Public spend fake film dollars

Las Vegas: Fake notes succesfully spent

The US secret service has ordered a firm which makes fake money for the film industry to hand over its product after people managed to spend it.

Independent Studio Services has been ordered to stop printing cash and retrieve all the notes it has made so they can be destroyed.

Some of the company's cash was successfully spent when fake notes flew off the set of a Jackie Chan film shoot in Las Vegas.

Chan also starred in Shanghai Noon

"The product they were producing was just too close to genuine," said Assistant Special Agent Chuck Ortman, charges with enforcing anti-forgery laws.

One billion dollars (£670m) of fake money was blown up on the set of the action movie Rush Hour 2.

A total of 19 notes were later found to have been spent in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

Independent Studio Services owner Greg Bilson said the ban was a bad thing for the US film industry.

"It's unfortunate," he said.

The more realistic they look, be it fake money or weapons, the easier it is for the general public to be confused with the real thing

Prop company co-owner Pam Elyea

"It's another reason for people to say, 'Well we're going to take our production to Canada.'"

The seized bills are the same size as real money, but US law says that reproductions should be 25% smaller or 50% larger than the genuine article.

The problem is that these notes look strange on screen, putting pressure on props firms to produce more realistic looking money.

"The props our businesses rent out are more realistic-looking than they used to be," said Pam Elyea, co-owner of History for Hire.

"But the more realistic they look, be it fake money or weapons, the easier it is for the general public to be confused with the real thing and the more problems that poses."

Rush Hour 2 is due for release later in the year.