MovieChat Forums > CHiPs (1977) Discussion > Ep. 2.19 - Bio-Rythms

Ep. 2.19 - Bio-Rythms

posted 9 years ago by liberius
3 replies | jump to latest

In the climax Jon and Ponch ride away from a semi-trailer that's about to explode. When it does they are thrown from their bikes quite violently.

This has to be one of the more impressive practical stunts I've seen from that era. It's done in one wide shot as they come towards the camera, trailer exploding behind them. No cutaways or tricks like that, yet the double dismounts as the shock wave hits them are incredibly real.

Great stunt work. Here it is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djkTtkny8rU&feature=youtu.be&t=38m40s

[–] 9 years ago

[deleted]

[–] liberius 9 years ago

Yes, the slow-mo explosion of the trailer is handled well. It almost doesn't look slowed down which I guess is the key; we shouldn't focus on it and scream: hey, neato slow motion! And the SMDM used it as a genius way to show speed and strength despite the completely counter-intuitive nature of it.

But slow motion was horribly overused in the 80s, as were many of the car stunts and explosion effects developed for shows like Chips.

Even in Chips it could get silly. From the same epsiode...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djkTtkny8rU&feature=youtu.be&t=3m30s

...here you can see three cars jump the blue car in a pretty cartoonish way. Further, and worse, you can see the huge steel ramp fastened to the back of the blue car.

But, I was 14 and at the time it looked like a lot of fun.

[–] Glory9491 9 years ago

Looks like it really would have hurt the stunt people. Made me cringe when I saw it. But yes it was a great stunt.