Clint Eastwood Was Wrong
Clint Eastwood said that before Sergio Leone made "A Fistful of Dollars" in 1964, the Production Code did not allow for scenes in which the person firing a gun and the person being shot were in the same frame. The following is a list of movies made before 1964 that contradicts this claim.
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- DirectorMichael CurtizStarsAnn DvorakLee TracyRichard CromwellMolly Louvain's plans for a respectable marriage with her sweetheart Ralph fall through so she takes to the road with a two-bit crook and becomes wanted by the police in connection with a high-profile crime.Admittedly, this is a Pre-Code movie, made before the Production Code was strictly enforced.
- DirectorHoward HawksStarsHumphrey BogartLauren BacallWalter BrennanDuring World War II, American expatriate Harry Morgan helps transport a French Resistance leader and his beautiful wife to Martinique while romancing a sensuous lounge singer.This just barely qualifies as a contradiction to Eastwood's claim. There is a scene in which we see the man firing a gun and the leg of the man being shot in the same frame.
- DirectorGordon DouglasStarsMark StevensEdmond O'BrienGale StormProwl car cops on night duty romance a reluctant young woman who works for the department while in danger from a vengeful racketeer.There are two different scenes in this movie in which the man shooting and the man being shot are in the same frame, one near the beginning of the movie and one near the end.
- DirectorGeorge StevensStarsAlan LaddJean ArthurVan HeflinA weary gunfighter in 1880s Wyoming begins to envision a quieter life after befriending a homestead family with a young son who idolizes him, but a smoldering range war forces him to act.It is hard to see how Eastwood could have forgotten about this one. Wilson shoots Torrey in the same frame. And in the final shootout in the saloon, Shane shoots Ryker in the same frame as well.
- DirectorJohn FrankenheimerStarsFrank SinatraLaurence HarveyJanet LeighAn American POW in the Korean War is brainwashed as an unwitting assassin for an international Communist conspiracy.We see Raymond Shaw shoot another soldier in the head in the same frame during a flashback. Later, Shaw shoots his wife in the same frame as himself. We sort of see Shaw shoot his father-in-law while he is lying on the floor, but his wife's arm blocks most of it.
- DirectorJohn FordStarsJames StewartJohn WayneVera MilesA senator returns to a Western town for the funeral of an old friend and tells the story of his origins.When we find out who really shot Liberty Valence, we see Tom Doniphon and Liberty Valence in the same frame.
- DirectorHoward HawksStarsJohn WayneDean MartinRicky NelsonA small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a disabled man, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy.There are so many scenes in which the shooter and the person being shot are in the same frame that it is not worth listing them all. In the first one, someone is shot at pointblank range.
- DirectorMichael CurtizJohn WayneStarsJohn WayneStuart WhitmanIna BalinTexas Ranger Jake Cutter arrests gambler Paul Regret, but soon finds himself teamed with his prisoner in an undercover effort to defeat a band of renegade arms merchants and thieves dealing with the Comanches known as Comancheros.In the opening scene, Stuart Whitman kills a man in a duel in the same frame. Later on, John Wayne shoots several men in the same frame.
- DirectorFrank TuttleStarsAlan LaddVeronica LakeRobert PrestonWhen assassin Philip Raven shoots a blackmailer and his beautiful female companion dead, he is paid off in marked bills by his treasonous employer who is working with foreign spies.Early in the movie, Raven and the blackmailer are in the same frame when he shoots him. At the end of the movie, a cop shoots Raven, and they are both in the same frame.
- DirectorHoward HawksStarsHumphrey BogartLauren BacallJohn RidgelyPrivate detective Philip Marlowe is hired by a wealthy family. Before the complex case is over, he's seen murder, blackmail and what might be love.When Marlowe shoots Canino several times, they are both in the same frame.
- DirectorGerd OswaldStarsHugh O'BrianNancy GatesRaymond BurrAn honest sheriff attempts to save an 11-year-old boy who helped him capture a notorious killer.Hugh O'Brian shoots three men in one frame.
- DirectorLeslie FentonStarsAlan LaddVeronica LakeDouglas DickAfter WW2, two army buddies, one of them terminally-ill, embark on a series of adventures in South-East Asia and run across a dangerous criminal and his pretty secretary.Near the end of the movie, Alan Ladd shoots the bad guy with a pistol jammed into his gut.
- DirectorVictor FlemingGeorge CukorSam WoodStarsClark GableVivien LeighThomas MitchellA sheltered and manipulative Southern belle and a roguish profiteer face off in a turbulent romance as the society around them crumbles with the end of slavery and is rebuilt during the Civil War and Reconstruction periods.Scarlett shoots the Yankee in the same frame.
- DirectorAnthony MannCharles WaltersStarsGlenn FordMaria SchellAnne BaxterThe Oklahoma Land Run of April 1889 sets the stage for an epic saga of a frontier adventurer, his wife and family and their friends.Glenn Ford shoots a man in the same frame.
- DirectorJohn FordStarsBen JohnsonJoanne DruHarry Carey Jr.Two young drifters guide a Mormon wagon train to the San Juan Valley and encounter cutthroats, Indians, geography, and moral challenges on the journey.Ben Johnson kills a man in the same frame, and then kills a second one in the same frame too.
- DirectorRaoul WalshStarsJames CagneyHumphrey BogartPriscilla LaneThree men attempt to make a living in Prohibitionist America after returning home from fighting together in World War I.After Eddie kills George, he shoots one of George's men at the top of the stairs in the same frame. Seconds later, Eddie shoots another guy outside in the same frame.
- DirectorBurt BalabanStuart RosenbergStarsStuart WhitmanMay BrittHenry MorganThe rise and fall of a 1930's Brooklyn crime syndicate, known as Murder Incorporated, led by mobster Lepke Buchalter.In the opening scene, during the credits, Peter Falk shoots a man, the two of them in the same frame.
- DirectorRichard QuineStarsFred MacMurrayKim NovakPhilip CareyAn undercover police officer falls for the beautiful moll of a bank robber on the run, and together they plan to double-cross the hood and the cops.When Fred MacMurray is shot at the end of the movie, he is in the same frame as the cop that shot him.
- DirectorWilliam WylerStarsBette DavisHerbert MarshallJames StephensonThe wife of a rubber plantation administrator shoots a man to death and claims it was self-defense, but a letter written in her own hand may prove her undoing.In the opening scene, when Leslie (Bette Davis) is shooting her lover, she is in the same frame with him on the second shot.