10 Ridiculous Movie Myths About Explosions

3. If A Car Crashes, It Becomes A Ticking Time Bomb

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=893jbUQUE6Y Here's one of the more irresponsible depictions of explosions in cinema, because it actually changes the way people think. In the above clip from the risible slasher flick Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2, a car is shot through its radiator, and upon crashing, rolls back onto its side. The driver must've thought himself exceptionally lucky for the nanosecond he got to appreciate his predicament before he was turned molten by a hilariously elephantine explosion that totally came out of nowhere. The problem is that in reality, cars that have crashed then exploding into fireballs are extremely rare. However, having been reared on Michael Bay flicks and crappy horror films as we have been, we don't know any better, and so in the event of a car accident, we become immensely paranoid that the gas tank is going to blow up at any second. In reality, this is immensely unlikely, and in frantically scrambling to remove yourself or, moreover, others from the car, you might end up aggravating a spinal injury from the crash and cause far more damage than the initial crash itself.