History Main / KnifeThrowingAct

* ''Series/WhodunnitUK'': The CircusEpisode "Final Trumpet" opens with Mad Wolfgang and his LovelyAssistant Nola rehearsing their knife-throwing act. Later, during the questioning, Wolfgang gets so infuriated at Patrick Mower that he hurls a knife at him, which hits the target board behind him.

* Literature/GiveYourselfGoosebumps'':

* ''Film/GangsOfNewYork'' features a confrontation between the main protagonists in which Cameron Diaz's character Jenny Everdeane acts as a target girl in an impromptu [=knifethrowing=] act with the villain, Bill 'The Butcher' Cutting, played by Daniel Day-Lewis. For extra suspension, he keeps "accidentally" slipping, and constantly on the verge of hitting his partner, both to amuse his audience and to make the protagonist sweat.

* ''Film/TheFightingPrinceOfDonegal'': When Hugh wants to prove his point about DividedWeFall regarding the clans, he takes a dagger and throws it on a shield on the wall, explaining that one clan's struggle against the English occupation is not enough. He then throws other daggers on it, and it starts unhooking. Henry O'Neill (Tom Adams) then provokes him into a fight, loses the fight, takes a dagger and throws it on the shield, which makes it fall, meaning all clans are now united and follow Hugh.

* In the anime of ''Manga/{{Golgo 13}}'', a hitman posing as a circus performer demonstrates his skill with his WeaponOfChoice by throwing a knife into the bulls-eye of a dartboard, just past his girlfriend's head. She shows her own badass credentials by [[NervesOfSteel not flinching]]. After playing the trope straight on stage, he then uses his skills against Togo, who unfortunately is an unflinching badass himself.

-->-- '''Gleam''', ''FanFic/TheVictorsProject''

--> "I don't get what's so good or exciting about the knife-throwing act. [[COmicallyMissingThePoint That idiot missed the lady in every shot!]]"

Sometimes the person who's capable of feats such as these can also be a very talented KnifeNut with a penchant for throwing knives.

* ''Literature/AngelsOfMusic'': In "Guignol", Rollo is a knife-thrower with ''Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol'' who is dismissed by Guignol for collaborating a little too willingly with ''Le Theatre Des Horreurs'' when they take over the theatre. He returns in "Deluge", alongside several other of the Angels' old enemies; now a fully-fledged KnifeNut looking to flense the Angels in revenge for his earlier humiliation.

* Joey Falconetti makes his debut scene doing this in ''VideoGame/{{Ripper}}'', as a way to interrogate Jake Quinlan. It's helped that Falconetti's already a KnifeNut. This trope is also played with, as the act takes place in one of his cyberspace wells, although it's never stated if the knives are virtual; granted, he also has real knives outside of cyberspace.

* ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'' fanart sometimes has [[{{Meido}} Sakuya]] [[KnifeNut Izayoi]] do this ''to'' Hong Meiling. Sometimes (usually depending on Sakuya's mood) the poor girl ends up becoming a {{Youkai}} [[HumanPincushion Pincushion]].

** You can be dragged into this in ''Under The Magician's Spell'', and the performer will assure your worried relatives that one of the knives is fake and harmless. [[spoiler:"Whoops! Wrong knife!"]]
** You can also be forced into this in ''Hocus-Pocus Horror''. The trick is designed for you to get your hand chopped off in front of the audience, but [[spoiler:you're decapitated when you sneeze and move your head]].

Compare WilliamTelling, another show of ImprobableAimingSkill.

The old carnival routine where a person (usually a LovelyAssistant) stands against a board as a target (sometimes a spinning wheel to ramp up the danger) and the throwing knives are supposed to hit on either side of the target, which may lead to a KnifeOutline.

Compare WilliamTelling, another show of aiming skill.

Usually faked when done in live action, even where the possibility of error is supposed to be realistic; [[DontTryThisAtHome too many things can go wrong trying to do it for real]], and lovely assistants in {{Stripperiffic}} outfits aren't easy to come by these days...

* Referenced in ''Anime/IrresponsibleCaptainTylor''. The marines hear someone listening at the door during a secret meeting with the captain, so they leap outside throwing a couple of knives which hit on either side of Harumi, who's dressed in a skintight outfit (instead of her usual look) as she's trying to assassinate Captain Tylor.

* In the French film ''Film/TheGirlOnTheBridge'' (1999), a knife throwing act is at the centre of the plot. Vanessa Paradis stars as Adele, a girl who attempts suicide by jumping from a bridge but is saved by knife thrower Gabor, played by Daniel Auteuil, who persuades her to become his target girl. They soon fall into a complex relationship in which knife-throwing is very overtly and erotically depicted as a sadomasochistic substitute for sex.

* ''ComicStrip/ModestyBlaise'': "El Casador and Conchita", the identies adopted by Willie and Modesty when they appear as a knife thrower and LovelyAssistant in Willie's circus.

* A major plot point in Creator/AAPessimal's ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' fic '''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6093110/1/Clowning-is-a-Serious-Business Clowning Is A Serious Business]]''' is the Fools' Guild reluctantly accepting girl students, to a Department Of Circus Skills that incorporates learning both how to throw knives and how to stand still in front of the target. The principal tutor in the new school is a [[{{Spexico}} fiery Latin lady]] who has ''excellent'' knife skills. As she demonstrates. Knife-throwing - by Assassins, Thieves and circus practitioners - is a recurring theme.

* The 1987 television movie ''Film/IfItsTuesdayItStillMustBeBelgium'' features Courteney Cox as a character who becomes a target girl in a circus knife throwing act.

* Knife throwing, with a celebrity acting as target girl, was a regular feature on ''CircusOfTheStars''.

* ''Series/{{Elementary}}'': Footballer Phil Simms appears as himself in "Just a Regular Irregular". Apparently he is the world's greatest knife thrower and only went into football because there is no money in the impalement arts. He is Sherlock's knife-throwing expert and Sherlock consults with him about how a murder during a knife-throwing act at a circus in the 1930s could have been committed. Simms tells Sherlock that his theory is impossible and then demonstrates his knife-throwing prowess before leaving.

* An episode in ''Human Weapon'' that dealt with Ninjitsu had one of the masters they talked to (and who tried to teach them a bit of his art) specializing in throwing various sharp objects ranging from knives, star-knives, caltrops, and nails.

* ''Series/TheLastLeg'': In series 18, ep. 5, the team decide to test whether Prince Andrew's claim that an overdose of adrenalin can destroy your ability to sweat. To do this, Adam has Alex blindfolded and strapped to a board surrounded by balloons. Adam tells Alex that his going throw knives to pop the balloons. He then proceeds to pretend to throw knives while the balloons are popped by Josh who is standing next to the board. Alex's flinches reveal that he has no idea it is being faked.

* In ''{{Nikki}}'', the episode titled "The Jupiter and Mary Chain", first aired in 2001, featured the characters played by Nikki Cox and Susan Egan taking jobs as target girls.
* In the ''SoldiersOfFortune'' episode "The Danger Sisters", a sister knife-throwing act working in North Africa hire Tim and Toubo as bodyguards.

* The target in question is a painting, not a live person, but Count Carl-Magnus has a knife-throwing scene in ''Theatre/ALittleNightMusic''. It's ''almost'' completely irrelevant to the plot. (He's demonstrating his prowess with weapons to a romantic rival.)

* In a moment of GettingCrapPastTheRadar in ''WesternAnimation/HarveyBirdmanAttorneyAtLaw'', Peanut is trapped in a genie's lamp with a woman. He says they're going to go on a "magic carpet ride" and asks her to hand over a roll of nearby rope. Later on, when said genie releases his captives, Peanut appears with the woman tied to a giant target, having apparently been doing such an act the whole time.

[[quoteright:299:[[Music/{{Slaughter}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/album-stick-it-to-ya_1260.jpg]]]]
[-[[caption-width-right:299:DoNotTryThisAtHome. [[DoWrongRight Try it at school]]!]]-]

* Dave Nelson from ''Series/NewsRadio'' was once a knifethrower named [[TheGreatWhodini The Great Throwdini]]. At a talent show, he met an old knifethrowing rival of his, Throwgali.

* In the ''VideoGame/HeartNoKuniNoAlice'' movie, Alice suddenly finds herself strapped to a board in the circus. Two demented kids start throwing knives at her, ignoring her protests. One of the knives cuts her cheek. The last two would have landed in her chest if Blood Dupree hadn't blocked them in time. Enraged at them for endangering her, he annihilates the kids with a machine gun.

* On ''Series/MyNameIsEarl'', Earl's transgression of the week is "Broke Joy's Fancy Figurine." That figurine was a prize in a mother-daughter beauty pageant Joy and Connie competed in circa 1981. Ever since, the prize has been going to Shelly Stoker and her daughter. They agree to give Earl the figurine if he helps them win the pageant. (Conveniently, Ms. Stoker's boyfriend left her the day before, and he was supposed to be in the "talent" portion with them.) The Stokers' talent is knife-throwing, and they come from a long line of women that are especially good at it. Shelly's daughter doesn't want to win the contest, because she'd rather go to school and eventually become a doctor, not compete in pageants like her StageMom wants her to do. Earl convinces her to miss on purpose, because he didn't want to hurt a little girl to cross his ex-wife off The List.