BERNAL BATTERED BY GUNS AND ARROWS FOR THE KING

(VIDEO) Gael Garcia Bernal battered himself during rifle drill maneuvers and couldn’t see the bulls-eye in archery scene in The King.

Motorcycle Diaries star Gael Garcia Bernal had to master rifle drill maneuvers and learn to shoot a bow and arrow to authentically portray a Navy man in The King. While he looks very impressive twirling the rifle on screen, he wound up destroying his fingers in the process.

Hitting the bulls-eye during the archery scene with William Hurt was next to impossible as the two stars are as blind as a bat. Gael says he heard the arrow hit something but he wasn’t exactly sure what.

“Just a lot of training and a lot of spinning it around and carrying it and doing that drill. I was working with an ex official in the army and he showed me how to do it. I practiced every night. The rifle is really, really heavy. More than dropped it I got hit quite a lot and my knuckles would be completely destroyed and my fingers and my funny bone would get hit and it would hurt like hell. It was dangerous but I didn’t hit anybody.”

Gael is on his way to the Cannes Film Festival to promote his next film Babel which also stars Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett.rnrn

“We both need glasses and the characters had no glasses on and I didn’t see anything because I can not see from far away properly. We were completely lost. It’s all fiction, it’s all cinema, it’s all make believe. I have no idea where it landed! They made a sound like it landed somewhere but I don’t know where. I heard a little ‘uh’ but I don’t know what it was. Yeah it takes a lot of strength and endurance because you’re like, ‘no, no.’ It goes and it goes so quickly it’s impossible. It takes a lot of patience.”