I did my own stunts!

Back in the day, it was noteworthy whenever an actor confessed to doing their own stunts. Not many thespians were willing to put their lives and limbs on the line for each major motion picture in which they appeared. That's what separated action stars like Jackie Chan from the rest of the pack. I'm sure there were a few others with enough courage and insanity to do their own stunts, but Jackie was the one who had the biggest impact on my field of perceptions. I believe the stunt that forever earned my respect was from Rumble in the Bronx, wherein he lept from a dock to a moving hovercraft while nursing a broken leg that had been damaged in an earlier attempt to perform this same stunt. Yes, not only did he agree to pull off this crazy stunt, but he also persevered in completing it even after badly injuring himself. Jackie's reputation as a stuntmaster is well earned, and demonstrated during the ending out-takes of all his movies. Even watching him screw up the exceedingly dangerous stunts is awesome and exciting. With all that in mind, I decided the picture accompanying this quote had to involve Jackie in one of his typically perilous situations. Of course, were that stunt performed today, it would probably be almost entirely computer generated. Heck, the guy doing the stunt might even be computer generated.
I'll be the first to admit I'm into this whole CG thing, but I can nevertheless not deny that these new advances in SFX are making the stunts featured in modern films significantly less dangerous. Coincidently enough, the number of actors who claim to be personally performing these stunts has risen sharply in recent years. It has become fashionable for big name stars to claim the credit for doing their own stunts, even for movies that don't really seem to include any stunts. At the same time, I haven't noticed a significant decrease in the number of stuntpeople used in most major films. I can only conclude that some actors have taken to believing that running in front of a bluescreen that will later be edited to include falling rocks constitutes a dangerous stunts. Frankly, the most dangerous thing most of these stars end up doing is agreeing to appear in some of these films in the first place.
Most of these claims come up during the self-indulgent interviews that always preclude major movie releases. The stars make the rounds of the entertainment news shows, talking up their contributions to the latest Hollywood blockbuster. Does anyone else find it ironic that these shows covering the news in the entertainment world are themselves very rarely entertaining? Maybe because the interviews are usually filled with bluffing and bluster. My contact from Japan put it best when he noted that he wants to see the following appear in an interview: "Hell no, I didn't do a damn thing. Let the stuntman break his neck. I went and took a nap." Now that would be a stunt. I have to agree that such an honest answer would magnify the quality of the interview a hundredfold. I would also like to thank him for sending in this suggestion, and in so doing increasing the quality of this page by several orders of magnitude.
All that aside, I have to say that I wouldn't mind having a few stuntmen of my own. Especially if they looked somewhat like me (which apparently isn't always a job requirement) so that I could send them to perform a few of my more harrowing stunts. Such as going to classes, where the danger of falling asleep can be great indeed. Unfortunately, that would probably be too risky even for most stuntmen to handle. You know, union rules and all.
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