Has a major film ever intentionally used live ammunition to film a scene?

Question

I was imagining the other day that most war films and scenes are filmed with people faking shooting. Sometimes wars scenes are not even using blank rounds, like in Star Wars. This leads me to wonder if anyone has ever filmed a major movie without using blank rounds, in order to provide some bizarre level of realism. One wouldn't have to worry about acting or special effects to make it appear real, but it would probably be too dangerous and illegal for most. Still Film has a long and crazy history and the human race has seen many movies.

Has a major release non-documentary, non-simple art film ever intentionally used used live ammunition to film a scene?

Of course, many documentaries have footage of live warfare, and possibly some avant-garde video art exhibits have done so, but I mean just what we might consider a regular movie with at least a TV, VHS, or Theater release.

Answer 1

Yes, there were some. To name at least one (the earliest I could find proof link about):

The Captive (1915)

DeMille’s obsession with realism backfired when an extra, Charles Chandler, was shot and killed by a gun used as a prop on set. Later on, Blanche Sweet confessed that DeMille encouraged extras to use real bullets instead of blanks to create more realistic battle scenes.

Source: Wikipedia

Also Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)

While filming Rocky's shootout with the police, one scene called for Cagney to be "right at the opening" as machine-gun bullets took out the windows above his head. At this point in his career, Cagney had experience with the unpredictability of using live gunfire and he later recalled that either "common sense or a hunch" made him cautious. He told Curtiz to "[shoot the scene] in process," and as he got out of the way, "Burke, the professional machine gunner, fired the shots". One of the bullets deflected hitting "the steel edge of the window," and going "right through the wall" where Cagney's head had been. This experience convinced Cagney that "flirting this way with real bullets was ridiculous".

Source: Wikipedia

Answer 2

In the 1961 Kurosawa film Throne of Blood, actual archers shot actual arrows at the walls next to the film's main star. Any one of the arrows could have killed or seriously injured him.

The process is all described in this short documentary.

Also, there is another example with live firearms ammunition in a movie, but it's not quite what you were asking for. In the 1981 film Scanners, the filmmakers needed to make it look like a person's head exploded from telekinesis. The effect didn't look right when they tested it with an explosive inside a dummy's head. So they set up the dummy and then shot it from behind with a real shotgun. Here's a 12-second clip of that scene.

But since the gun was never seen, I don't think that's a real answer to your question.

Answer 3

"Act of Valor" (2012) featured extensive filmography which included actual bullets being fired as well as active-duty SEALs.

per: On Active Duty for the Movies (Real Ammo), The New York Times

“We’ve never had a film where the principals were active-duty SEALs,” said Bob Anderson, director of the Navy’s Office of Operations West, in Los Angeles, the liaison between the Navy and Hollywood. Or, for that matter, he added, a movie that used live ammunition in battle scenes.

Answer 4

I was reading about this recently (yes, it's Cracked.com, but it's well sourced).

Not only was this not an uncommon way of getting bullet effects, the crazy didn't stop with guns - The Birth Of A Nation used live cannon.

From 6 Terrifying Ways Films Used To Achieve Special Effects, Cracked.com:

6 - Action Films Once Used Real Bullets

In today's films, shooting effects are usually achieved with blanks, tiny explosives called "squibs," and if that's too much trouble, a dose of computer magic. In Hollywood's early years, they didn't have access to such fancy tools, so whenever gunfights occur in early movies, there's a good chance that they're really shooting at each other. If you lived near a film set, we're guessing you stayed inside that day.

They did have blanks back then, but that only lets you appear to fire the gun. To simulate a bullet hitting a wall/window/etc. next to an actor, well, they simply had a guy shoot it. If you needed some artillery fire for a war scene, same deal. All of the cannon fire in 1915's The Birth Of A Nation (the classic film that paints the KKK as the good guys, because 1915) is the real thing -- the pyrotechnics to fake it hadn't been invented yet.

Answer 5

In the 1985 Soviet war film, Come and See, live ammunition was apparently used in some scenes.

According to the film's Wikipedia article:

The 2006 UK DVD sleeve states that the guns in the film were often loaded with live ammunition as opposed to blanks, for realism. Aleksey Kravchenko mentions in interviews that bullets sometimes passed just 4 inches (10 centimeters) above his head (such as in the cow scene).

I didn't find a better source for the claim than that, but in the video below, the director, Elem Klimov, mentions "real bullets hissing over their heads" while talking about the film. (The video is in Russian, but there are English subtitles.)

Answer 6

Face/Off used live ammo in some scenes.
Per Face/Off - Beretta 92FS, The Internet Movie Firearms Database :

During the shootout in the funeral home, many of the guns are shown in close ups, except they are at different locations than the scene takes place. This is because they are non-blank adapted guns firing real bullets in front of a high speed camera, to capture the bullet in flight.

Answer 7

This is a great question. The Day of the Wolves, an early 1970's, low budget crime caper movie used live ammo at the Swansea ghost town location (but nowhere else during the shoot). Live ammo was used for the "training" scenes of the wolves (criminals) firing into disused buildings.

Live ammunition was also used during filming of the John Landis segment of the twilight zone movie (the one that ended in the terrible accident that killed three people), mentioned here and a crew member from the production also confirmed to me. The live ammo is apparently the reason that Spielberg (co-producer with Landis on the movie) no longer speaks to Landis.

From what I've been told, it also wasn't that unusual to use live ammo in low budget Filipino action movies, but we're not talking about folks indiscriminately firing at each other, just scenes where it's cheaper to see the effects of bullets in action filming from behind the gun than laying down squibs.

However, industry professionals in the US and Europe will be somewhat aghast if live ammo is used, which is viewed either as dangerous corner cutting or amateurish production ethics.