The Crow - Film

The Crow is a 1994 American action film based on the 1989 comic book of the same name by James O'Barr. 

The film was written by David J. Schow and John Shirley, and directed by Alex Proyas. The Crow stars Brandon Lee, in his final film, as Eric Draven, a rock musician who is revived from the dead to avenge his own murder, as well as that of his fiancée. While filming during the last weeks of production, Lee was mortally wounded when a dummy bullet, which had become lodged in one of the prop guns, was shot into his abdomen by a blank cartridge. The film was a critical and commercial success after its release, opening at the top of the box office.

On March 31, 1993, at EUE Screen Gems Studios in Wilmington, North Carolina, Brandon Lee sustained an accidental gunshot wound on the set of the film. He was taken to an area hospital, where he later died. There were eight days left before shooting of the film was to be completed.

The scenes involving Lee and Shinas' characters in their apartment had been saved for the end of filming so that Lee could work the final week without makeup. 

In the story, Lee's character comes to his apartment where his girlfriend is being raped by a gang of thugs, and then he is shot and killed by Michael Massee's character, playing one of the thugs. Weeks prior to the event, a scene was being filmed that required dummy rounds to be shown being loaded into the handgun. Inexperienced crew members, pressured by time constraints, purchased live ammunition, removed the bullets, dumped the gunpowder, and then replaced the bullets back into the empty cartridges with the live primers still in place.

When the time came to film the scene where Michael Massee shoots Lee's character, the same gun was loaded with blank cartridges. 

Unknown to the crew, the bullet from one of the dummy rounds had become lodged in the barrel of the gun. It is believed that someone on set was playing with the gun, pulled the trigger and inadvertently caused the live primer to fire; this would have resulted in the bullet moving a couple of inches into the barrel of the gun. When the gun was operated, the propellant in the blank rounds – which is used to give the visible effect of a gunshot – dislodged the bullet, which penetrated Lee's abdomen and lodged in his spine. The injury caused massive blood loss. As the production company had sent the firearms specialist home early, responsibility for the guns was given to a prop assistant who was not aware of the rule for checking all firearms before and after any handling. Therefore, the barrel was not checked for obstructions when it came time to load it with the blank rounds.

Soon after the accident, Lee was taken to the New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, where he died about 12 hours later, at 1:03 p.m. 

After Lee's death, the producers were faced with the decision of whether or not to continue with the film. Sofia Shinas, who had witnessed the accident, did not want to continue and went home to Los Angeles. The rest of the cast and crew, except for Ernie Hudson, whose brother-in-law had just died, stayed in Wilmington. Paramount, who were initially interested in distributing The Crow theatrically (originally a direct-to-video feature), opted out of involvement due to delays in filming and some controversy over the violent content being inappropriate given Brandon's death. However, Miramax picked it up with the intention of releasing it in theatres and injected a further $8 million into the production to complete The Crow, taking its budget to approximately $15 million. The cast and crew then took a break with script rewrites for the flashback scenes that had yet to be completed.

The Crow - Full Movie

Source :Text by Wikipédia