Several San Francisco police officers responding to a 911 call about an armed robbery ran into the Alpha Market on Cole Street with guns drawn.  

“Drop the gun!” an officer ordered, aiming his weapon at a man in a ski mask brandishing a pistol.Instead of dropping the gun, the man in the mask turned to the officers and said, “It’s a movie!”

That’s what they all say.

It was shortly before 11 a.m. one Wednesday. What happened next, according to Ade Saba, owner of the Alpha Market at 960 Cole St., is that the police “got really upset.”

“They wanted him to drop the gun, but the guy didn't take it seriously because he knows it's a plastic gun,” Saba said. The police report said “the gunman refused to put down his pistol, and the officers overpowered and disarmed him.” He was not arrested.

Perhaps most stunned of all was the Japanese film crew across the street. With the simulated robbery at the Alpha Market, they thought they had a pretty good new episode of “World’s Most Interesting Footage.”

Then it got a little more interesting.

“We were shooting about a stupid crime - a little segment people can laugh about,” said Yasmine Yoshida, filming coordinator with Duo Creative Communications, the film company. “It’s supposed to be funny, but all of a sudden it wasn’t funny at all.”

Unfortunately, Yoshida said the cameras were no longer rolling when the real guns arrived. “They were just so scared,” she said.

Police told her that the actor, David Lubin, was lucky he hadn’t been killed. “They said when they see someone running around with a gun, they usually just shoot,” she said. “They don’t ask any questions.”Yoshida said Duo Creative has a great relationship with Saba and his Alpha Market, where they’ve been filming each month for the past year.

The show is filmed in San Francisco in English, but shown with Japanese voice-over in Japan.

“It’s a very popular show,” Yoshida said. But that Wednesday, the city’s Film Commission came around asking a lot of questions, “and I was in hot water,” she said. Ultimately, she said that Duo Creative had all the proper permits and did not need to inform the police about the bogus burglary because it was on private property.

“We did everything right,” she said.

Source: The San Fransico Chronicle, www.sfgate.com/chronicle/