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Horses in movies question!!

I’m watching Indiana Jones and something occurs to me that I’m sure is a stupid question, but one horse owners can answer. Every time I’ve seen someone in a movie jump from a horse to a truck, or a train, or whatever, the horse just keeps running, perhaps slowing a little, and then the camera follows the action. Do horses really keep running for a while after their rider leaves? Do they just veer off and stop to find some grass? It seems like without a rider they’d stop caring about running for no reason.vidmate mobdro word counter

I think they are trained to continue running because it makes for a better action visual. Whether or not that’s something that is likely to happen for an untrained/unplanned parting of ways depends a lot on the horse and the setting. There are certainly any number of examples of steeplechase horses that keep on trucking, sometimes even crossing the finish line first (although they cannot actually “win”) after the rider falls. The handful of times my horse has had an unscheduled dismount event, his tendency is to stop and stare at the person on the ground with an “OMG, are you OK?” look on his face.

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:lol: What a great way to describe that look! That is it exactly.

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Really depends. If the horse is razzed up and you come off at speed, the horse will bolt for home or do victory laps around the indoor arena trying to get all the other horses to join in the fun. A jazzed up horse that just bucked off its rider or a racehorse or a bolting horse whose newbie rider toppled off, will all probably bolt for home and ignore all cars and traffic in the way, unfortunately.

If you come off during quieter work in the arena the horse is more likely to stare at you in disbelief.

BTW, those stunt jumps involve the rider being lifted up by invisible wires. There are some great out take bloopers that show the riders hovering in midair, etc.

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I can attest that sometimes an unscheduled dismount at speed results in the horse continuing to run. :slight_smile:

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The other thing is, the stunt rider being hoisted off the horse is not an accident IRL (whatever it’s shown as in the film), but actually a stunt the horse has been trained to do and expects. Realize that behind the camera, there is a huge hoist or crane that the rider is suspended from, and a million helpers and gaffers and assistants and electric generators and flood lights and what not all crowded up. Horse would be taught to just run, like a circus horse or a vaulting horse, at a good steady fast canter, while folks do all kinds of crazy activities on and off it’s back. Stunt rider gets shot by the posse and falls off (on a soft mattress hidden in the sage brush): horse is used to this.

You can of course also train a horse to stop and go nuzzle the downed rider like Aragorn’s PRE in LOTR :slight_smile: which was very sweet.

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:rolleyes: Yeah, well…
My TB seemed to say “WTF U doin’ there?
Get up & stop embarrassing us both!”

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Did not know this. Would love to see this. Any links, such as to YouTube? Movie making can be such “smoke and mirrors”ðŸ˜‚

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKmEMG9eIxQ

the Lone Ranger “blooper” videos on YoutTube. Right at the start of Video #1, and then on Video #2 around 54 seconds and 1:30 there are horse stunts with the wires visible.

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I wonder, if you fall or jump off your scooter will it keep running?

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Probably - unless you need to have your thumb on a lever to keep it going like my quad or if it gets unbalanced and falls over.

You can see how it is done in this Keanu Reeves video. https://digg.com/video/keanu-reeves-…-to-ride-horse

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Mine always kept going…I had one…ONE…who stopped to see if I was ok. Rest were like see you later sucker! Often a rider falling can actually scare the horse…and the are flight animals so they can actually speed up! Eventually they will slow down… Some will run for home or where they think they are safe…of course mine always just went exploring. (Took me a couple of hours to find one once, in the dark in the cold and snow…he was having a ball).