Stunt performers have been around since the
days of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, but they were really in demand when moviegoers
acquired a taste for high-octane action that came later in the form of Wild West films. Not every actor could gallop at high speed
while shooting at foes. While these days all kinds of safety mechanisms
are there to make sure things run smoothly, being a stunt double is still a very dangerous
occupation. Wages vary, but the Screen Actors Guild tells
us stunt doubles should get at least $859 a day. That said, Colin Follenweider, sometimes called
Hollywood’s favorite stuntman, will get the big bucks for being Spider-Man for a while. “Ultimately, we're expendable where the
lead in a film isn't,” he once said. Let’s now look at when things turned bad,
in this episode of the Infographics Show, Movie stunts that went horribly wrong. 15. A Hangover tragedy
Australian stuntman Scott McLean almost didn’t survive the making of the movie Hangover II
in 2011. While filming in Bangkok, Thailand, he was
doing a simple stunt that meant putting his head out of a car window while the car was
traveling at high speed. It sounds simple enough, but something went
wrong, and his head hit an oncoming truck. This left him in a coma for six weeks with
some serious brain trauma. He left a Thai hospital and then underwent
eight months of rehabilitation in Australia. After that, he needed constant care. He blamed the stunt coordinator for the accident,
but it seems Warner Brothers didn’t pay for all of his medical bills. For that, McLean’s partner said in 2013
that she was “disappointed, upset and disgusted.” 14. Horror on the Resident Evil Set
A horrific accident happened to stuntwoman Olivia Jackson while the movie Resident Evil:
The Final Chapter was being filmed in 2015. She was riding a motorbike at high speed down
a road. A crane above her was supposed to lower down,
and the camera would film her as she rode. But that crane came way too close, and she
hit it full on. Her face was degloved, her lung was punctured,
and she had to be put into an induced coma. Not only that, her injuries left her with
an amputated arm and a twisted back. She survived, but some months later tweeted,
“I don't mean to moan, but sometimes I just want to crawl out of my own skin & all the
pains in it.” She seemed to face her injuries with bravery
and was at least better off than another crew member who was crushed to death by a Hummer
while making the same movie. We think now you’re starting to see what
a dangerous occupation this can be, and you’ll also see how it can get even worse. 13. The dark side of magic movies
A stuntman, David Holmes, was playing the stunt double for none other than Daniel Radcliffe
in the Harry Potter franchise. The movie was Deathly Hallows. The stuntman was tied to a harness flying
through the air, and at one point he was jerked back. This was all part of the show, except he was
pulled back too fast and ended up being slammed against a wall. He broke his neck and has since been paralyzed
from his chest down. He does have the use of his arms, though. Six years later, he was interviewed at age
31 about how much he was enjoying living in the house that he had especially designed
for himself and his disability. Believe it or not, he was very positive about
life. “Breaking my neck has made me 10 times more
creative. My brain is still moving as fast as my body
wanted to,” he said. 12. The dangers of James Bond
As you can imagine, there have been plenty of accidents over the years while filming
the James Bond movies. The worst accident happened during the making
of the 1981 movie For Your Eyes Only. During a bobsled chase, one of the sleds turned
upside down and trapped a young man called Paolo Rignon underneath it. Unfortunately, he did not survive. 11. They really are expendable
This tragedy happened during the filming of Expendables II in 2011. During the making of the movie on Lake Ognyanovo
in Bulgaria, there was a scene with an explosion. Two stuntmen were injured during that explosion. Their names were Kun Lieu and Nuo Sun. Lieu, who was acting as Jet Li’s stunt double,
died from his injuries, while Sun survived. Lieu’s parents sued over their son’s death,
and some years later it was reported that Jet Li donated $750,000 to the Lieu family. 10. A bad landing
Stuntman Jack Tyree met the same fate of death during the making of the 1982 movie The Sword
and the Sorcerer. He jumped off a cliff, and it was intended
he would land on an airbag. Unfortunately, he missed the airbag by a few
feet and died from his injuries. The stunt was actually left in the movie,
and it was dedicated to him. 9. The death of a pilot
Art Scholl was famed for flying planes acrobatically. You might have seen Scholl’s high-flying
tricks in the movie Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and he was also one of the
stunt pilots for the famous movie Top Gun. It’s said he went into an inverted spin
during the filming of Top Gun in 1985 and lost control of the plane. His last words were “I've got a problem
here.” That he did, and he hit the ocean at high
speed. The plane exploded on impact, and the man’s
remains were never found. No one knows exactly what happened. “Something mechanical must have happened,”
said another pilot. “An inverted flat spin was nothing for him. He's done so many of those.” 8. Zombie catastrophe
If you are not familiar with those old movies, we imagine you have heard of the show The
Walking Dead. During filming in 2017, stuntman John Bernecker
was supposed to fall from a balcony, which is something you see in many, many movies. This time things didn’t go as planned. He was supposed to fall onto a mat, but he
missed it after trying to grab a rail and fell right onto the concrete floor. He was rushed to the hospital and died soon
after. That particular scene involved a fight with
actor Austin Amelio. He later said, “I have no words. My heart is absolutely broken from John Bernecker.” It must be an awful thing to be pretending
to fight and then see your stuntman hit the floor. 7. Deadpool disaster
This tragedy occurred during the making of the recent superhero spoof movie Deadpool
II. The victim was stuntwoman Joi 'SJ' Harris,
and she was the stunt double for actress Zazie Beetz, who played Domino. Harris, who was a formidable motorcyclist,
had done the stunt perfectly four times. But it seems on the fifth take she lost control
of her bike and hit a building, being sent right through a window. In a statement, director David Leitch said,
“No words can express how I and the rest of the Deadpool 2 crew feel about this tragedy. Our thoughts are with her family, friends
and loved ones in this difficult time.” 6. More tragedy in the Lee family
This stunt that went wrong actually involved an actor. That actor was the son of Bruce Lee, Brandon
Lee. In 1993, he was making the film The Crow,
and the scene involved him walking into a room to see his girlfriend being raped by
a bunch of thugs. Lee is shot in the film with a .44 Magnum
revolver, except the bullets were not supposed to be real. Blanks are used, of course. However, as Snopes writes, there was a problem
with one of the blanks used in this scene: “Unfortunately, a fragment of a dummy bullet,
used earlier in close-up shots, was lodged in the barrel, and the blank charge propelled
the fragment into Lee’s side, fatally wounding him.” 5. More Crow darkness
Unbelievably, death struck again during the making of another Crow movie. This time it was 1999’s The Crow: Stairway
to Heaven. Canadian actor Marc Akerstream was hit by
flying debris during an explosion scene. 4. Too many X’s
This tragic event happened during the filming of the 2002 movie XXX. During the filming, there was a scene in which
stuntman and former Navy SEAL Harry O’Connor was being pulled at a very high speed on a
paraglider. Unfortunately, he got pulled right into a
bridge and didn’t survive. 3. Beijing blaze
During the filming of John Woo’s 2009 epic film Red Cliff, there was a scene in which
a small boat hits a large ancient ship, and there was a massive explosion and subsequent
fire. A fire there was, and unfortunately quite
a few crew members were actually trapped in it. One of them died, a young man by the name
of Lu Yanqing. He burned to death in the blaze. The set was just outside of Beijing in a place
called Xiaotang Shan. According to Reuters, the reason why the fire
got out of hand was because that day there were very strong winds. 2. All too real
This tragedy is strange because it happened during the making of a BBC TV series called
999 in which stuntmen portrayed people having lucky escapes. The irony was, of course, that one reenacted
lucky escape didn’t involve a lucky escape. An English stuntman called Tip Tipping, a
former Royal Marine and SAS soldier, died in a scene in which he was parachuting. Another Bad Landing
A tragic accident occurred on the set of a film called Vampire in Brooklyn, which was
supposed to be a kind of spoof horror-comedy. It starred Eddie Murphy and was released in
1995. A stuntwoman called Sonja Davis died while
falling backwards 42 feet (13 meters) during the making of this film. Davis’s mother used to turn up on the set
quite often and watch her daughter perform. After the accident, she told the LA Times,
“The last words I heard my baby say was when she yelled down to the stunt coordinator,
'Are you sure?' I could feel Sonja wasn't comfortable with
the stunt.” A terrible thing happened in that the air
cushion that was meant to save the stuntwoman did the opposite. Instead of cushioning her fall, it acted like
a trampoline and sent her flying into the air. She hit a building and then landed on the
floor. She spent 13 days in a coma and eventually
succumbed to her injuries. Maybe Davis had a premonition because her
mother told the LA Times, “She asked them three times (as she stood on top of the building
before the stunt) if they were sure it was OK,” the mother said. “I could feel her lack of confidence and
then she paused.” Okay, so that’s probably about as bad as
it gets. In Sonja Davis’s case, it seems the death
definitely could have been avoided. In fact, it seems in most of these cases death
could have been averted if the crew had been more careful. After hearing these stories, would you take
up this profession? Let us know in the comments. Also, be sure to check out our other video
Luckiest Unlucky Man In The World. Thanks for watching, and as always, please
don’t forget to like, share and subscribe. See you next time!
