# People getting hit by cars in movies, and why it perplexes me **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 1, 2005, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311 "2005-06-01T02:14:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/1 "2005-06-01T02:14:33Z")
I think this could be an entry in the next edition of Roger Ebert’s _Bigger Little Movie Dictionary_ or whatever the hell it’s called. In movies, people often get hit by cars. Sometimes the character darts out in front of the car, sometimes, for whatever reason the driver has lost control, but in the vast majority of scenes Ive seen of vehicle/pedestrian collisions, the person being hit is either standing in the road, having felt the need to turn back and make a few parting comments to someone on the curb/sidewalk/in their driveway, or is ambling across the street with little or no oncoming traffic, except for the vehicle that hits them. In nearly every case, the person has been in the vehicle’s path with clear visiblity for, if not a good long while, at least more than long enough for the driver of the vehicle to see the person and do something like honk, slow down or stop the car, or make an adjustment in trajectory (known as swerving) in order to avoid hitting the pedestrian. It seems to me that the only reason the driver could fail to avoid the collision would be that he/she was deliberately running the pedestrian over, possibly as punishment for standing in the street to make that one last snarky remark to his/her friend or soon to be ex lover, rather than saying it on the sidewalk. Why is it that so many movie pedestrian deaths seem to be in accidents in which the driver of the vehicle could easily have avoided hitting the soon-to-be dead (or in the case of _Boxing Helena_, merely dismembered) pedestrian? This bothers me almost as much as the fact that whenever a married couple is shown doing the tube snake boogie, it is almost invariably a portent of bad things to come. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Kenneth\_Noisewater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@Dr.Kenneth\_Noisewater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Kenneth_Noisewater)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/2 "2005-06-01T02:17:57Z")
Look at it from the other side. As far as I remember, whenever a driver (in the movies) gets into a car accident (hitting somebody or another car) they’re always distracted briefly by something in the car or turning their head to talk to the passenger too much - not paying attention to the road. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/3 "2005-06-01T02:19:25Z")
> [@Dr. Kenneth Noisewater](#): > > Look at it from the other side. As far as I remember, whenever a driver (in the movies) gets into a car accident (hitting somebody or another car) they’re always distracted briefly by something in the car or turning their head to talk to the passenger too much - not paying attention to the road. Or they are aiming for the person. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/4 "2005-06-01T02:56:13Z")
Why would you keep watching if the car missed? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![waits](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/df788c/32.png) [@waits](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/waits)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/5 "2005-06-01T14:11:18Z")
I thought you were going to complain about the scene in which the hero is chasing the bad guy and runs into traffic right in front of a car. But instead of getting hit, he does the butt-slide across the hood and continues the chase. I hate that. Just once I want to see him go down with a fractured pelvis. Oh and regarding > [@The Asbestos Mango](#): > > the fact that whenever a married couple is shown doing the tube snake boogie, it is almost invariably a portent of bad things to come. it’s because it’s true. _I hope my wife isn’t reading this._ ---
**Author:** ![Winston\_Bongo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a9adbd/32.png) [@Winston\_Bongo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winston_Bongo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/6 "2005-06-01T15:25:10Z")
And I thought you were going to talk about how characters are always getting hit by cars without being even slightly injured. You know . . . there’s a foot chase, two guys dash across the street through heavy traffic, and inevitably one of them gets hit by a car, rolls up over the hood and down the other side, then gets right back up and continues running as if nothing happened. And usually the car that hits him doesn’t stop. Has this _ever_ happened in real life? Heck, I’ve been hit hard enough by \*shopping carts \* to render me immobile for a minute or so – at least long enough to rub my shins and go “Ow, ow, ow.” ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/7 "2005-06-01T15:53:36Z")
Winston, Waits, happens to me every so often. Maybe three-four times in the last couple years. They call where I work the Boulevard of Death for a reason. Anyhow, I was hurt once, but the other times, I kind of threw myself onto the hood, slid, and bounced. Backpack briefcase took a lot of the impact. ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/8 "2005-06-01T16:11:40Z")
> [@The Asbestos Mango](#): > > . . . or is ambling across the street with little or no oncoming traffic, except for the vehicle that hits them. A minor contriubiting factor could be safety of the stunt. I imagine that having a stunt person hit by a car driven by a stunt driver is something you want to be very careful about, and adding extra vehicles to the scene would make it more complicated and dangerous. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Hook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hook)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2005, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-getting-hit-by-cars-in-movies-and-why-it-perplexes-me/306311/9 "2005-06-01T19:25:32Z")
Remember Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. Neither one can help it!