I missed the first part when the posse set out in the cars. Was the lead car loaded with ammo or dynamite or something? Is that why they yelled jump and jumped out when the ambushers opened fire? Is that why the car exploded even as it barely left the ground going over the cliff? Why else woould the car's occupants have yelled jump?
Come see a fat old man sometime!
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Actually, gas tanks don't explode when you shoot them. Bullets are copper jacketed or just plain lead, and neither will make a spark. Plus there is not enough oxygen in a gas tank for the fumes to ignite. You can actually drop a lit match into a gas tank and it will not explode.
So, gas tanks are not explosives, and all the movie hype about them exploding on impact or when they're shot just isn't true. And nobody jumps from a car just because it's being shot at, not even in the movies. Unless the car is loaded with explosives, which is why I asked the question, because I didn't get to see the part where they set out. For all I knew, they loaded it with explosives before they set out, again, which is why I asked the question. I was just wondering if anyone saw whether they loaded explosives into the car before the posse set out.
The question is part rhetorical, as it was obviously meant to just be a spectacle special effects deal as part of the gun battle, and not really follow any reasoning. Most violent scenes in movies are like that, with cars exploding as they tumble down a hillside, or people getting shot but not bleeding, or guns never running out of ammunition, etc.. The thing is the car's occupants yelled jump probably because the car was going over the cliff, and as soon as the jumped and before it even cleared the cliff's edge it exploded. So clearly it was just a spectacle for the scene and nothing else.
Come see a fat old man sometime!
They may have jumped because it was going toward the cliff and they had no way to stop it. I, too, thought the explosion midway down the cliff was strange. I guess I could have chalked it up to overdone special effects but I couldn't leave it at that. I rewound the scene and there is a gunshot just prior to the explosion so they covered their behinds to legitimize the effect.
However, as the early poster suggested, a gunshot to the tank doesn't mean an explosion, but who knows how those tanks were design in 1909. Hell the 1970's Pinto proved it can be done.
Well, actually the Pinto didn't have an exploding problem. It just had an issue with the gas tank where in rear-end accidents the tank tended to be punctured by surrounding parts resulting in fires that killed a few occupants.
And a tank design wouldn't effect whether a gunshot caused it to blow up, since a gunshot cannot make a gas tank blow up.
Anyhow, the scene achieved its purpose which was simply as a special effects spectacular. It just didn't make sense to explode it before it even went over the cliff's edge, I mean they barely had time to jump. Which is why I wondered if the car were loaded with explosives (again I didn't catch the part where they packed and left). So, they may have loaded explosives in the car before they left, and when the gun battle started decided the car was too dangerous and needed to be abandoned, but even then running it over the cliff doesn't make any sense.
Come see a fat old man sometime!
Having seen a special on this years ago, there actually was a design change which would have solved Pinto's problem. A fuel cell, much like those used in Nascar, was designed for the Pinto, thus solving the Pinto fire problem. Why it wasn't used I can only speculate.
Are there any Ford engineers out there who may have an answer?
Kind of like my favorite car as a young adult was the Corvair until Ralph Nader's book "Unsafe at Any Speed" succeeded in killing it off.
The explosion was dumb but consistent with filmed car crashes of the era. There were always cars going over cliffs on TV shows in the late 60s/early 70s. Mannix drove one over nearly every week (usually a convenient 'rental')... Shows tried to outdo each other or ramp up the excitement without regard to realism. Direction was pretty ham-handed at times with this a good example.
Having seen a special on this years ago, there actually was a design change which would have solved Pinto's problem. A fuel cell, much like those used in Nascar, was designed for the Pinto, thus solving the Pinto fire problem. Why it wasn't used I can only speculate.
I had an accident with a Ford Pinto in 1978; I hit a guard rail and apparently the gas tank ruptured. The car went into flames, perhaps even when I was driving. But I got out. The car burned... and it probably burned extremely hot because I had some very flammable materials (about 200 music LPs) that burned.
Gasoline is not an explosive unless it is mixed with pure oxygen. Face it -- engines in motor vehicles do not explode destructively.
Exploding cars are almost a cinematic convention. Never mind that gasoline is not an explosive; if it were explosive it would not be a motor fuel. A car can be incinerated, but that happens more slowly. I despise the explosion of a motor vehicle whenever I see it unless the vehicle explodes for some other reason.
Am exploding vehicle, unless the explosion results from a bomb or a mine, is a cinematic goof. I hold that goof in contempt.
I can attest that gasoline is not an explosive from an accident that I had that resulted in a car fire. I got out of the car in plenty of time... but the only burn that I got was a sunburn, and that was from being stranded in a semi-desert area in the late afternoon.
Nope - no explosives in the bit you missed.
shareI caught part of "Big Jake" on TCM early on the morning of 23 December ... I thought the same thing: why the hell did that car burst into flames as soon as it left level ground ??
I agree with you about "bullets into the gas tank" .. No, it was just for dumb dramatic effect.
The "bullets" that supposedly were incendiary enough to ignite the gas after penetrating metal also bounced off the other cars' rubber tires later in that scene. (Once, for visual and plot effect, a "bullet" blew a hole in a tire, but in immediately-following scenes, "bullets" were "bouncing" off tires [with dust effects]).
Michael Bay was an executive producer, I could be wrong.
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If I recall correctly the driver was shot and killed which prompted everyone to bail from the car. It exploding was just ohh and ahh.
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Carpe Carpio