Stunt Help: Selling a hit from behind

Bill Clar

Bill Clar

Well-known member
I'm filming a slapstick action sequence that involves an actress getting hit in the back of the head with a frying pan. I can stage it with stacking and various camera angles but my problem is timing. The actress won't see the frying pan, thus depriving her visual cue.

I've thought about poking the actress offscreen to simulate the cue, but again, timing is an issue.

I'm also considering an over the shoulder of the assailant then a jump cut to a CU of actress selling the hit.

Has anyone ever experienced this problem?

Thank you in advance for any info you can give me. I've googled this particular problem and searched this forum with no results.
 
I don't know your room set up/if this is possible, but simple solution seems like a mirror.

Any way that could work? so that she could at least see herself
 
But it may not look natural if she is watching the mirror.

Is there any talking? If not you can deliver a verbal or other audio cue and remove it later. Even better you can rehearse the sequence to a verbal count so that both actors can time their actions to fall on the same beat.
 
When I did something similar, I had the person doing the hitting give the countdown. After only two or three rehearsals, the two actors had developed a good timing and it worked great.
 
Thanks all!

There's no talking during the strike so a countdown will work. I'll be filming both the assailant and victim from behind so no worries about seeing their lips move.
 
Verbal cues are great, but if I were coordinating two actors (rather than stunt performers), I wouldn't be very happy having one swing a real frying pan near the back of the other's head. In the past I've rented very convincing rubber frying pans from prop houses/armorers. The flat part of the pans have had enough "give" in them, that you can make contact. A confident swing of the pan, within proximity to the victim's head should help move the victim's hair, helping "sell" the illusion.

If you are shooting from behind both actors, and really can't rent/buy/borrow a soft prop pan, consider using a longer lens to compress the "safe" distance between head and pan.

On a recent shoot, I had an actor swing a real wooden mallet at the back of an actor's head. The victim was on his knees and had no visual way of knowing when the hit was coming. We could see both actor's mouths, so they couldn't give cues. A correctly timed handclap by a crewmember gave the victim a cue to react. We got a good take in no time. Hope some of this helps.
 
When John Cleese filmed the Faulty Towers program and had to slap Manwell, he apparently just hit him, painfully hard, repeatedly over several takes. They do talk about suffering for your art after all.

Anyway, I was thinking about a prop frying pan, or actually buy one from a toy store or joke shop.
 
Take a bunch of shots, she can react slightly late (yell behind the camera just before reaction), don't spend too much time fine tuning, you need to take those shots fast and move on. If she is slightly late, no problem. Delete a frame or a couple from the moment of impact. If she is too early, there is nothing you can fix. Also take from a couple of angles so you can cut it up. ALWAYS take atleast several angles of any action setup. And maybe even a closeup. You can miss the frying pan by meters if you just stage it correctly. Take those over the shoulders too. Take everything you think you might need, and do it fast. Don't start waiting for people to setup lights if you do a closeup of a pan that just whizzes for less than a second.

Cut the scene up in your mind and also take a longer version where you can see everything. As you are shooting, edit it already in your head + bunch of backup shots. That's my procedure and it tends to work. You need to know exactly what you are doing (even if you don't) so you can move the shoot along. Don't stop to think like "do I need this?" and consider angles too much. It's an "action scene", take it and move on.

I hope my advice helps ;)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top