Happy mistakes/accidents on film and TV.

We are beating this one into the ground, but what they hey...

I disagree that it looks mistimed or un-Stevelike. To the contrary, it seems perfectly timed. It seems clear he is supposed to fall over the couch and end up exactly were he does, because Goldie walks all the way over there to the other side of the room to wait for him. If he was only supposed to stumble in the doorway, she would not have walked so far away from him. She walks across the room so she will end up in the right spot to be speaking to him when he finishes his pratfall over the couch.

If he looks shocked, that is acting... his character is shocked.

To me this is one of the strongest pieces of evidence that it was all deliberate. Because again, if the clanking sound was a mistake and they didn't want it in there, why didn't they remove it in post production? It would have been simple to go back and re-loop the dialogue and have no clanking sound. I can think of no plausible reason they would not have done that if they felt the noise was a mistake. You haven't suggested a reason, plausible or otherwise.

Why? Because the pratfall is much more impressive if he has to negotiate a landing between the sofa and the coffee table. Obviously, it was not beyond his skills to do it. I thought you had conceded that the pratfall was intentional, but here you seem to be suggesting it was accidental. If you are suggesting that, I would again note that it seems really unlikely that he could perfectly execute a complex pratfall like that without any practice or rehearsal. And it also seems really unlikely that Frank Oz would have coincidentally set up a wide shot of the entire room and instructed Goldie to walk all the way to the far side of that shot, right at the moment that Steve happened to "accidentally" fall.

I think you're making too much of this. I don't see her breaking the fourth wall, I see her rolling her eyes, which I guess could be a reaction to Steve's character falling. At any rate, there's too much evidence this was planned (everything I wrote above) so whatever she's rolling her eyes at, I don't think it's because of a significant mistake in the scene. Because again, if there was something wrong in the scene, they would have done a retake.

 

again: the clanking worked! that's why they kept it in! just like when terry nearly crashes his motorcycle in the graffiti opening, unplanned. a mistake but in the end it works in the scene. why replace it or use another take when its funny and works probably better than what they planned. they even kept goldie looking at the camera.
observe the table, barely six inches from the sofa, if you were planning a pratfall wouldn't you move the table so steve wouldn't smash into it? why have it there? steves talented but that makes no sense. if he slides off the sofa the wrong way his head smashes into it. no. they planned some sort of trip/fall over the sofa but NOT the way it happened....

and goldie looks at the camera (well more towards the crew) that is still unexplained. if this worked how they planned she wouldnt of done that....thats thespian goldie hawn
(ive now studied this clip more than the zapruder film lol)
ps someone tweet steve martin for gods sake and ask him, I cant watch this clip anymore.

 

Danny Kaye's slapping Bing Crosby with the feather pom-pom causes the Old Groaner to break up. From White Christmas.

 

I’ve enjoyed @the pope ondine and @czeskleba going back and forth on this. I tend to agree with czeskleba which saddens me as I found the scene very funny before the curtain came up.

 

the guy dropping the stretcher was unplanned and altman left it in, theres also a scene where Elliot Gould calls Sutherland 'Gloria' a reference to his real wife and they left it in (altman as big on the happy accidents theres tons more)

 

If something in a comedy films works comedically, and there is no direct evidence that it was an accident, then it makes sense to go with the simplest explanation: that it was put into the film intentionally. When someone takes a big fall, it's natural to assume there would be some noise from the fall. Sound effects add to the comedic effect of physical comedy like this. There's no reason to believe the noise was not intentional, and I still think there's a good likelihood it was foleyed in.

Not if you knew Steve was capable of landing between sofa and table as he does, and perhaps even wanted Steve to bump the table to create a sound effect. As I noted before, the closeness of table and sofa makes the fall more impressive. It's analogous to the famous Buster Keaton scene where the side of a house falls on him, and he escapes unharmed because he passes through a small window. If it had been a big picture window, it would be less impressive.

The fact that Oz seems to have arranged the shot perfectly to capture the fall on film argues that it did happen exactly as planned. As does the fact that Goldie walks all the way across the room and ends up in perfect position to speak to Steve when he lands where he does... her movements look blocked out in advance to correspond to what Steve was doing. And again, it seems unlikely that a complicated pratfall like that could have been executed spontaneously, without rehearsal or practice.

I still think you're reading more into that than is really there. But even if we do accept the premise that she's looking at the cameraman briefly, it could be for some reason completely unrelated to what happens in the shot. Perhaps the cameraman farted loudly. Who knows? I think the complexity of the pratfall, the way it's executed, Oz's arrangement of the shot, and Goldie's positioning all argue strongly against there being anything accidental in the main action of the scene.

Earlier you mentioned how Robert Altman liked happy accidents in his films. It's important to remember that Frank Oz is not Robert Altman. He's Bert. I suspect he ran a fairly tight ship directorially.

 

Where are the background buildings??

 

or that steves fall went haywire and he slammed into the table! we could keep going but I believe we have reached an impasses. at this point we are just reiterating our points. lets table this (heh heh) until we have official word.....the house sitter shall remain an enigma wrapped in a riddle

 

Yes indeed, we've definitely exhausted all discussion on this topic... at least until new evidence emerges.

 

This particular Mel's Drive In location was in San Francisco but was torn down some time ago. Not sure about the other buildings.

 

I believe Lucas removed them and made the sunset look better for the 1998 DVD release.

 

Exactly right!

 

booo....hisss.....

 

Not good

 

It was funny no matter what.

It looks to me like it was another Steve Martin pratfall, innocently planned by Steve himself. He wouldn't be the first one to plan a mistake.
He just did it without alerting anybody.
If it works, he's a genius, if it doesn't, it makes the blooper reel...win-win.

There was nothing on the floor that would make him trip like that.
He did the visual stumbling over his own feet in exactly the way we used to do it in dozens of times in class in high school, as can be seen if you slo-mo the scene...the actual tripping movement (less than a second and a half) is exaggerated.

Goldie gave an honest reaction because Goldie didn't know.

If in fact it was on purpose, I give him more credit for having the ability to do it on one take, despite all the pressure of 'I only have one shot at it'.

 

Love this movie.

 

One of the Hobbit's cut his foot.

He had exited the boat during the scene and was walking up on shore and stepped barefoot on a piece of glass that they did not previously detect was there. The audience did not realize his foot was cut and he finished the scene, which was in the movie.

 

It's A Wonderful Life

When Uncle Billy drunkenly leaves the Bailey home, it sounds as if he stumbles into some trash cans on the sidewalk. In fact, a crew member dropped a large tray of props right after he went off-screen. James Stewart began laughing, and Mitchell quickly improvised "I'm alright, I'm okay!" Frank Capra decided to use this take in the final cut, and gave the stagehand a $10 bonus for "improving the sound." The crewman thought he'd be fired for the mishap.





"Could I Have $17.50?" - Frank Capra rehearsed this scene (the Bank Run scene) between James Stewart and Ellen Corby several times. When Corby's character was asked how much money she needed, she replied $17, which was in the script. Just prior to the first actual take, Capra took Corby aside and told her to give Stewart an odd number, thinking it would be funnier. When she said "17.50" to Stewart, he was taken off-guard and impulsively kissed her, which was not in the script. Stewart's spontaneous reply was so genuine that Capra left the scene in the final film... Good old Jimmy

 

I know about that one but... how is that a *happy* accident?

 

My favorite show of all time.

 

There's a real helicopter crash in ATTACK OF THE KILLER TOMATOES.



From imdb.com:

The helicopter crash in the early scenes was unintentional. The tail rotor blades accidentally hit the ground, causing the helicopter to spin out of control. Debris and the top rotor blades narrowly missed the police officers in the scene and the crew off camera. The pilot received minor injuries. After being pulled from the wreck, Jack Riley and George Wilson quickly ad-libbed the rest of the scene as the wreck was set on fire. The crash of the $60,000 rented helicopter used up more of the budget than all other aspects of the film combined.

 

that's crazy....and the cop was still acting as the copter was out of control behind him

 

They were very lucky it didn't go more Twilight Zone: The Movie.

 

How about the munchkin hanging himself on the set of the Wizard Of Oz?

 

Urban legend.