Dear colleagues: As my class has been looking at some of Michael Curtiz's vintage action pictures, like "Charge of the Light Brigade" (Warners '36), I 've been trying to recall what I'd once read about a Hollywood stuntmen's technique or device which (if memory serves) was called "running W" (?). Or am I mis-remembering that colloquialism? That was the technique, supposedly banned in the US around 1939, that had been used to trip horses racing forward at breakneck speed -- throwing head-first into the dirt both horse and rider, sometimes with rather painful results (to put it mildly). Not surprising for a Curtiz film, I suppose. Curtiz was notorious for his rough treatment of everybody -- cast, crew, animals. I'd guess that "Charge of the Light Brigade" in the Curtiz oeuvre may have run second only to "Noah's Ark" (1928) in the number of casualties and even fatalities (to man and beast) that happened in the action scenes. Or did Killer Curtiz exceed even "Noah" and "Brigade" in some other rough action picture of his? To refresh my rusty memory on the matter of "horse tripping," I did a web search, not very successfully. There were many references to "running W," but if any referred to Curtiz and/or "Light Brigade," I must have missed them. I did find an informative page (attached below) about the legislative turning point occurring in 1939, due to the killing of one horse in "Jesse James" (that equine was pitched over a cliff). Given what must have been an enormous discrepancy between ONE dead horse in "Jesse James," and arguably DOZENS of dead horses in "Light Brigade," 3 years earlier, I can only guess that some magazine must have published a colorful article about the spectacular technique that killed the one horse in "Jesse James." That would offer one possible explanation of what incurred the wrath of the American Humane Association (AHA) -- and led to the new rules of 1939. I can only speculate that if a similar article had been published about all the dead horses in "Light Brigade" (and the "running W," or whatever was used to trip them up), the AHA crackdown might well have occurred a few years earlier... What follows is a slightly one-sided, but still informative, excerpt from the web-site site of the International Fund for Horses, which I did find in my web search. -- Steven P Hill, University of Illinois. __ __ _ __ __ __ _ __ __ __ _ __ __ __ The International Fund 4 Horses : http://www.fund4horses.org/print.php?id=129 Horses in Film: Abused for Entertainment? By Kelly Chase [ .... ] Animal Rights have not always been in existence; therefore, many animals have been abused, injured, and killed during the making of movies. Some of the most heinous cases of animal abuse and neglect noted in filmmaking involve horses. [ .... ] Their presence in period films is necessary to make the productions historically accurate. Nearly two hundred horses were used during the filming of the chariot race scene in the 1925 Fred Niblo film, "Ben-Hur" [MGM]. Fortunately, it was reported that not a single horse was injured. This would probably relate more to luck than a deliberate attempt by anyone to ensure the safety of the animals. Many of the horses used in Westerns were not so lucky. It is not surprising that so many horses were injured or killed during the making of Westerns, considering what horses were subjected to. In her book "West of Everything," Jane Tompkins discusses what horses endured, in Western films, for the sake of entertainment [ .... ] What horses endured in Westerns is similar to that which the heroes themselves endured, with one exception; the horses were not acting voluntarily. The American Humane Association (AHA) has fought for animal rights since 1877, but it was not until the tragic death of a horse, during the filming of the 1939 Henry King film, " Jesse James" [20th-Cen. Fox]. that the AHA was given legal rights to monitor the treatment of animals in films. The horse in question was forced to jump off a cliff into a raging river. The device used to make the horse fall was a slippery platform called a ‘tilt shute,’ which when tilted up forced the horse to slip off the cliff. This is just one of the many cruel methods utilized in the movies to force animals to fall against their will. The public was outraged and demanded action. This prompted the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) to grant the AHA legal rights to set guidelines and to monitor the treatment of animals on movie sets. The contract fell under the administration of the Hayes Office, which had the responsibility of setting the standards and practices of film making during that time. Unfortunately, in 1966 the Supreme Court dissolved the Hayes Office, ruling that their practices constituted censorship. This meant that film companies no longer had to abide by the regulations protecting animals that had been set by the AHA. From 1966 to 1980 the American Humane Association tried to monitor the treatment of movie animals, but since film companies were no longer legally bound to have them there, they often refused to allow the AHA on their production sets. Gina Barrett, former Director of the Western Regional Office of the American Humane Association, stated, "During that period of time, frankly, animal abuse in film making grew again." Unfortunately, it took the death of another horse before reform was finally brought about, and animal rights were reinstated. During the filming of the 1979 Michael Cimino film, Heaven’s Gate, a horse was severely injured when explosives were placed underneath its saddle, and the animal had to be euthanized. So, in 1980, the entertainment industry granted the AHA sole authority to protect animals used in film through a contract with the Screen Actors Guild. [ .... ] __ __ _ __ __ _ __ __ __ __ _ __ __ __ __ __ __ _ __ __ __ __ __ __ ---- For past messages, visit the Screen-L Archives: http://bama.ua.edu/archives/screen-l.html