Shooting of Calf - The Way West (1967) Discussion

[–] crimson_n_clover 18 years ago

I just saw that and wondered the same thing.Ewwwww.

Just before the calf was shot a young guy told the young girl standing near the calf to "Get out of the way Gidget!" Geez.Sally Field who played the girl had her own sitcom called "Gidget".

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[–] ms_grumpy_gills 18 years ago

He called her idget, a form of the word idiot. Trust me, I live in the south. They use that expression.

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[–] ms_grumpy_gills 18 years ago

p.s. I don't think the calf was actually shot. The calf took too long going down, and when it was down, it was still breathing, and didn't look like it was in any pain. They probably just had prop arrows glued or taped to the calfs side, or something along those lines. If they had really shot the calf, it probably would have been termed animal abuse. I seriously doubt that was real.

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[–] virginiaac 17 years ago

I have just watched this rubbish Western and I am not only surprised to see three big stars wading through it, but revolting acts like the shooting by arrows of a calf. I really do hope this scene was manufactured as it was revolting, unnecessary and whatever they did to get the calf down, cruel.

It needs banning for this scene alone. I also doubt it was authentic as the Native American Indian had great respect for life and I would have thought they would hardly waste two arrows on a calf when they could have got two of us whities.

A thoroughly useless, wasteful film which should never have left the studio. Shame on everyone who had a hand in it.

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[–] goofyfoot-1 17 years ago

Yeah, they had so much respect for life that they would drive bison over a cliff..............

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[–] milo44 9 years ago

Spot on .... BIGTIME .

"A man that wouldn't cheat for a poke don't want one bad enough".

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[–] Kennyjbaran 15 years ago

Really sad that you are convinced this was real?! Come on this was 1967, animal rights people were on the set in all likelihood and even the actors on set would have protested anything resembling actaul harm to the animals involved. Sounds like you have a hatred of this movie and are just assuming thise scene involved actually shoot the anmial. BTW, you argue the native Americans had great respect for life, while this is true they were also very smart tacticians in battle, they knew the best way to rid themselves of the white interlopers was to remove their source of food, that calf represented that source of food, it wasn't disrespect for life but being smarter than your enemy.

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[–] Noel_MarquisDeMaynes 17 years ago

The calf was shot with two arrows, not three. I just watched the scene frame by frame. It seems the arrows flipped out of the calf's side.
Please note the calf does not even flinch at the "impact". You also don't see it fall. It is safe to assume it was not harmed in any way.

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[–] babamulon 15 years ago

They have the arrows (half arrows that is) pinned to the calf, and pull them out with a wire of some sort. Then they reverse the shot, so it looks like the arrows stick IN the calf, not go OUT from it. The wires are visible at the end of the scene, but they are not there at the beginning. This proves the thing i wrote above.

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[–] AngelKH 15 years ago

Thanks for explaining because I was worried about the calf too. I thought the scene was unnecessary and irresponsible. Irresponsible because people might have believed it was real and therefore thought it acceptable to hurt an animal as they had seen it in film. The scene should not have been made or should have been edited out, however I don't believe in generally banning whole films. I'm glad you saw the wires and knew how it was done. Thanks.

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[–] richard.fuller1 15 years ago

Essentially the same technique that Charlie Chaplin used for a scene in which he is pushing a wheelbarrow or walking along and an executioner with an axe is swinging the axe and just misses Chaplin's foot. It was revealed the executioner already had the axe in the ground, Chaplin walked backward, stepped closely over the axe, then the executioner lifted it quickly into the air.

Likewise, the same way the house falling to the ground at the camera in Wizard of Oz was achieved; it was a model house and the camera was on the ceiling of the studio and the base of the model was held against the camera and the model was released, so we see it fall and it actually hit the studio floor and bounced across the floor.

I always watched the remake of Stagecoach and wondered about Red Buttons being shot. I suspect it must have been done similarly this way as well.

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[–] thundercloud47 12 years ago

Even as far back as the 1960's they did not deliberately kill animals to make a film. The American public would not have stood for it. I know this because I remember that era very well. I'm sure that there are organizations who claim that they were. Those folks either don't know any better or they are simply trying to get people to donate money to them by telling a white lie now and then.

This was not always true of Hollywood. I have seen scenes from the 20's and 30's where it was pretty obvious an animal was actually killed.

It also was not true of foreign films. If you saw a horse falling off a cliff in one of those films you were actually watching the death of that horse. I would imagine they did this because it was cheaper to kill the horse than it was to do special effects necessary for that scene.

As far as the native Americans respecting life??? Before I go on further here about that I must inform anyone who reads this that I am happily married to a woman who is part Souix. That's to let everyone know I'm not prejudiced. That being said there is a place not too far from where I live called Buffalo Drop where the Indians would stampede the Buffalo over a cliff to kill them. It was much easier than hunting them but they also wound up wasting a lot of meat. It did not matter to them because they thought there was an endless supply of buffalo.

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