Wes Studi emptying shotgun in elevator
.....only to put shells back in the magazine. Why?
I see no reason for this. For dramatic effect?
Was he emptying, I thought he was just chambering a round, but yes, either way, purely for dramatic effect. This is one of my pet peeves, especially when done by filmmakers who know better.
No operator worth his/her salt chambers a round moments before a raid, assault, ambush…
The only exception being if someone is given a weapon they didn’t personally load themselves and is clearing said weapon and reloading for peace of mind.
Me too bro. Its my pet peeve also.
But yeah, the magazine was already loaded and he racked the pump five times and shucked those shells to the floor, then took other shells from his pocket and put them in one at a time as they were talking on the ride up
One thing i thought of is maybe he needed different loads, for some reason. The ones he shucked were blue and the ones in his pocket were red slugs.
Cant figure it out so i figured its just being dramatic, though that is unlike Mann to do somethimg for dramatic effect. He is always pretty accurate.
It’s possible he was switching out round type like you mentioned, maybe going from slug to bird shot given the apartment setting, and to prevent collateral damage of rounds going through walls and harming neighbors. I never noticed the blue to red, good observation.
Even still, this would be done in the patrol car or outside the building at the very latest, given his experience level.
It's red to blue, and he's going from a spread-shot to a heavy-hitter so he can blast the hinges off the door. I don't think that's "realistic," but it's what he's doing. It's the opposite: he's preventing collateral damage (or minimizing it) but using one slug for one target instead of a buckshot's spread. Still, they probably should've just used one of those battering ram things the SWAT guys have. Maybe they couldn't get one fast enough?
It happens in the elevator just because then we get to watch a more interesting scene of them switching out rounds and checking bullets (Pacino) right into them breaching the door instead of needing a cut. It's more cinematic.
Yeah, that's it. He wants different rounds. He's about to use the shotgun to blow the hinges off the door. Now, I don't know if this would work, I don't know if this would be anything close to acceptable practice with police procedures or what (I doubt it), but that seems to be the point.
He unloads buckshot and loads in (I think) solid slugs so they'll hit the hinges hard. He has to chamber the round because he's about to use the gun and no round was chambered after his reload.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGym1iVaWoY&t=41s
Nice bit of clarification, I had forgotten about the breach.
shareYeah I was aware but didnt mention it in the op because I think its irrelevant. The real question is why were there different shells in the gun to start with. I am not LE but my guess is they use slugs exclusively so shouldnt be a need to shuck out those shells.
Unless Im wrong and they vary the rounds. But I cant think of a reason why for that, except rubber bullets for crowd control, which Studi would not be participating in probably.
I love that scene. Of course, I love every scene in this movie...
shareHow can you tell the red shells are buck shot?
My thing is seems like they would use slugs exclusively in that line of work, so there wouldnt be a need to switch out the shells.
I have the screenplay...i will check to see if anything is mentioned there.
I'm partly guessing that the red shells are buckshot because of the reloading itself. There would be a reason for this. The movie isn't going to show him unloading and then reloading for no reason, and we're all pretty much in agreement that he's switching ammunition types. The Internet Movie Firearms Database identifies the blues as slugs. (https://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Heat#Shotguns) The write-up in this youtube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGym1iVaWoY) description thinks like I do, but of course I don't know why the person in the video came to that conclusion.
They don't use slugs exclusively. If you run "Do police use buckshot or slugs in shotguns?" through a search engine, you'll find a bunch of forums (including places like Reddit) where they talk about how different officers use different ammunition for different situations or personal preferences. This article (https://www.police1.com/police-products/firearms/shotguns/articles/shotguns-for-the-21st-century-warrior-TIRR5aEeVHRbYm7y/) says, "Buckshot remains the most commonly utilized police shotgun ammunition." This academic paper from the US Dept. of Justice (https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/shotgun-police-work) talks about multiple ammunition types.
Okay cool.
I still think it was a slipup by Mann, the shucking the red shells part. Seems like an unnecessary detail that is only distracting, unless some reason was stated or shown, which there wasnt.
Mann doesnt usually slip up on details like this. It strikes me as dramatic effect, which i dont care for, like racking the slide on a pistol every time mentioned earlier as a pet peeve.
He couldve had everything the same but minus the removing reds, imo.
Like checkovs gun, there needs to be a valid reason for everything seen and heard in a film.
Good replies Ace, thank you.
Rant over lol
Cheers
I suppose it depends on what you deem a valid reason. For me, I like the detail put in to watching him reload for a new purpose.
Rant away! That's some of the message board fun.
Thanks for some good conversation.
Cheerio
Me too, but all Im saying is he could have done the put in without first ejecting shells.
share