[Dionysusigma]

I'm just curious here--was the G18 meade before or after 1986? If after, then how did the armorers for The Matrix: Reloaded acquire one? How can anyone that's not an LEO get H & K G36s, UMPs, and so forth? I'm asking this because I've got quite a bit of interest in being a movie armorer, but am curious as to legal issues.
Thanks in advance...

[buzz_knox]

They film the flicks outside the US, or at least the portion involving post-ban Class III.

[Dionysusigma]

Much of Reloaded was filmed in Australia... and we all know how much the Aussie Gov't loves guns :rolleyes:

Plus, the G18 and the UMP were used in a scene that was shot in Alameda, CA...

[buzz_knox]

Well, 18 U.S.C. § 921(o) doesn't provide for an exemption for moviemakers to possess post-ban Class IIIs. So, they question of how they get them legally is simple . . . they don't. What they do is fall into that category of elites who don't have to worry about the law.

[garrettwc]

The studios lease them.

There are several companies that make their money supplying cars, guns, planes, etc to the movie industry. These companies, modify guns to shoot blanks and/or not be usable with real ammo.

The gun you saw probably started life as a run of the mill G17. The prop company, modified it, had it inspected by the local BATFE rep, then has said documents of blessing on the "prop gun" filed away.

When the movie types are ready to shoot a scene, they call up the prop guy and say bring me whatever, just like ordering a pizza.

[Ken]

There's a company called Stembridge Gun Rentals. They have an extensive collection and have supplied tons of guns used in various movies. They were featured in one of the American Shooter episodes. OLN is still running them so you may still be able to see it.

[Ken]

Here is a link to OLN's American Shooter schedule. The Stembridge show is listed for 11/2.

[buzz_knox]

I thought Stembridge sold off their stock because under California's last major gun ban, it was illegal to provide "assault weapons" to non-licensed individuals. At least, that was my understanding.

As for leases and rentals, ATF is giving them a pass. Think any of us could get a lease/rental that left a gun range's property. Nope. It would be construed as possession and thus be a criminal offense.

[gun-fucious]

i'm sure alot of the modern movies use airsoft & prop guns

paying 200 bucks for a rubber duck AR15, prolly makes the insurance dood happy
http://www.westernstageprops.com/miva/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=WSP&Category_Code=SPRG

i gather the rubber monkey wrench is SAG approved for cold cocking:
http://www.westernstageprops.com/miva/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=WSP&Product_Code=PM32&Category_Code=SPRT

[HankB]

Many times the "guns" you see in the movies are replicas designed to shoot & ignite a flammable gas at the muzzle. Ejected empties are then filmed separately and the whole spliced together. (IIRC, the first Matrix movie has the characters shooting MP5's and the film shows a shower of spent .223 cases hitting the floor.)

As far as the law itself goes . . . special people are exempt. Just ask Ted Kennedy's bodygard how much time HE spent behind bars after being caught trying to enter the Russell Senate Office Building with a small arsenal of unlicensed weaponry . . .

[Justin]

It is legal to possess post-86 full autos if you are a registered machinegun dealer. These guns are known as dealer samples and cannot be transferred to people who aren't dealers. I would suspect that this would be the case for newer guns (like the P90's in Stargate: SG1) you see in movies and TV shows.

These guns are converted to shoot blanks (obviously.)
Whether that is a permanent conversion, and how the law deals with it, I don't know.

There are also a couple of other ways that guns are shown in movies. Most of the time, in scenes with lots of extras, or where the guns aren't being fired the weapons are nothing more than rubber replicas.

For scenes where the weapon is being fired, there are a couple of different options available:
1)
Real guns converted to fire blanks.

2)
Prop guns designed from the ground up to fire nothing but blanks.

3)
Using prop guns that are designed to generate muzzle flash using ignitable gas. (For an example of this, watch the movie 'Ghost Dog' keep an eye out for the flashback scene where the mafia guy comes to the rescue of Ghost Dog.) The dead giveaway with gas-powered guns is that they don't cycle or eject spent casings.

4)
There is also the non-gun safety blank firing system that was developed a few years ago, and garnered the inventors an technical achievement Oscar in 1994.
To B. RUSSELL HESSEYof Special Effects Spectacular, Inc. and VINCENT T. KELTON for the hardware design and GEORGE JACKMAN of De La Mare Engineering, Inc for the pyrotechnic development which together comprise the non-gun safety blank firing system.
These "non-weapon" guns produce the effect of a gunshot in motion pictures yet are extremely safe even when fired at very close range at performers. These devices also have significant functional advantages over conventional weapons by synchronizing gunshots to bullet impacts.
The above taken from http://wwwdb.oscars.org
These types of guns were used in 'Alien: Resurrection.' Unfortunately I don't have any other information on these types of prop guns. :(

5)
Using non-firing guns and compositing muzzle flash, etc. in during post-production (for a good example of this, look at the Matrix bullet-time sequence that takes place in the subway station.) Generally this technique is one of last resort, because it is also the most costly.

[Justin]

(IIRC, the first Matrix movie has the characters shooting MP5's and the film shows a shower of spent .223 cases hitting the floor.) I believe that was more of a technical gaffe than anything. In the lobby shootout scene there is a segment where Neo is firing a pair of Czech Skorpion submachineguns. The guns are obviously ejecting pistol-size casings, but then the camera cuts to a close-up of his feet and the empties hitting the floor. It's quite obvious that the empties are rifle casings, most likely .223. More than likely the two cuts were filmed apart from one another, and when it came time to film the closeup of his feet, they were simply dropping casings on the ground for effect. Whoever was in charge of continuity wasn't paying attention that day.

(sigh, this is what happens when a serious gun geek also happens to be a hardcore movie geek as well...)

[DougCxx]

I read an article on the CA movie gun companies a while back, and almost all of the guns they have are real, and functional. Basically, the CA government harassed and nickel-and-dimed all the other several different armorers out of existence until there was only two, and then a few of the biggest directors and producers got together and informed the state that if they couldn't find firearm props for their movies locally, they'd make movies elsewhere. And then suddenly, amazingly it got very quiet....... And much of the paperwork circus stopped...... You'd almost a thunk that CA legislators liked guns or something..... -but they still have said that (the gov't) won't allow any new companies to get into the business. So there's only two left in CA.
~

[Sunray]

"...they don't..." Nonsense. You really think a multi-million dollar movie company is going to risk prosecution by doing anything illegal?
Movie guns are just that, movie guns. They are not real fireams capable of firing live ammunition. Blank firing only with permanent BFA's. Any non-shooting firearm on screen isn't a firearm at all. It's rubber or plastic. Some movies don't use blanks either. All that is put in during editing. Gun shots don't sound enough like gun shots so the sound people dub it in and add their own sound later. Some movies use kid's cap guns and add the sound later. It's all make believe.
Filming a movie brings in tons of money to a local economy. Movie makers have no comprehension of money. It's spend, spend, spend. If a country says, no you can't do that here, the movie company takes the huge amounts of money spent locally, elsewhere. That's why you see movie companies cluttering up the streets and you get arrested if you complaining about being held up getting to work.
"...category of elites who don't have to worry about the law..." Geezuz, that only applies to politicians, their close supporters and some media hacks.

[Nightfall]

I've been wondering this myself lately. I remember seeing an episode of Stargate where there was a fight sequence in a hallway, using P90s. The camera zoomed fairly close to the guns, and you could see the shells being ejected from the correct spot, with what appeared to be something close to the correct caliber. It looked very, very convincing if it wasn't real, more so then the P90s normally do when they're just carrying ‘em around. Besides, I can't imagine a TV show spending the kind of cash it would take to make an effect look that good. Must be the real thing, or a conversion.

BTW, thumbs up on the American Shooter episode. The racks of guns they had made me drool. There was also a bit about the license class they had which allowed them to do these things, might explain this better.

[nomadboi]

One of my directors recently told me that muzzle flash is a standard built in effect in the new version of Adobe Premiere, a standard for low-budget independent filmmakers (the kind I work with these days).

Thus we've been using lots of airsoft replicas.

SG 1 uses a mix of gas blowback airsoft replicas and blank firing replicas, I believe. Seen some of the airsofts for sale on ebay, licensed as coming from the SG1 set.

I run a small props rental business in Seattle, mostly just for low budget indie films and for plays (which are all low budget around here). Some blank firing handguns, a bunch of airsofts, some swords and such... http://www.nomadboi.com/rentals/firearms.html -it needs to be updated to account for some new purchases, but the wife has the digital camera and is out of town.

[greyhound]

There's a company called Stembridge Gun Rentals.



Speaking strictly for myself, my company needed a functioning Mauser, and we got it from Stenbridge Gun Rentals. Good folks IIRC. (Don't ask why we needed it!:D ).

This was in 2000, so at least as of then they were still top dawg.

Things may have changed, though....