sighting in the Remington Model 600 .350 Magnum my wife and I carried as ‘Bear Repellant’ during Alaska F&G stream surveys, I neglected to use any ear plugs.
Result: serious twitterpation and ringing ears for days. Man, that little carbine was LOUD!
On that note, suppressors on movies and TV go the other way, and always make the almost-silent “pew” noise that no gun ever makes. In reality they make gunfire sound like it does in the movies; loud, but not deafening.
It’s interesting that you both mentioned Heat and Miami Vice. I posted to mention Collateral. All three are Michael Mann films. He seems to have a thing for this.
This thread has been interesting because I’ve somehow previously gotten the impression that movies radically beef up sounds of gunfire with things like lions’ roars, bison stampedes, rocket engines, and volcano eruptions to make them a lot bigger than they would bs in real life.
And I can’t be the only person to have seen Dread, can I? That’s a major plot point of the movie.
Micheal Mann films—yes, all of them, including Last of the Mohicans—feature very realistic weapon handling and sound. Heat used production sound, not post-production, which is why you hear all the echoes and distorted reverberations as the sounds bounced off the buildings around them. He’s got almost a fetish with realism.
Black Hawk Down, though that detail about the soldier with hearing loss (BTW, that actor played Spud in Trainspotting!) was also in the book, which was written from action reports and interviews with the soldiers.
Realism is a bit problematic when it comes to recording really loud sounds.
You could record an absolutely authentic gun sound by putting a good mic next to an actual gun, but without playing the sound back at the actual volume, it’s just not going to sound right, ever. At a lower volume, it just sounds like a weak little pop. And there’s no way a cinema is going to play gunshots back at 130dB and risk getting sued by their customers because of hearing damage. I’m also pretty sure it would also be breaking noise restriction laws just about everywhere.
So, basically, you’re never going to hear an authentic gunshot sound in the cinema. At best, you can have the sound-guy design the gunshot noise using psycho-acoustic effects. There are a few different ways you can mimic the effect of a really loud noise. But that’s not exactly realistic either, and if you did it too often in the one movie I’m sure it would get old very quickly.
Although the sound that is used for silencers by foley artists is not accurate, I have personally fired both a 9mmP submachine gun and .22 pistol (both legal and stamped) which were quiet enough to distinguish the sound of the action over the muzzle blast.
On the topic of cinematic gunfire, one of my favorite shootouts (aside from the previously mentioned Heat) is in the David Mamet film Heist. The fight occurs outdoors on a quay, with the gunfire making the genuine loud, flat sound of true gunfire, and the participants frantically firing and dodging each other, fearful of being shot, and Danny DeVito standing in the middle of it pleading with everyone to stop shooting.
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