Well, if you pay attention, I believe it was shown she was a medical examiner for the city. It was a brief scene, but if anyone would know what blanks were, it would be a forensics expert.
You do if the writer wants to build suspense and manipulate the audience. The scene with the shop owner shooting the girl doesn’t have the same effect if you know there are blanks in the gun.
She loaded them later (as though she knew what she was doing - and even if she hadn’t known in the gun shop, she certainly would have known then) and at the end, looked satisfied when her dad gave back the gun and she looked at the box.
I thought it was fairly clear that she knew what she was doing at the beginning (though I didn’t know what she was doing - I was wondering why she wanted the red ones until the end, because I don’t know anything about guns. I thought he’d somehow missed.).
I can attest to that. Like I said, I knew at that point that her insistance on the one particular box of shells meant she had chosen blanks. This wasn’t her just picking something and getting out of there; it was her insisting that the gunshop owner give her a particular box, even though he tried to suggest something else.
If she didn’t know about bullets, she would have taken what he had suggested: it would have been easier that arguing with him to give her the red box.
I thought she just picked the most strikingly coloured box to get out of the gun shop ASAP, and had no idea they were blanks. I don’t see why she wouldn’t have said “give me some blanks” rather than “give me the red box” if she specifically wanted blanks.
But I admit she certainly loaded the gun like she knew what she was doing (in contrast to her father), and I would assume anyone, knowledgeable or not, would notice that the blanks didn’t have any actual lead in them.
So either I’ve missed something in the last bit there, or the script deliberately had her ordering blanks in an unlikely way just to conceal this knowledge from the audience (which takes the movie down a [very small] notch in my estimation).
BTW, I imagine blanks still shoot out a fair amount of hot gas and bits of brass cartridge. At the range depicted would we have expected the baby girl to still be injured, or at least her clothing to have been marked?
I don’t remember the scene exactly, but I had the impression her father was still in earshot, even if he had left the counter, so she would not ask for blanks out loud. And my guess is that the clerk understood too, which is why he did not make a big fuss about it in the end.
After the scene showing her job at the hospital, I am certain she knew what she was buying. I would guess that her character had spent some time at a firing range also.
I’m with brickbacon, and others, who believe this is a storytelling choice. I only saw the film once, but as I recall, the box says “BLANKS” in big letters on the side. It’s hard for me to believe she would have missed that while loading the gun. Of course, IRL one would say “Gimme some blanks,” but if she had done that in this movie, where’s the story? She didn’t want the dad to have a gun to begin with, right? So how do you make a gun harmless? Put blanks in it, of course.
The scene is written so that you think she is just trying to get out of there, a deliberate mislead so that the gun shop owner questioning her ammo choice won’t seem too odd. Also it plays to the stereotyped notion that women don’t know anything about guns, and that we’d choose ammo based on box color rather than any other criteria! :rolleyes: These sorts of stereotypes are what the movie’s all about. The exchange in the gun shop was a hint, so at the end you’ll think back and go “ooooooohhhhhh!” It’s a bit too clever, but I’m also bitter about it beating BBM, so I’m disinclined to give Haggis and Crash much of a break.
So, though it’s a little bit of a gotcha, it makes a lot more sense to me that she knew what she was getting from the beginning. The other option is that she’s not only stupid but also blind, and that doesn’t seem in character.
As I recall, they were 6-10 feet away from each other, I believe. It wasn’t point-blank range. I don’t know much about guns, but I think they’d have to be closer to show physical effects of being shot with blanks, but I could be wrong about that.
Again, similar to what brickbacon said, Ryan Phillipe is eager to prove himself as a “good” white man, in contrast to his overtly racist partner. Their partnership illustrates the film’s theme of hidden, internalized racism (RP) vs. external, institutional racism (Matt Dillon).
RP is by all appearances a “good” white man, in that he tries to stand up to racism and “help” poor, defenseless blacks. But the movie is saying (I think) is that this attitude is just more racism in another form. RP is still a racist, because society has made him so. It is impossible for any of the characters in the movie (thus, by extension, anyone in L.A. or the US in general) to think of people as “people,” separate from their race. Becasue RP tries to deny this in himself, he ends up committing a terrible act. By contrast, MD who owns up to his racism, ends up having the only moment in the film where anyone manages to break out of color blindness for a moment, when he rescues Thandie Newton. At that moment, she is a woman in distress, and he is her rescuer. That’s all that matters. So in that moment of humanity, he is (somewhat) redeemed. Whereas RP’s lack of self-awareness leads to tragedy.
RP picks up the hitchhiker as overcompensation for the racism he’s attempting to deny in himself. I mean, who picks up hitchhikers of any race, ever in the middle of the night? This is bad judgement from the outset, apparently done to “prove” that he’s a good man. Then his internalized fear bubbles up, when everything the hitchhiker says - though totally innocuous - seems to take a threatening tone. And because of his racism, RP assumes that the hitchhiker must have a gun and is reaching for it. This is another point that reveals a bit of script trickery. IRL if you were riding with someone who was getting visibly agitated during conversation, you’d probably back off ask to get out of the car right away. So the fact that the guy stays in the car and keeps talking seemed unrealistic to me. But then again, no story there.
Just saw it tonight on the “Free Preview” of some shit pay channel.
Utter Crap. A true waste of nearly 2 hours.
What was the point of that nonsense? That won “Best Picture”? Glad I didn’t waste any money at the movies again this year.
I just watched this yesterday, for the second time. I think Philippe picks the guy up to prove to hiimself he’s not a racist, but, in his eyes, the guys keeps laughing at him, and it pisses him off. How could he not interpret the talk about country music as mocking? He thinks he’s not a racist, but he cannot imagine a black man liking country music. Then laughing at his St. Christopher statue is the last straw, and the writer does Cheadle’s brother a disservice by not having him simply take a more easygoing approach to telling him why the statue is amusing. It’s not a perfect movie, but it’s pretty damned good, and I have no problem with its win. However, I haven’t seen BBM, so I can’t compare the movies on their merits at all.
So I guess this movie got on your last raw nerve, eh Gatopescado? 
Can you tell me what you hated about it? Not challenging your opinion, just want to know more. After I watched it I went to IMDB to see what others thought of it. I was sure, in light of the award and its high viewer rating that people would be gushing over it, and all I found was page after page of people bashing it. I found it very curiuos that so many people had such strong negative feelings, but no one really expressed *why * they hated it. I didn’t really want to engage in conversation with anyone there, as that never seems to accomplish anything, but being a fellow Doper, you are wise and insightful by default 
Did he? It’s been a long time since I saw the film, but I don’t remember it like that. I do remember him trying to dissuade her from buying the blanks by saying something like “Lady, do you know what those are?” and her snapping “Just give them to me.” Does he actually recommend something else?
Sure, she totally knew as they made clear by her expertise loading the gun. She obviously was experienced with fire arms so would know what she was buying.
When she was buying, I thought the plot was going to end up that he’s frantically trying to load the gun only to find that they were totally the wrong type (shotgun shells for example) - I remember him doing the “this ditzy woman doesn’t know what she is buying” attitude, not “here, try these instead.” Perhaps it is because I have no familiarity with guns (or ammo) myself that I was completely taken in and therefore shocked and horrified when he shot the little girl.
Grim
Wasn’t the idea that they were supposed to get free ammo with the gun, and the dad was insisting on it? Wouldn’t she have settled for no ammo if she was trying to keep it safe? I was under the impression she didn’t know what she was getting either “just give me the red ones”.
Wow, that’s even more manipulative storytelling if they had (1) her insist on ammo when she could have gotten out of it altogether and (2) give us the impression that she picked something real.
Thanks, Shalmanese. It’s nice to hear an actual opinion besides “what a piece of shit”. I agree that it was contrived, but I almost didn’t notice while I was watching it. On the whole I thought the writing and acting was very good(Ryan Phillipe notwithstanding).
The doctor absolutely knew that she was buying blanks. She doesn’t come out and say, “Give me the blanks,” because then that ruins the story later, that ruins the surprise. That’s the storyteller’s choice.
Plus, look at her choice through the lens of her character - she’s a doctor and doesn’t want anyone to get injured. She’s also aware of her (and her father’s) race and the racism they experience, and so doesn’t want her father to injure anyone due to the reprisals she fears. But as a shopkeeper of his race, she also wants him to have some sort of protection (she’d be stupid not to), and thinks that having a blank-loaded gun might serve as enough of a deterrent that he’ll never have to fire it. Maybe waving it around would be enough. But if it should go off, at least hopefully no one will be seriously injured.
The scene doesn’t really make sense if she doesn’t know what she’s buying - it’s contrary to her character. Her unease and the ammo store clerk’s smug tones are simply a dodge so that you, the audience, might not notice that she’s buying blanks and so will be more emotionally moved later.
I watched it last week.
She know they were blanks. She didn’t want the gun in the first place. Saying “the red box” instead of “the blanks” was a storytelling device, especially when paired with the invisible cape of protection.
Personally, I thought it would have been more poignant to have the kid shot and killed–less contrived. As it was, it came off a too much of trying to teach a lesson, with all the subtly of getting face slapped with a fish. The movie makers had something * very important * to teach us and, by Gadflies, they need to drive it home.
Movies with a point rarely, IMHO, rise above the trite.
Thanks for the eloquent summation of what are also my ambivalent feelings about the film.
Along with your insight I’d add that ‘trying not to be PC’ by peppering the script with racial jokes didn’t work either. It often seemed forced like with Graham’s line about who gathered all those remarkably different cultures together and taught them all how to park their cars on their lawns.
In the end I think that it could have been a good film, but wasn’t.
I don’t know how anyone is getting that she knew they were blanks.
She looked at a row of cartridges and (IIRC) after defering any bullets at all, just said, “whatever, give me the red ones.” If she wanted blanks, she would have looked at the cartridges and chosen the blanks. There was nothing in her choice that indicated “Oh, my father might be using this for nefarious purposes so I’m going to get the blanks.”
The film was manipulative about a lot of things. That wasn’t one of them.