The fatal shot that Alec Baldwin fired at camerawoman Halyna Hutchins in autumn 2021 still resonates – and not just legally. On the one hand, the Hollywood star has to answer to the court for negligent homicide starting today (more below), on the other hand, the fatal, because sharp, bullet brings an often repressed fact into focus: people die once more and once more in the service of Hollywood’s action and stunt cinema.
From 1990 to 2014, 43 people died on a US film and TV set. At the same time, 194 serious accidents were recorded. As early as the 1910s, the urge to provide audiences with the most realistic images possible caused seven accidents. Two were fatal, one of them on the set of Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Captive” (1915) due to live ammunition. An extra had forgotten it in a rifle.
Given that there are several hundred US productions per year, fatal tragedies are no longer a regular occurrence, but they are characteristic of the system. But how can incidents occur? It often affects the real professionals who, in their absolute routine, think: “It’s fine. But then we’re missing that little bit of luck and fate strikes,” says Tom Hanslmaier.
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The Helfenberger is a self-employed stuntman with Hollywood experience (“Inglourious Basterds”) and was trained in the use of weapons by a WEGA instructor. In principle, he is certain: “If I were to drive for a food delivery company in Vienna during rush hour for two weeks, the risk of being involved in a fatal accident would be significantly higher” than if I were on a shoot. This has been statistically proven. Hanslmaier compares his profession’s approach to that of freeriders (skiers in open terrain): Experienced professionals who have trained for the event have meticulously studied the terrain, weather and avalanche conditions before they go out into the field.
As in top-level motorsport or alpine sports, there is also an uncontrollable and unforeseeable residual risk in film. Factors include human and material failure. Time pressure, pressure and incorrect (leadership) behavior all play their part. Hanslmaier knows this from his early days: A director in Austria felt that a car stunt was too slow. Contrary to what he had rehearsed, the car then drove towards him faster. When he hit the windshield, he split a tooth, which he only discovered two months later.
The “Rust” case has definitely raised awareness in the industry. Since then, Hanslmaier has felt “a certain amount of excitement regarding whether the work is being done properly. When the gunsmith gives me the gun himself, I go to the sandbag and press the entire magazine through once more. To make sure that there is nothing left in it.”
Alec Baldwin fired a shot during rehearsals for the western “Rust” in 2021, killing camerawoman Halyna Hutchins and slightly injuring director Joel Souza. The trial once morest Alec Baldwin (66) for negligent homicide begins today in Santa Fe with the selection of the jury; if found guilty, he faces 18 months in prison. In March, “Rust” gunsmith Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was found guilty of negligent homicide.
