[Calvin Coolidge]

Of course, the characters in the movie are firing with smooth-bore muskets. Most were not even equipped with gunsights, as it was an exercise in futility. Not that this stopped the movie from showing Mad Max firing from the hip, while running, and bringing down multiple targets crouching behind cover in the middle of a forest. Ah, Hollywood.

[John H K]

I especially liked some of the ridiculously long range shots with pistols...those were a hoot.

"The Patriot" was as historically inaccurate as any supposed historical picture of the last 10 years, but because it was "politically correct" from the FR point of view, it usually gets a free pass around here.

[AnAmericanMother]

Is there any chance that some of these guys had rifled muskets? I know that Dan Morgan's riflemen had rifled muskets and were picked marksmen. I know a "Kentucky" rifle when I see one, but is there any reason that you couldn't fit a rifled barrel to a musket?

I'm not a coal-burner, but it seems possible to me.

[BallandPowder]

Powder..patch..Ball FIRE!

Of course, the characters in the movie are firing with smooth-bore muskets. Most were not even equipped with gunsights, as it was an exercise in futility

I shoot regularly with a group of men who use smoothbore flintlocks. They can hit what they want out to 125yds without a problem with great regularity

Also 15-25 yds with a flintlock/caplock pistol and hitting a knockdown squirrel target 6 out of 6 times is not uncommon for the guys who practice.

These guys are hobbyists, having to depend on your weapons for your life helps you be dedicated in your practice. Colonists HAD to be good.

[Zavien Doombringer]

Actually, the colonists did not have the smoothbore military muskets. They had rifled barrels, hint; Kentucky/Pennsylvanian/Virginian RIFLES. The accuracy of these rifles were a serious threat to the British. The militia were used as marksmen and snipers infront of the regular army, who were using the Charleville .65cal smoothbore. The British were using the Brown Bess .75 (3/4 of an inch of lead at you) smoothbore, which was far more less accurate than the Charleville

[Blood of Tyrants]

I beg to differ. The Kentucky rifle that was used by many American militia was rifled (hence the name "rifle"). Accuracy left much to be desired with the maximum accuracy of about 2 to 4 MOA (minutes of accuracy, it equates to about 2-4" from point of aim at 100 yards or 4-8" at 200 yards). Not great, but generally good enough to hit a man sized target at 200 yards.

The muskets had horrible accuracy. At best maybe 24 MOA (that's TWO FEET from point of aim at 100 yards). That is why the opposing sides walked right up to each other shoulder to shoulder and fired en masse. They are also much cheaper to manufacture.

P.S. I post most of this for those who may not be familiar with guns.

[Hatteras]

Yeah, I know what you mean. A friend of mine told me that he really enjoyed the movie "Predator" w/ Arnold Schwarzeneggar but it was ruined for him at the end. Acoording to him, nobody could outrun and survive a small nuclear blast by jumping off a cliff into a lake!

(nevermind that the entire movie dealt with an 8 foot tall semi-invisible, crab-faced alien with dayglow green blood...)

Ya'll need to get a life. It's a MOVIE!

[archy]

Of course, the characters in the movie are firing with smooth-bore muskets. Most were not even equipped with gunsights, as it was an exercise in futility. Not that this stopped the movie from showing Mad Max firing from the hip, while running, and bringing down multiple targets crouching behind cover in the middle of a forest. Ah, Hollywood.

Well, no. Gibson carried a number of weapons in the film: his rifle, with which he made his long-range shots, and the musket he recovered from his burning house, presumably leftover from his previous military adventures, and a couple of spares, with which he equipped his surviving sons. And, for when things got up close and personal, his tomahawk...which some GI's now enroute to the dry and sandy place are STILL using, if of more modern materials. It's generally true, as you say, that when a smoothbore flintlock musket is loaded with a single ball a 40-yard range is about the best at which I'm reasonably certain of a good hit on a target the size of a deer...or a human. A lot of my deer season practice is done on police silhouette targets mounted horizontally to the ground rather than upright, close enough for government work.

But when I load buck-andball loads consisting of a .45 to .54 caliber ball and multiple buckshot in my old Charleville or 1824 Harpers Ferry, a file of upright man-sized targets spaced shoulder width apart are very likely to suffer a fatal hit on the primary target, as well as some .30 to .33 caliber hits on those alongside. And at about 25 feet, the result is pretty certain if the charge is centered, and nearly as likely even if it is not. And such wounds were often eventually lethal in pre-antibiotic days.

But though you offer *Mad Max* from a previous Gibson film as a tossaway reference, the protagonist of those films, who used a sawn-off double 12-gauge not only had the right idea, but demonstrated reasonably usable technique in employing it, as he was short on ammunition, which was aged and of dubious quality- a condition not unknown to those ot the 1770's using Charleville and Brown Bess muskets- and he had to make his shots count, from up close.

You'll be happy to know that the fourth *Mad Max* film is now being shot in Australia as *Fury Road.* Max Rockatansky's baaaack....

[Hugin]

Of course, the characters in the movie are firing with smooth-bore muskets.

At the beginning when that scene takes place he is using his personal firearms, which are a combination of Pennsylvania Rifles and shotguns. The former are quite accurate out to at least 100 yards. Later on they are using Brown Bess muskets which were standard issue for the Continental Army.