Mid Semeter Survey

This is to certify that I completed the anonymous mid-semester survey for Art/Physics 123 and am requesting the five points of extra credit.

As a student at San Jose State, I understand the university's Academic Integrity Policy (http://info.sjsu.edu/web-dbgen/narr/catalog/rec-2083.html).

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First Term Paper

Physics in a Feature Film

The movie I choose for this paper is an action movie staring Bruce Willis named "Live free or die hard." This movie is a part of the infamous Die Hard Franchise. Die Hard movies are well know for their stunning and unbelievable action sequences; sometimes literally defying reality and general rules of physics for the purpose of creating unbelievable and stunning effects. Without breaking those rules the scenes would come across less exciting, which defeats the purpose of action movies. In this paper, I would be sharing few of those scenes where rules were broke to create visually stunning and dramatic action scenes.

In this fourth installment of the Die Hard franchise, one highly noticeable bending of rule is that people seem to fall under gravity much slower than they would in reality. During the first action scene when Detective McLain is attempting to escort a cyber criminal, Matthew Farrell, to Federal agents, and is attacked by hired assassins, McLain sends one of the assassin flying off the window by firing at a fire extinguisher near him. The assassin flies of the window but lands on the ground slower than he would have under real world physics rules.

In another scene Ferrell is yet again being escorted by McLain and a Federal agent to Homeland security and encounters those assassins again, but this time assassins are on a helicopter. McLain leads them into a chase and with wisdom runs over a fire hydrant, which initiates a powerful stream of water coming out of the ground with high pressure. The pressure of the water hits one of the assassins on the helicopter, which causes the assassin to lose his balance and fall on a moving car. Once again the assassin falls much slower than he would under valid laws of physics.

In both scenes, the rules were broken to create a dramatic effect, which results in an entertaining action scene. It also slows down a rather fast action scene, which allows the audience to process and articulate what is happening in that scene.

Also in this movie the recoil effect in firing weapons is minimal than usual or doesn’t exist at all; no matter how big the gun but there is no recoil. This is apparent throughout the movie. During the first action scene when McLain and Farrell are attacked in Farrell’s apartment, the hired assassins show up with the biggest guns and they are emptying clips as if rules of physics don’t apply to them. One of the assassins even has .50 caliber long range sniper rifle and he is still firing as if he can absorb the recoil easily.

In another scene when Farrell and McLain are en route to Homeland Security and their position is triangulated by the terrorist who then sends a batch of assassins to eliminate Ferrell. The assassins arrive on a helicopter with biggest and most powerful guns and opens fire on the patrol car carrying Farrell and McLain. This happens near a police road block, which inevitably ends up with exchange of fire between cops and assassins. Every size of gun is involved in this scene but yet no recoil to be seen all around.

The conscious decision to eliminate the recoil effect from this movie’s universe was taken most probably to avoid complex and chaotic action scene. Eliminating recoil provides somewhat stability to a rather unstable and loud action scene.

But there is always exception to every rule. Die Hard universe breaks its own rule of no or minimal recoil in one of the later scenes. When Ferrell and McLain comes to the power plant to stop the terrorists from blowing the plant, McLain runs into a bad guy and they both end up placing their guns to each other’s face and firing at once. They both, of course, dodged the bullets, but there was also some notable recoil shown in that scene. Even though in earlier scenes bigger guns were involved but there was either no or minimal recoil. But in this scene both are firing .45 handguns yet they have much bigger and noticeable recoil, thus, contradicting its own universe’s rules. There are few possible explanations for this conscious decision made by the movie makers. One most appropriate and apparent explanation is that this scene was in slow motion, which would make it hard for them to sell the scene to their audience if there was no recoil.

Another noticeable unrealistic rule that this movie’s universe seem to follow is that impact on or of a vehicle is higher than it should be in a real world setting; vehicles seem to air borne rather easily. While being chased by a helicopter boarded by assassins, McLain and Farrell attempt to dodge them by escaping into a four lane tunnel. But smart cyber terrorists hack into the transportation mainframe and open all the lanes from both sides of the tunnel creating a very good scenario for a multiple head on head collisions, meanwhile also aiming to eliminate Farrell and McLain. This indeed creates a massive chain- reaction of car crashes. One of the accident prone cars air borne and spins out of control, and keeps on spinning for a very long time; longer than it should've in real world. McLain and Ferrell, of course, survive all the deadly car crashes.

Later in the same scene McLain finds the patrol car with several hundred bullet holes, turns on the lights, and drives it into a toll booth at the opening end of the tunnel with approximate speed of thirty five to forty miles per hour. The car leaves the ground and flies into the air to a height more than it could be achieved with the given speed. With the given speed it might be hard to even run over the toll both all together.

The exaggeration of the impact on or of vehicles is yet another example of steps filmmakers take to make movies more entertaining and exciting to their audience, even though they had to defy the rules of a real word in order to achieve that goal. The high impact and exaggerated height achieved by those impacts provide adrenaline along with entertainment to the audience.
In a later action scene the movie makers break another rule of the movie’s own universe. When McLain is yet again being chased, but this time by a fighter jet, and this time he is riding a eighteen wheeler himself. He’s going up on a steep freeway ramp and simultaneously is being bombarded by the fighter jet. One impact almost turns over the eighteen wheeler but McLain manages to bring all the wheels back in contact with the ground, thus defying the rule of exaggerated impact on vehicles. In this case, the impact in less than it should be in the real world, whereas, throughout the movie the impact was always greater on vehicles as compared to the rules of the real world.

Now, why would they make an exception for a rule that is very important to ensure entertainment and adrenaline to audience? It is indeed one of the key rules of almost every action movie. Where it contradicts with the one the movie’s universal rules, it solidifies another movie’s universal but unrealistic rule. That rule being superhuman ability of an ordinary hero, McLain, to overcome all the obstacles to save the day. That scene is the sole example of that rule. His extraordinary abilities overshadow the mere exaggerated impacts on vehicles, the reason why movie makers broke the important rule of the movie’s universe. Few other scenes also affirm the extraordinary strength of very ordinary detective, McLain. When Farrell and McLain are hijacking a car and Farrell deliberately make the air bags come out and McLain rips it out with his bare hands. Also during the first action scene McLain punches through the wall with very less effort. He survives countless falls, a power plant explosion, a fighter jet, extreme chain-reaction car crashes; even he himself is so sure of his invincibility that he shoots the terrorist through his own flesh.

The movie throughout has more rules of its universe that contradict the realistic rules of physics present in the real world. All those rules are set consciously by movie makers to achieve the desired effects to help tell the story in a more exciting and entertaining way. Sometimes they have to make exception for their own rule depending on the various scenarios. Die Hard franchise set the standards for those rules, which are now replicated in modern films of same genre to some extent. This movie broke a lot of real world rules and created it’s own but it mostly stayed true to the realistic world. They represented a real world with real people with real problems rather than presenting an alternative universe as an excuse to break superficial rules of the real world. Even though the movie broke some rules to create breathtaking actions scenes, it mostly kept honest to the rules of the real world that actually are more valuable in this world.

Outline for the first term paper

Choosen Feature Film:

Live free or Die Hard. The movie is a fourth in line from Die Hard franchise, which are known from extraordinary action scenes.

Three simple scientific hypothesis:

1) People fall slower under gravity than in reality.

2) Absolutely no recoil no matter how big the guns are.

3) Impact on/of the vehicles is higher than it should be; they air borne pretty easily.

Scenes in the film confirming the hypothesis:

Hypothesis 1:

1) During the first action scene at Matthews apartment, bad guy falls out of the window after a fire extinguisher explodes on his face but takes a little too much time before he hits the ground.

2) When the fire hydrant is knocked off by a speeding cop car, the force of the water pouring out knocks of the bad guy from the helicopter and again the body takes a little too much time before it crashes to the ground.

Hypothesis 2:

1) During the first action scene, the bad guys have the biggest weapons which they are firing with absolutely no recoil.

2) At the beginning of the helicopter chase scene everybody opens fire from bad guys to cops with smaller to bigger weapons, but absolutely no recoil.

Hypothesis 3:

1) When the good guys are chased into the tunnel and there is a massive chain-reaction of car crashes, cars go air borne in a small tunnel and some spin out of control and keep spinning for a long time.

2) Later in the same scene the hero drives the car into a toll both with maximum speed of 45-50 mph, and the car flies into the with maximum height more than it could be achieved at the given speed and the cars kills the helicopter.

Scene that contradicts one of the hypothesis:

Hypothesis 2 (No recoil):

At the beginning of the power plant action scene, when good guy and bad guy fires gun at each other face to face in slow motion, there is a quite noticeable recoil from much smaller guns than usual guns we see used by bad guys through out the movie without recoil.

Stop Motion Drop Test

So, I took a bottle of Tylenol, cleared up my table, taped some guide lines on the table, mentally calculated the positioning of the Tylenol bottle during the fall, and started taking some pictures and finally put em together in Windows Movie Maker. That's about it. And sorry about the earthquake effect, I wasn't able to fix the camera at such an angle and height above the table.