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| - Though the first examples were created long ago, gunfights did not begin to take a prominent place in moviedom until they became a staple of the Western in the 1950s and 60's. Ranging from standoffs in Leone's Spaghetti Westerns to all-out gunfire in films like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), this type of sequence drastically increased in popularity with audiences of the time. Gunfights became more and more elaborate in the Western, and some filmmakers took steps to heighten the realism depicted therein. For instance, whereas most films up to this time simply showed actors reacting to being shot, The Wild Bunch (1969) employed nearly 10,000 squibs to simulate the blood associated with gunshot wounds (Felchner).
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| abstract
| - Though the first examples were created long ago, gunfights did not begin to take a prominent place in moviedom until they became a staple of the Western in the 1950s and 60's. Ranging from standoffs in Leone's Spaghetti Westerns to all-out gunfire in films like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), this type of sequence drastically increased in popularity with audiences of the time. Gunfights became more and more elaborate in the Western, and some filmmakers took steps to heighten the realism depicted therein. For instance, whereas most films up to this time simply showed actors reacting to being shot, The Wild Bunch (1969) employed nearly 10,000 squibs to simulate the blood associated with gunshot wounds (Felchner). A number of non-Westerns of the era also began to popularize the shootout - and guns in general - including Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Dirty Harry (1971). And as these films transitioned audiences into the 70's, a number of movies began to extensively employ guns. 1972's The Getaway featured Steve McQueen blasting away at a squad car with a shotgun as well as a bloody confrontation in a Texas hotel. The Gauntlet (1977) depicted extensive gunfire at and around Eastwood's character. The Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun (1974) went so far as to make a gun a key plot element, ending with a cat and mouse confrontation between Bond and another gunman. The 80's saw the rise of the One Man Army action sub-genre, and to compensate for a lack of gunman action icons like Schwarenegger and Stallone would dispatch innumerous baddies with machine gun fire. Action heroes' newfound and uncanny ability to never sustain any serious injuries also gave rise to the lack of realism many 80's action films are known for. This borderline cartoony depiction of violence was furthered by Hong Kong director John Woo's development of gun fu, a hyperkinetic combination of martial arts-esque stunts like dives, rolls, and even flips combined with guns, often two pistols at a time. This innovative take on the shootout has had much influence on the action genre since, and a number of modern directors continue to mimic the styles created by Woo. The 90's and 2000's have not been dominated by any definitive shootout characteristics, but rather have become two decades exhibiting a plethora of styles and levels of realism surrounding gunfights. The era has seen action ranging from Robert Rodriguez's One Man Army gun fu El Mariachi movies to Michael Mann's depiction of realistic armed conflict in Heat (1995) to the Wachowskis' borderline surreal Matrix films to the AK-47 v. M16 battles seen in Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down (2001).
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