Johnny Depp escaped being crushed by horse

Los Angeles: Hollywood actor Johnny Depp was almost trampled over by a horse while he was filming for his latest movie The Lone Ranger. The 50-year-old actor insisted on doing as many action scenes himself as possible in the film, but he admits he regretted his decision when he was thrown off his horse Scout, and dragged for almost 25 yards, reports contactmusic.com.

"We'd been running the horses pretty hot that day and went down a couple of paths. That all worked out fine until we changed paths in order to get closer to the camera car. Scout decided to jump over a few obstacles. So yeah, user error," he said. "You would expect to be riddled with fear or adrenaline, but I saw everything very clearly, which was the horse's muscular front legs moving at a dangerous speed," Depp recalled.

"I was still holding on to the mane like an idiot trying to get back up and at a certain point you have to make a decision, do I go down and hit the deck on my own? Or do I wait for the hoof to split my face in two? So I decided to go down on my own and then, incredibly, the horse lifted its front legs and he missed me," he added.

It was a scary moment for Depp, but he was thereafter. "He could have crushed me in seconds. I was lucky that the horse's instincts were good. I hit the deck and then stood up. Everybody was yelling at me, 'Stay down!' But I felt fine and just stood up and shook it off."

"After it happened, they were a little skittish about putting me back on a horse for any stunts, but I did get back on and it was fine. And Scout is a very good horse. Really, he saved my life. I'm trying to buy him," Depp said.

IANS