Animal cruelty in "Young Indy?"

Posted by ROB T. from 162.10.138.197 on January 02, 2000 at 01:12:11:

I forgot to mention this in my review of "Daredevils of the Desert" but I saw something in the video that disturbed me. The use of a horse-trip during one of the action scenes.
Horse-trips were very popular in the thirties and forties for motion picture production and I thought they'd been outlawed sometime in the late-seventies. They work like this; the horse wears a harness that includes a set of wires that run down the horses' front legs and attach to a rope that is tethered to a stake in the ground. Enough rope is played out so that the horse can be tripped when it reaches a certain place. The rider runs the horse at full gallop and when the horse suddenly reaches the end of the tether its' front legs are yanked out from under it and the horse falls face-first in the dirt. The rider is thrown over the horses' head. Add in an explosion and sound effects and it's all very exciting. It's also very dangerous for the horse and rider and that's why they don't do it anymore. Now they use horses that are trained to fall sideways on command. In any movie where you see a horse fall it is easy to tell if the horse is trained or if it was tripped; a trained horse falls to its left side and turns its head to the right. A tripped horse falls face first from a full gallop and will sometimes even do a front somersault.
In the United States a representative of the Humane Society is on hand during any movie that uses animals so that those animals can be protected during filming.
Since the "Young Indy" movies were filmed in foriegn countries I guess they fell outside the jurisdiction of the Humane Society.
I'm just surprised that a company like Lucasfilm would condone an action like that.

The scene I'm talking about happens during the battle charge toward the end of the movie. Just look for the horse that plows into the sand face first at a full run. You can't miss it.

Any comments???

Follow Ups:

I noticed this too... Short Round 07:27:10 1/02/2000 (0)

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: I forgot to mention this in my review of "Daredevils of the Desert" but I saw something in the video that disturbed me. The use of a horse-trip during one of the action scenes.
: Horse-trips were very popular in the thirties and forties for motion picture production and I thought they'd been outlawed sometime in the late-seventies. They work like this; the horse wears a harness that includes a set of wires that run down the horses' front legs and attach to a rope that is tethered to a stake in the ground. Enough rope is played out so that the horse can be tripped when it reaches a certain place. The rider runs the horse at full gallop and when the horse suddenly reaches the end of the tether its' front legs are yanked out from under it and the horse falls face-first in the dirt. The rider is thrown over the horses' head. Add in an explosion and sound effects and it's all very exciting. It's also very dangerous for the horse and rider and that's why they don't do it anymore. Now they use horses that are trained to fall sideways on command. In any movie where you see a horse fall it is easy to tell if the horse is trained or if it was tripped; a trained horse falls to its left side and turns its head to the right. A tripped horse falls face first from a full gallop and will sometimes even do a front somersault.
: In the United States a representative of the Humane Society is on hand during any movie that uses animals so that those animals can be protected during filming.
: Since the "Young Indy" movies were filmed in foriegn countries I guess they fell outside the jurisdiction of the Humane Society.
: I'm just surprised that a company like Lucasfilm would condone an action like that.

: The scene I'm talking about happens during the battle charge toward the end of the movie. Just look for the horse that plows into the sand face first at a full run. You can't miss it.

: Any comments???

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