Story.

Basically this is what happened. The gun is, from what I've read, an Italian-made copy of a Colt Peacemaker, which is a single-action revolver, which means that the hammer must be cocked with the thumb for each shot. The gun was designed in 1873 and has no safety device. Although the gun can hold 6 cartridges, experts carry them with only 5 cartridges loaded, and an empty chamber under the resting hammer, because the hammer rests directly on the primer of the cartridge if all 6 chambers are loaded, and the gun WILL FIRE if the hammer is struck a sharp blow. That is NOT what happened to Baldwin.

Baldwin was handed a loaded revolver, either fully loaded with 6 cartridges or safely loaded with only 5. The number of cartridges loaded in this case is not germane, because as part of filming the scene, Baldwin thumbed the hammer back without allowing it to lock into the fully cocked position, but let the hammer slip off of his thumb, at which point it fell forward under tension from the mainspring, and fired the cartridge in the chamber, which turned out to be a live round. On a Colt Peacemaker or clone, you do NOT have to bring the hammer to full cock to fire it - - just thumbing the hammer back far enough to cause the cylinder to rotate and bring a cartridge into position to fire will result in a fired cartridge if the hammer is slipped off the thumb. In point of historical fact, some gunfighters used to file the full-cock notch entire off their Peacemaker and fire it by slipping it off of the thumb. OR they would file the full-cock notch to create a "hair trigger," which means a trigger that is much lighter than normal. A gun that has this sort of "hair trigger" can go off by itself if the gun is dropped.

So Baldwin is not lying if he says he never touched the trigger; the gun can fire without the trigger ever being pulled. Just thumbing the hammer back and slipping it off of the thumb will fire the gun. Presumably Baldwin didn't know that. Probably 99 out of 100 people don't.

Having said this, though, Baldwin's liability is far less than the armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, whose job it was to make sure no live rounds were on the set, and particularly not in the gun. She failed, and has admitted so. She'll be lucky to avoid jail.

‘Rust’ Armorer’s Industry Veteran Father Hands Police Possible Pivotal Tip On Origin Of Live Rounds; Hannah Gutierrez-Reed Admits She Didn’t Check Gun “Too Much”

All she can do at this point is start negotiations with the prosecutors to accept a plea deal.

Probably not, since none of the Seven are a woman, a queer, or a tranny.



Which reminds me of the old joke that Michael Landon told on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show: "No, none of the Cartwright family was gay. Good thing Hop Sing was, though."

The Tall Man from the film Phantasm has passed on at the age of 89.

Entertainment Weekly reported the news of Scrimm’s passing. “Angus Scrimm passed away peacefully tonight surrounded by his friends and loved one,” director Don Coscarelli wrote in an e-mail to EW. “[His] performance as the Tall Man is a towering achievement in horror film history. He was the last in a long line of classic horror movie stars. He was a terrific actor and an even better friend. He will be missed.”

Born Lawrence Rory Guy, he pursued acting for most of his life (he portrayed Abraham Lincoln in an Encyclopedia Brittanica short that appears on Shout! Factory’s PHANTASM II Blu-ray), but found steadier employment for many years as a journalist and author of liner notes for Capitol Records, winning a Grammy for the latter. He appeared in the early-’70s fright films SWEET KILL and SCREAM BLOODY MURDER, but the seeds of his greatest success were sown when he took the role of an abusive father in the 1976 drama JIM THE WORLD’S GREATEST. That movie marked the directorial debut of Coscarelli, whom he referred to, upon his induction into the FANGORIA Hall of Fame at our 1994 Chainsaw Awards ceremony, as “a magician of filmmaking, a man without whom there would be no PHANTASM, no Tall Man, and no ‘Angus Scrimm,’ ” the name he adopted for the 1979 hit.

Sure, they were cheesy movies, but tell me you weren't horrified the first time you saw one of those flying steel balls in Phantasm impale a man's head and drill into his brain?

So long, "Angus." Thanks for all the frights!

...on its lead actor disparaging the film just before its release, and thus hurting profits:

Daniel Craig Told [by Sony Films - - Ed.] To Quit B*tching About Being James Bond."

We see this time and time again, as a major star actor/actress feels it necessary to open his/her piehole and hold forth on whatever angers him/her during the round of interviews that accompanies a film release. Maybe it's Liam Neeson talking gun control, or Emily Blunt regretting taking US citizenship after watching the GOP debates. Just shut up! Pre-release interviews are to talk about how great the movie is, and nothing else. If you have some profundity to get off of your chest, wait a month until your movie is gone from the theaters, and then share it with the world.

Looks like it.

Classical music abandoned the public long ago, even before the end of the 19th century, going off in various strange directions that the public wasn't willing to follow. With the advent of moving pictures and especially the beginning of "talking" films with dialog, musical soundtracks became an important component of the industry, and film composers supplied the beautiful melodies that the public had been missing.

Horner is (was?) a prolific composer, with over 100 film scores to his credit, and a bunch of awards, also, including two Oscars.

Probably my favorite work of his was Braveheart.

"Lost chapter reveals Willy Wonka's room of fudge."

I always suspected that there was some fudgepacking going on in Oompa Loompa Land...

Oompa Loompa Doopity Doo, I Have Some Fudge To Pack Into YOU!

Here.

The actual boat itself, now restored and again sailing the Nile.



If you're a fan of the old Bogart/Hepburn movie, or even the C.S. Forester novel on which it was based, it would be worth adding to a bucket list.

"Skin him, Pilgrim, and I'll get you another!"

A Russian man attacked by a brown bear in eastern Siberia said he escaped with only minor wounds after using his knife to kill the animal.

Sergei Rumyantsev, 55, said he was riding his horse near a paddock in the Siberian forests about 35 miles from his home in Eselyakh when he was "suddenly, unexpectedly" attacked by the bear, The Independent (Britain) reported Friday.

"I had a rifle in my saddle but I didn't have time to get it out. I only had a knife at hand," Rumyantsev said.

He said he was able to stab the bear while his hunting dog bit the wild animal and held it back.

Bears, although fearsome in the extreme, can be killed by men armed with a knife; Ben Lilly, for example, did it often.

*reference to a favorite scene from one of my favorite movies:

...the trailer for the second of Peter Jackson's movies based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit has been released:

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug hits theaters Dec. 13th:

Wyatt Earp (Kevin Costner) meets Doc Holliday (Dennis Quaid) for the first time, from the movie Wyatt Earp:



That bit with the whiskey bottle was masterly. Watch Doc's eyes narrow when he sees how fast Wyatt's reflexes are; then, realizing Wyatt doesn't represent a threat to him, he smiles, amused by it.

Here's a bonus scene from later in the movie:

An Arizona town is gobsmacked by an anatomically correct gargoyle statue.

Well, if gargoyles were real, that is. This is all supposition, after all.

*bonus points for anyone who can identify where I paraphrased the blog post title from.

Here.

Here's one sample, the between-the-legs shot:

...forgot to get the Spike Lee Seal of Authentic Blacknezz in a movie featuring African-Americans:

Yesterday, director Spike Lee ripped into Quentin Tarantino’s new ultra-violent slave revenge fantasy pic Django Unchained. Lee told VIBETV, “I can’t speak on it cause I’m not gonna see it. All I’m going to say is that it’s disrespectful to my ancestors. That’s just me … I’m not speaking on behalf of anybody else.”

Lee, you will recall, feuded with Clint Eastwood over the same subject.

"The Weekend Word: Marriage."

Ah, yes, mawwiage marriage: that blessed event, that dweam dream within a dream...

...this wonderful tribute from ESPN:



h/t Hot Air.

...except for a nice RLT - - Rat, Lettuce and Tomato sandwich, when the rat is nice and lean, and the tomatoes are SO ripe, they're so perky, I love that...

A woman in UK eats a sandwich with rodent in it, and is only offered £10 in compensation.

Of course, you know where I found inspiration in this story:



One of the truly great films, yet it only did so-so at the box office.

...can turn his ankle.

Robert Downey, Jr., injured performing a stunt on the set of Iron Man 3 in Wilmington, NC.

Peter Jackson announces a third "Hobbit" movie.

And, no doubt, each film will stray even farther from the spirit of Tolkien's work.