44 Minutes...

[NotoriousTFB]

Has anyone seen the trailer on FX for the new movie they are producing called 44 minutes? It's an entire movie based on the 97' North Hollywood bank robbery which turned into an all out fully automatic gun battle that spilled onto the streets of hollywood, possibly the craziest thing I ever did see on the news.
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[Seiyuuki]

I just saw the trailer for the new movie "S.W.A.T." and I think a saw a scene straight out of the Hollywood shooting too.

[hood]

The ironic thing about the L.A. gun battle with those guys, is that SWAT didn't show up until far later at the very end. Maybe it would have turned out differently if they were on the scene faster. MSNBC Investigates had on the whole thing a while back. Not much point in having a movie when you can just watch the whole thing in realtime video taken from the street, and from an overhead chopper.

[Knave]

If you ever watch the movie Heat, with Robert de Niro and Al Pacino, the climax is a gun battle in downtown Los Angeles that echoes the '97 Hollywood bank robbery shooting. It was eerie... especially since Heat was made quite a few years before the actual event.

[Mal3]

Heat is one of the VERY best movies of it's kind. One Andy McNab worked in training the actors that played the bad guys in the movie. Just watch as Val Kilmer changes a magazine in his carbine. I've heard he took quite some time getting it right, but in the end it must have been worth it.

Gotta love when the movie doesn't have unlimited Hollywood issue magazines and seconds long bursts of auto fire, but quick, controlled and aimed bursts like in Heat.

I still remember how good the sound was in the movie. When the guy with the FN-FAL executed the armoured car driver the noise was unbelievable!

[Apogee]

Def. a great movie. You've also got to love how they bound with covering fire at the back robbery. I was very impressed with this movie.

[Mal3]

Gunplay in movies is mostly crap. In Heat it seems like the actors have been RL gunfighting for all their lives. The selection of weapons is also cool. Of course it wouldn't be a great movie unless it had a good plot and actin along with production values. It has it all.

The Way of the Gun is another movie that's quite alright. The gunfighting it is very cool, with three distinct styles going, the "old mobster style" with snub nosed revolvers, the "VIP protection style" with wondernines and the "nitty gritty style" with the main characters using .45 1911s, 7.62mm battle rifles, shotguns and tactical vests.

Nothing I hate more in movies with gun action than "running two gun tactics" and canting the pistol. Especially when it looks so cool when done right as in Heat.

Questionable use of the word cool, but we're adults, we know the difference between movies and RL, right?

[Zoomie]

I also hate it when the guy has a handgun in his hand, using only one hand to shoot a guy that's a good distance away, and he nails him. To be honest, I find it hard to hold a handgun onehanded without shaking.

[Mal3]

Been some time since I've shot my .22 lever rifle, but when I got to shoot a pistol again recently i didn't hit worth squat!

People seem to think you can just shoot people like there's nothing more to it than pointing and pulling the trigger...

On a different tangent I part time as a security guard and got some hand to hand training from ex military guys. They were showing how to disarm a guy with a pistol and always asked the gun toting person to hold out the dummy gun at them, as if aiming, and then took it away from them.

I took the pistol and held it with my upper arm practically straight down by my chest and only the forarm extended all the while putting my offside in the direction of the instructor and asked them what to do if someone did that. The reply was "nobody shoots a gun like that."

It's good to have all the answers p-)

[hood]

My favorite part about Way of the Gun is the accurate sound during the sniper scene. It's the only movie that I've seen where the bullet hits before you hear the report of the gun coming from the rear speakers. A very chilling scene because of it.

[Mal3]

Never run around with two handguns when you could be a few hundred meters away with a powerful rifle ;)

[Trigger]

It's the only movie that I've seen where the bullet hits before you hear the report of the gun
I remember an old Clint Eastwood movie called 'Joe Kidd' with a sniper duel of sorts between Eastwood and one of the bad guys. Someone was paying attention to detail in that scene as well. People would get hit and then a few seconds later the report is heard. Details like these make movies fun.

As for the L.A. bank robbery, 60 minutes II did a special about bank robberies in general about 2 years ago and it had some fantastic footage of the shootout including one of the perps shooting himself in the head when he realized he was going to be captured...believe it or not, it wasn't edited.

[hood]

Well, I think you're a bit mistaken. I've still got the MSNBC Investigates one and neither of them shoot themselves. It's a police marksman that takes out the first one with a headshot. The second one is wounded and left to die after he gives up. Police allegedly blocked ambulances from coming to help him.

[Mal3]

I saw that bit on some news show. There was some unbelievable footage there.

There was made a movie of the infamous Miami Shootout also. It starred Michael Gross but I don't remember if it was any good. Low budget cable stuff anyways. The bit I remember was the amazingly bad translation found in the subtitles. It could have been funny but mostly it was infuriating...

[Trigger]

Hood, are we talking about the same L.A. shootout? I still have my copy too. One bad guy tries to take cover behind a small car and goes full auto with what looks like an AK. Police return fire aiming beneath the car and get several leg hits, he eventually bleeds out. His cohort now seperated is running and shooting. He take several hits to the body, but he's heavily armored and he finally puts his own gun to his head and fires. It was my understanding that police had to actually 'borrow' some hunting rifles from local gun shops during the engagement. Either way, good footage. ;)

[hood]

yep we're talking about the same one... i'll have a look when I get home, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't off himself.

[Smoothie104]

Im pretty sure he doesnt off himself either. I think I remember a cop coming around the corner, or around some cover and taking the guy out with a head shot. The footage was shot from a chopper.

[JiJoMacLE45]

Larry Phillips is the shooter in question. He had expended all of his rifle ammunition and had transitioned to his nickel plated 9mm Beretta. As he was walking down the sidewalk, he was struck once in the upper torso, which caused him to drop the handgun. He bent down, picked it up, placed the barrel under his chin, and pulled the trigger. At the same instant that he pulled the trigger, a round from an officer down the street struck Phillips in the face. It was later determined that he was struck simultaneously by the two rounds. So it can be said he was killed by the LAPD or that he committed suicide. The view of him placing the handgun under his chin was obscured by the helicopter's position. Most offical versions list his cause of death as suicide.

[Duke]

I was overseas when the shootout/bank robbery happened. So when I was the footage of TV, I thought it was a movie. I couldnt believe what i was watching. Also, I agree with hood why watch a movie when the MSNBC documentary is that, a documentary. Another documentary that was better than the movie was the Weather Channels documentary on the Perfect Storm, INCREDIBLE. Just the facts ma'am.
Sgt. Sniper if a handgun shakes when holding with one hand that means your arm is not relaxed and the grip too tight.

[Trigger]

Thanks JiJo, I guess Hood and I were both right. I was starting to wonder if my memory was failing me. That's one image I wont forget for a long time.

[hood]

Indeed. :) I couldn't believe that his body armour stopped that many bullets. It's been said that getting hit while wearing a vest is supposed to feel like a bat it hitting you, but it looked like it was hardly affecting him at all.

[Trigger]

Exactly. He would jerk a little when he was hit, but that was all. I wonder if he was high on something.
While were on the subject, I read somewhere that these same two guys had been arrested a few months(?) prior to this after a traffic stop. In the back seat of the car was an arsenal of weapons and ammo (the same used in the robbery) which was returned to them (minus some restricted items) for some reason.

[Mal3]

I though that confiscated guns were never given back in California?

[Registration Information]

I AM VERY CURIOUS AS TO IF ANY OF THE TWO HAD PREVIOUS MILITARY EXPERIENCE. LOOKING AT THE FOOTAGE THEY WERE SOMEWHAT DISCIPLINED AND IF THEY LEFT EARLY ( INSTEAD OF RETURNING SO MUCH FIRE) THEY MIGHT OF GOTTEN AWAY WITH IT

[Trigger]

I don't recall either of them having prior military experience. If memory serves, the guy who shot himself/was shot was the 'brains' and his accomplice who bled out was an aspiring bodybuilder, but I'm not sure if this is accurate. I bet JiJo could find out... ;)

[Mal3]

I've always been vary of aspiring bodybuilders... rofl

[NotoriousTFB]

well, both the robbers seemed to have been looking for one hell of a shootout, the trunk of the car they came in was said to have been loaded to the brim with over 150 magazines for AK-47's which were bought and then illegaly converted to full auto fire, this is why you see the robbers reaching into his trunk for what seems like unlimited ammo, and besides this, both of the robbers were wearing kevlar body armor which was cut up to fit the arms, stomach, ribs, neck, and almost every other part.......except the legs, which the police quickly figured out as you can hear them yelling "go for the legs, go for the legs!" one robbers downfall was that he left this car and tried to steal a white pickup truck from some citizen, and he was trying to transfer all the weapons he could from the initial car to the pickup, and when he got into the truck, it wouldnt start! it was busted, maybe from being hosed down with bullets? but when he couldnt start the car, he got blown down by either the police shot, his own pistol, or the man on the grassy knowell, ah who knows......the other robber seemed to have been shot to death very early on.

[hood]

Well, the first robber got separated from the one that went for the white pickup a bit later on. It wasn't clear if they spoke to each other and decided this, or the 2nd guy ditched the first. The first guy tried to walk away while firing endlessly, but obviously he ran out of ammo so it ended not that far down the sidewalk from the bank. The thing that makes me think they weren't military trained, was that they used full auto non-stop. With an AK47, you're obviously not going to hit much like that. It worked great as suppresive fire, but he kept running out very quickly. I seriously doubt these guys really thought out their escape plan very well. If they ever got caught coming out of the bank, they were going to lose, even with the extreme firepower. Their only chance would have been to try and make a fast getaway. Because of their delay, it gave the police enough time to gather more firepower to keep them from going anywhere. 2 against 100 isn't going to win, particularly once they exhaust their ammo supply. If they had taken the firefight to the road, they could have kept the cop cars at a good distance because they'd be taken out with AK fire pretty quickly. It would have seriously decreased the manpower advantage by preventing the police from gathering their assets into a focused group.

One could say that their reaction was what a SEAL team would do, which is to engage targets with all they have, and peal away before the enemy figures out a tactic. The problem is that they didn't leave fast enough.

[Smoothie104]

Why go through all the trouble of getting all dressed up and robbing a bank just to kill yourself?

[NotoriousTFB]

like i said, why would anybody who plans on a clean getaway cover themselves up in kevlar body armor, and bring thousands upon thousands of rounds of ammo and fully automatic weapons to a robbery, unless of course they were pretty sure that they would get into a high powered gun fight with the police, I mean, does anybody wonder if they did it just to get worldwide attention.....and if they did, well they succeeded even in death, they now how a movie being made about them, and nobody will soon forget what happened that day.....the police are calling this the worst shootout in the history of shootouts in the U.S.

[Smoothie104]

Worse than Waco?

[hood]

Well, Waco wasn't really much of a shootout, because we didn't want to fire back at them. Concerning them wanting to die there, it was shown on security cameras that these 2 guys had robbed other banks in their full body armour before, so it was hardly the first time they did it.

[NotoriousTFB]

But the other times these guys robbed the banks, they were probably expecting similar results as the Hollywood job, only they got away with the money. It really is quite a question, eh Hood? Was the gunplay what led them to rob the bank, or was getting the money only a bi-product of wanting a shootout? Were they just awaiting the perfect moment to unload on unexpecting police..ya know...I mean in all honesty, I can only think of one bank robber in history who even slimly matched the artillery that these guys had, and he was a Mr. John Dillinger....when he flawed a bank robbery in Minnesota, the police found what he left behind.....a stash of multiple Tommy Guns, a .38 special converted into a SMG, at least 5 or 6 1911's, multiple 100 round drum backups, multiple magazines, revolvers, and hundreds of rounds of ammo taboot. So I suppose what I am getting at is that no real bank robber who expects to get away carries that much firepower unless he wants **** to hit the fan......and we all know how Dillinger died, in a hail of FBI gunfire behind the Biograph theatre in Chicago, in a wild shootout.

[Mal3]

Dillinger was killed in a wild shootout? I thought he had been ambushed and plain shot.

[NotoriousTFB]

john dillinger was exiting the theatre when he realized the feds were there, he made it to the back alley, and was ambushed, he went out trying to shoot his Colt .38 super, before he got killed by tommy guns, your right, I was actually thinking of his friend Babyface nelson, who wasted all sorts of cops during an attempted robbery, he was quoted yelling out "I know ya's got bulletproof vests on, so I'm gonna aim high and low" immediately after he said that, he shot one cop in the head, and another in the groin. Babyface Nelson was John Dillinger's gunsmith of sorts. Oh well, I got a little bit too into the comparisons there.....just me making dramatics of things... :cantbeli:

[Knave]

Baby Face Nelson is credited with saying "I've had enough of this cat and mouse" when he was pulled over driving a stolen car in Barrington, Ill. He was shot 17 times but killed two Federal agents in the process.... not that I know where they were hit.

When Dillinger was killed, he is only alleged to have pulled a gun - in fact a gun was never entered into evidence as being on his person, so whether he had a gun is only rumor. The story goes that he reached into his pants, which caused the FBI agents to fire at him. But what isn't rumor is that he was shot four more times - three in the head - while he lay ****e on the ground after he was first hit.

[Smoothie104]

Not wanting to shoot back at Waco?
I read that in the initial gunfight, the Feds withdrew after they ran out of ammo.

[NotoriousTFB]

when I quoted nelson, i didn't mean that he was killed after saying that, just that he actually did say that, and it was a pretty good quote, sorry for the confusion

[hood]

Smoothie, what/where did you read? According to the official report, other than various gas canisters, no bullets were fired at the compound at all.

[Smoothie104]

Hood, you thinking of when they sent the tanks in and the Gas, that was 51 days after the initial firefight.

The inital fight was on the 28th of Feb.
The feds were apparently "serving a warrant" (with 70 some agents dressed in Tactical Gear jumping out of the back of covered trucks, along with 3 helicopters, including a BlackHawk from the Texas National Guard)

The Mission was to be inside the front door within 7 seconds of pulling up to the compound

No one knows who started shooting first, but 4 ATF agents were killed and 16 wounded. I think 5 or so Cult members were killed. After the Feds ran out of ammo, a cease fire was negotiated so they could extract their people.

[hood]

ah ok.. it's been a while.