“Finding Nemo” had its “Fabulous Fish Guy” to help keep Nemo and Dory swimming in morphologically true fashion.
“Snakes on a Plane” relied on reptile wrangler Jules Sylvester to keep the titular stars slithering.
Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” (which dug into theaters Thursday) employed the services of actor, fight director and weapons expert Anthony De Longis to keep the world’s most famous archaeologist cracking. Not cracking wise, but working Indy’s second-most-iconic accessory after that dusty fedora: his bullwhip.
So when they call De Longis whip-smart, well, they mean it.
In an article titled “Bullwhip: The Ultimate Flexible Weapon,” De Longis writes about things like energy, supersonic speed, velocity. He often delivers his theories of whip science with professional poetry: “I want to slow the motion of the whip so the camera can catch the action and the audience can better appreciate the story the whip is telling.”
With sentences like that, we had to talk to him. Our only regret is, we didn’t ask: Devo’s “Whip It” — love it or hate it?”
Post: Is this your first Indy?
De Longis: It is. I was inspired so much by “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” I set out to teach myself the whip. As a result, I came up with a more efficient, more effective, more visual style of working with the whip that I first evolved for Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman.
Q: How did this come about?
A: I get this phone call one day. “Is this Anthony De Longis? This is Harrison Ford.” I was like, Omigod I’m talking to Indiana freaking Jones. Not that I said that. I composed myself.
Q: Is he a good student?
A: Yes, he is. Harrison was delightful.
Q: Who invented the bullwhip?
A:Actually, no one knows. It was invented over 3,000 years ago and we can see examples of it in both the Chinese and Egyptian cultures. It’s the first man-made tool to break the sound barrier, even before we knew what a sound barrier was. It is a superb choice for an accessory for an adventurous archaeologist. It’s very simple — until you pick it up. Then you’re dealing with the science of kinetic motion. The tip of the whip goes 700 miles per hour.
Q: Clearly, you’ve given this some thought.
A: Right now I’m writing an article for “Black Belt Magazine” on the versatility and effectiveness of the whip. If you crack whips or do martial arts, up to this time they’ve been thought of as very separate. But across the world there are flexible weapons in every culture from chain whips to nunchucks to the mace and chain. They all can generate tremendous power. But only the bullwhip can achieve supersonic speed. Q: Describe the sound.
A:Well you can go to delonggis or Youtube and see my wife and I doing our synchronized bullwhip routine (search “bullwhip tango”).
Q: We noticed your wife is Dr. Mary De Longis. Does she need to be a medical doctor to do this work?
A: She has a Ph.D. in cellular biology. We’ve got quite a life together.
Q: Have you ever been hit?
A: You bet. Michelle Pfeiffer did all her own action in “Batman Returns.” She just did better than everyone else. Her first day of rehearsal she wrapped Christopher Walken around the neck and yanked him in for this great two-shot. What I didn’t know is one day, she hadn’t slept much the night before and I wandered into range thinking she was as focused as she normally was. She was just a little off and I was just a little off and she caught me with the tip of the whip right on my upper lip.
Q: Ouch?
A: Oh, you betcha, it was like a little explosion went off in my head.
Q: You’ve helped some to tame the bad name for the whip “Roots” instilled.
A: Are you a lady of color? Very exotic. Well, there’s no idea man can’t turn into a bad idea. That’s some of the baggage that it carries. That’s why the first thing I tell people is this is a tool and an amazing expression of design.
