I don't know why he swallowed a fly, I guess he'll die...

Posted by ROB T. from 162.10.138.28 on October 19, 1999 at 22:38:14:

In Reply to: Why does bellock eat a fly? posted by Lou Che on October 19, 1999 at 12:50:36:

Okay, here's the full skinny on the fly eating episode. This is only conjecture but I'd stake my reputation that it's pretty close to accurate.
First, we never see Belloq actually swallow the fly. It only crawls on his lip and then mysteriously vanishes. I agree that after all that time in Tunisia Paul Freeman probably never even noticed the fly, however if it had gone completely inside his mouth there's no way he could disregard it not even for his craft.
The reason we don't see the fly ever fly off his lip is because motion pictures are shot at 24 frames per second. We don't see everything that's going on in the scene. It's an illusion that causes our mind to think we see fluid motion when we are actually seeing a series of pictures with subtle differences between them. This is the reason that the wagon wheels in old westerns appear to be spinning backward. You actually see less than half of what goes on in any given scene in a movie.
Add to that the speed that a flying insect moves at and it becomes clear. If the fly on Belloq's lip flies away and out of frame the camera will only capture it in flight for a frame or two. Too short an amount of screen time for the human eye to register so it appears that the fly just vanishes.
If "Raiders" had been shot at 48 frames per second (something that the studios are considering doing) then we probably would've seen the fly buzz away.
Bottom line. He never ate the fly.

Follow Ups:

Should he swallow a spider now? Mikal 05:42:19 10/20/99 (0)

Post a Followup:

Name:    
E-Mail:  
Subject: 
Comments:

: Okay, here's the full skinny on the fly eating episode. This is only conjecture but I'd stake my reputation that it's pretty close to accurate.
: First, we never see Belloq actually swallow the fly. It only crawls on his lip and then mysteriously vanishes. I agree that after all that time in Tunisia Paul Freeman probably never even noticed the fly, however if it had gone completely inside his mouth there's no way he could disregard it not even for his craft.
: The reason we don't see the fly ever fly off his lip is because motion pictures are shot at 24 frames per second. We don't see everything that's going on in the scene. It's an illusion that causes our mind to think we see fluid motion when we are actually seeing a series of pictures with subtle differences between them. This is the reason that the wagon wheels in old westerns appear to be spinning backward. You actually see less than half of what goes on in any given scene in a movie.
: Add to that the speed that a flying insect moves at and it becomes clear. If the fly on Belloq's lip flies away and out of frame the camera will only capture it in flight for a frame or two. Too short an amount of screen time for the human eye to register so it appears that the fly just vanishes.
: If "Raiders" had been shot at 48 frames per second (something that the studios are considering doing) then we probably would've seen the fly buzz away.
: Bottom line. He never ate the fly.

Optional:

Link URL:   
Link Title: 
Image URL:

[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ The Indyfan Forum ] [ FAQ ]