Whip It Good
I'm into bullwhips. I make 'em, read about them, use them, and write about them. Being able to handle a bullwhip is an impressive skill. There's a section in Absinthe and Flamethrowers that covers the basics in terms of whip use and technique. If you don't think learning the bullwhip is Golden Thirdstuff, you haven't tried it.
The following movies are my Top Whip Movies, chosen for having characters known for their whip using skills. (Interested readers are invited to write me with their favorites. Whip experts will note that the movies below include both stockwhips and cat-O-nines, which are quite different from one another in purpose.)
1. All Indiana Jones Movies. My son Andy is a graduate student in archeology currently on a dig in Ghana. I gave him a bullwhip as an undergraduate. I wonder if he brought it, and if it could go as carry-on luggage?
2. Legend of Zorro ("Nobody leaves my tequila worm dangling in the wind,") Mask of Zorro, and the many other Zorros
3. King of the Bullwhip. This 1950 oater stars Lash Larue, the king of the bullwhip, hence the title.
4. Catwoman. Yes, a pretty bad movie, but it has Halle Berry in a tight leather outfit cracking a whip.
5. Blues Brothers. Jake Blues sings the theme from Rawhide in Country Bob's Bunker, while cracking a conveniently placed bullwhip.
6. Bullwhip (with Rhonda Fleming and Guy Madison.) GM is an underappreciated talent.
7. Mutiny on the Bounty. I seem to remember some sailors getting flogged.
8. Jailhouse Rock. I vaguely remember Elvis getting flogged.
9. The Ten Commandments. I also seem to remember some Israelites getting flogged. "I can flick a fly from my horse's ear without breaking his stride," - Vincent Price as he gently pets his whip in what I think is the best whip related scene from The Ten Commandments,
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Flash Gordon! Whip fight on the spiked platform with James Bond!
No fan of the bullwhip should miss the ridiculous movie Oblivion (1994) with a bullwhip-toting gal named "Lash". The end titles of the film even pimped a sequel, Backlash.
The first time I spent the night at a friend's house I was four. We were lying in his bunkbeds, giggling and snickering and too wired to sleep.
His dad burst into the room. "If you kids don't shut up and get to sleep I'll come in here with a bullwhip!!"
Not another peep. And not another sleep-over there!
The The Kentuckian - theres a bullwhip fight scene between bad boy Walter Matthau & Burt Lancaster...
I thought that Blues Bros. movie set was in 'Bob's Country Bunker' ??? (I can still hear 'Rawhide' on my bad nights .... )
Wait, wait... now I know Catwoman was a horrid movie and you admit as much, but what about the Catwoman previous to Halle Berry, the amazing Michelle Pfeiffer? She really learned how to own that whip. In spike heels.
Okay, now I want a bullwhip. How does one go about selecting a first whip?
What about Forbidden Kingdom? Totally unrealistic and awesome whipwork
I learned to crack a bullwhip a few years ago at a circus convention. It had just the right balance of challenge to payoff to entertain a constant stream of jugglers throughout the day. The guy who made and was selling them put on a great show at the end of the day.
I was sorely tempted to buy one but a decent whip was way outside my budget considering how rarely I'd use it. A couple of my friends bought smaller signal whips: less impressive, but they could still give a satisfying crack and whip a cigarette out of some hapless volunteer's mouth with a bare minimum of accidental searing pain. Fun stuff!
10. Roots. I vaguely remember Geordi LaForge getting flogged.
Passion of the Christ?
To all those people who suddenly got the whip bug, let me help you out.
First off, if you're interested in buying whips:
- davidmorgan.com - Possibly the best (and most expensive) whipmaker, made the whips for the Indiana Jones' movies.
- neawhips.com - One of the many makers of inexpensive vinyl whips. More durable, but less supple than hide whips.
...and many, many more. There's as many whipmakers as there are whip users.
If you want to learn how to crack a whip, I can't think of anything better than the Youtube Channel of Adam Winrich: http://www.youtube.com/user/AdamCWM. I learned how to do my tricks from this guy's videos alone.
Another movie to add to the list: Clint Eastood's High Plains Drifter. Whip flies into barroom over swinging doors and pulls badman outside, man is whipped to death, then the bloody whip is flung into the bar, panicing the other bad men. Said whip got a Best Supporting Actor nomination in 1973.
A Clockwork Orange, where Malcom McDowell's character imagines himself as a Roman centurion in the time of Christ, dishing out punishment, and oozing about being dressed in "height of Roman fashion".
And don't forget "The Magic Christian" when Raquel Welch cracks the whip on the high society galley slaves.
I wonder about that boy...
http://www.einsiders.com/reviews/dvd/images/caligula1.jpg
Just be warned that whips require practice, and practicing will get you a lot of attention - some of it hostile. My neighbors have gotten used it tho and are happy to know it's not gunfire.
I stopped using whips when I became a vegetarian, but lately I've found a couple of guys that are making nylon whips that I'm able to be quite accurate with. And they break in easier than leather bullwhips. A good David Morgan or Joe Wheeler can take a year to properly break in.
I once checked out of the library an old Roy Rogers movie from the '50s called "Across the Great Divide". I guess all of those B-cowboy movies has one climactic scene where the hero gets in a fight with the villian. Where usually it's with fisicuffs, in this one (for variety's sake, I guess) RR & the bad guy whip the crap out of each other with bullwhips!
Wasn't it Elwood Blues who was doing the whipping? Also, there's a great flogging scene in Starship Troopers!
Should call out "Zorro's Black Whip" serial on its own; a female Zorro with many different-sized whips hidden on her persons. Awesome.
Killer scene in "The Proposition," too.
You forgot The Man from Snowy River and the Douglas Fairbanks movie, Don Q, Son of Zorrow, both of which feature stockwhips.
@ KENEKE
David Morgan developed the relatively tough, Aussie/US hybrid bullwhips featured in the Indy movies. They used Australian style platting but had tougher points than fine Aussie whips, which hold up well to stunt work. Morgan's books are fine works on the history of whips, and it is fun to have whips made by the Indy Whips maker, though I don't know that he is actually platting them himself at this point.
A major supplier of whips for enthusiasts is westernstageprops.com . They have a wider selection of whips than Morgan does. And, of course, you can always google for direct sources and reviews of Australian and US made whips.
Minimum Wage! Hee-Yah!
#21 Anon:
I was just about to leave a comment about Morgan's whips. My boss bought a trenchcoat from David... says he's a fine fellow that really does his research to find the best gear.
A bullwhip, in a trained hand, can cut a person to ribbons.
Anyhoo, there's some good whippin' in one of the Garbo silent movies: 'The Temptress',
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0017449/
I think - it's the one set in South America, and amongst other uses, the whips are used to punish a peon, suspended spread-eagled over a pit: also, IIRC a similar scene is present in the 1924 'Thief of Bagdad',
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0015400/
with a captured thief suffering this fate.
There is also IIRC a memorable scene of an oxen-train, with its drivers using big ox-whips, in one of the old 1950s flicks set in Africa: Mogambo?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0046085/
King Solomon's Mines?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042646/
perhaps it was in the more recent "Mountains of the Moon"?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100196/
In any case, those ox-whips looked formidable.
Indy fans might want to check out the indygear.com/cow forum (Club Obi-Wan - registration required) which has a thriving community of whip users and makers, instructions on safe use, techniques, preferred vendors, pricing, and so forth. It's not limited to Indy-style bullwhips, although that bias certainly exists.
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HAHA, "Whip It" is the name of the new roller derby movie with Drew Barrymore. Whip is the name of a maneuver on the track. How funny.... Ah, hahhaaha, hahahaha!
It's my understanding that whips can be useful when herding dinosaurs:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikOON68MBC8
Although some dinosaurs are cooler than others IMHO.
Another terrible movie with decent whip-age:
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues.
One of the cowgirls (Ruby, I want to say her name is), is a old west kind of dominatrix. She's fond of her whip indeed.
Many great whip scenes, my friends, but I just remembered the King of Whipmasters.
Bunny Wigglesworth, from Zorro The Gay Blade.
Make that the Queen of Whipmasters.
Uh, guys, duh! Anybody remember a certain falling balrog with a magnificent whip snag on the ankle of a grey wizard?
Many great whip masters, to be sure, but the greatest of them all, the King of the Whip, has to be: [drumroll] Zorro's brother, Bunny Wigglesworth, from 'Zorro the Gay Blade'.
Er- Make that Queen of the Whip.
pleasant steel whip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yU_ycriWA8Q
@31: But the Balrog was using a forked whip, not a single-tailed whip.
Also, when selecting whips bear in mind that longer is not necessarily better, particularly if you believe that target cracking isn't everything. I'm a sport cracker; it was only after I purchased my first 8ft bullwhip (from dube.com, a juggling store - yes, take a wild guess as to how I got into it) that I found out that the Hungarian pig drover's crack, an impressive crack above the head, could only really safely be performed above the head. Good singletail whip manufacturers can be found here, but bear in mind that most of them are internet-illiterate.
Also, if you're insane or awesome or (preferrably) both, you could get a fire bullwhip. It's well worth the waiting time; I've used mine a couple of times, and every time someone has told me they want my babies.
How can we ever forget one of the whip's finest performances ever in cinema and literature- Balrog whipsnags the ankle of Gandolf!
But the King of the Whip has to be none other than [drum roll]
Zorro's brother, Bunny Wigglesworth!
(Um- make that Queen of the Whip.)
Wow -- I'm shocked that no one mentioned the original Star Trek series episode, "Plato's Stepchildren," where Kirk and Uhura kiss (first "interracial" kiss on TV!) and then get whipped by the villain, Parmen. Classic!
Just the other day I was reminiscing about the Disney film "The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin" (1967) which I must have seen when I was about 10.
I don't remember anything about it, except it had a title song and I thought it was quite good.
Don't know if there are actually any bullwhips in the film though.