Hollywood Density: Difference between revisions

* In ''[[Kelly's Heroes]]'', [[The Caper]] involves a squad of Allied soldiers in [[World War Two]] stealing $16 million in [[Nazi Gold|gold bars]] from a bank behind German lines. In the [[WW 2]] era, the price of gold was fixed at $35 per troy ounce, so $16 million worth would weigh 15.67 U.S. short tons and have a volume of 26 cubic feet. It has been calculated that the writers grossly misrepresented the size and weight of that much gold given how much is visible in the movie and the means they use to carry it away.

* [[Soft Water|Water is soft,]] and according to many, many disaster movies, very light. [[Most Writers Are Human|Most of us use water every day,]] and we expect it to flow around anything it encounters that is denser than air. However, one liter (1 cubic decimeter) of water weighs one kilogram. This means that every cubic meter of water weighs 1,000 kg, or 2,204.6 lbs. ''This'' means that a 7-foot wall of water hits a building with 3.1 pounds per square inch, which is comparable to an explosion at close range. Now, scale this up to the 300-foot wave in ''[[The Day After Tomorrow]]'' or the 3500-foot wave in ''[[Deep Impact]]''. Bomb shelters built to withstand megaton nuclear blasts ''might'' survive, but they would be very hard-pressed.

** More evidence wizards are simply physically tougher than Muggles?

** Or perhaps the "duplicated" gold isn't really gold (because otherwise, in a universe with that type of magic, gold would quickly become [[Worthless Yellow Rocks]]).