I was very excited to see the American Reunion movie. I saw American Pie just after college and remembered it was quite funny.
Jim, Michelle, Oz, Heather, Stifler reunite for their high school...
45. Leon. A.K.A. The Professional. Dir. Luc Besson. 1994.
"Somebody's coming up. Somebody serious."
The opening sequence gets the thumbs up over the climactic battle which, for sheer spectacle, may have the edge but it lacks the sheer finesse of this moment. If you ever wondered what an action scene crossed with a stalk and slash scene from a boogeyman horror flick was like, then look no further. There's not a foot wrong in this perfectly paced ode to restraint and suspense over BANG BANG BANG. Leon yanking the goon who looks like McNulty over the railing to his doom is one of my favourite shots ever. It's a lovely quiet "jump" moment.
46. Back to the Future. Dir. Robert Zemeckis. 1985.
"Come on, move!"
Marty uses one of Northern Ireland's most famous exports to evade a group of pesky Libyan terrorists. This is unique among action scenes in that Alan Silvestri's score, couple with the sheer charm of Fox's performance, can make the viewer feel like he or she has single-handedly won the World Cup.
The highlight of the entire prequel trilogy. Qui Gon meditating while Darth Maul paces is so everything I love about Star Wars.
I remember cursing all of the other sequences that lightsaber fight was cross-cut with. Ironically, all that dullness served to sweeten the duel that much more.
47. Die Hard: the entire sequence that begins with Karl facing off with McClane through "I guess we need some new FBI guys." Just a master class in elevating stakes, editing, music and stunts.
49. "A plan is just a list of things that don't happen."
I'm probably one of like 4 people who prefers Christopher McQuarrie's follow up to The Usual Suspects to his breakthrough, but even I won't deny that The Way Of The Gun is an uneven, at times overwrought movie. I don't care, the movie could be total steaming shitpile for 95% of it's runtime (but it has Nicky Katt in a prominent role so, you know, it's not) and the intense, gritty shootout that ends the film would make it worth watching.
It's chaotic but never incomprehensible, and there's some basic strategizing going on but it's simple stuff which doesn't obscure the fact that the characters are scrambling for their lives from the moment the first shot is fired. Look at the physicality of Phillipe and Del Toro, particularly contrasted with their elderly opponents; there's no John Woo antics going on, and for the most part they're just hiding and firing from cover, but it never feels like they're sitting still. But there's no action heroes here. The guys breathing hard, tangled up in their own gear, feeling the impact of every round, kevlar or no, and it's hard to imagine a less glamorous action beat than Phillipe's agonized gagging after he finds a surprise in the fountain. Plus they're reloading. A lot.
Also an old man gets blasted in the crotch with a shotgun.
Not even an action movie. But when it comes time to throw down, Hanson's film executes them with an old-fashioned, non-showboating efficiency. And it's BADASS. Russel Crowe should've used more shotguns in movies scored by Jerry Goldsmith.
56. Kung Fu Panda (2008, dir. Mark Osborne and John Stevenson)
The Bridge fight sequence
A fantastically put together sequence from a movie that has continued to grow in my estimation. It takes an oft-used location in action movies and uses the freedom of animation to milk the 5-on-1 fight for all it's worth without sacrificing the stakes. Fantastic editing, exciting score, great choreography... just really cool stuff in a movie that has several great action sequences.
Unfortunately, I couldn't find a good clip of the fight that featured the sound FX. The one below does allow the John Powell/Hans Zimmer score to shine though. Now... let's see if embedding is disabled...
John Matrix makes, breaks, and kills the fuck out of Val Verde to get his daughter back in a climactic action scene that glorifies and immortalizes how sometimes, movies just gotta tell realism to go fuck itself.
Shitty, shitty movie, but it has a exceedingly well done car chase in the middle of it that, quite frankly, belongs in a much better film. It's well choreographed, shot well, and edited to perfection.
60. The Matrix Revolutions, The Superbrawl (The Wachowski Brothers, 2003)
As much as I enjoy that other flick, somehow, a $300 million Superman movie happened *AFTER* this and had nothing that looked like it. Thats kinda bullshit. The fight is screaming EPIC from the top of a goddamned mountain, and every penny of the money spent to execute it is onscreen. the film itself might've lacked for many. I can't imagine this being one of the complaints.
Felix, your Equilibrium entry made me think of Ultraviolet, which immediately made me wish for a "Chewers' 100 Worst Action Sequences" thread.
Once we hit the 100 mark with this list, would anyone else be into such a thread? Being negative is fun! I think there could be some really entertaining debates in it.
Also, I'm kicking myself for not posting Casino Royale's opening parkour sequence first.
But it's got Christian Bale vs. Ricky Gervais trying to smack each other with guns!
It is completely ludicrous if that's the first thing you see from the movie, but the movie sets up the whole gun-kata concept early enough where it doesn't seem as silly when it's used.
How about the fact that they'd both be completely stone deaf by the end of the battle? The guns are going off right in their fucking ears for the entire fight, fer cryin' out loud.
Oh yeah, I'm sorry...heaven forbid I try and apply logic to the fight scene.
The woods fight. It's hands down the best example of medieval warfare. Too often movies try to make knights fight honorably and wooden, but that's not how it was at all. It was quick and bloody and in many ways cheap, and Kingdom of Heaven showed that chivalry really was never on the battlefield. Excellent, excellent scene.
I've got to say, it's really nice to see the final showdown from Rob Roy in here. It's one of the few sword battles where you really feel how heavy the weapons they're wielding really are.
I don't know if you'd call it an "escape" or the "final fight," or what, but they tear some shit up in the house as the werewolves close in. And then, we are gifted with a bare-knuckles brawl between a mean runt and a 7-foot-tall werewolf.
72. The Huggies caper, Raising Arizona (d: Joel Coen, 1987)
"Well, it ain't Ozzie 'n' Harriet."
I love how sustained and consistently funny this chase is. The way elements like the store clerk and rampaging dogs dip in and out of the main action, the perfect punctuation of lines like "Son, you got a panty on your head," the modulation of Pete Seeger's 'Goofin' Off Suite' into Muzak and back again, and how Hi never loses sight of his goal.
73. Transformers: The Movie (directed by Nelson Shin, 1986)
"One Shall Stand, One Shall Fall"
Your inner child punches the air with a "Fuck Yeah!". This scene is proof positive that Transformers: The Movie wasn't just a cash grab & that the makers of it were sincerely trying to make something dynamic, interesting, & bad-ass.
John Hyams (son of Peter) delivers the best film in the series by a long-shot, imbuing the characters with actual motivations and emotions not commonly found in any modern action movie (much less a DTV title). Besides being a very good action picture, Hyams has a natural flair for down and dirty action sequences, most notably displayed when the man/myth/legend JCVD storms an enemy-encrusted compound.
79. The opening battle between HMS Surprise and the Acheron in Master and Commander. I'd time this almost from the opening exchanges between Calamy and Hollom, right through until the Surprise loses itself in the fog.
There's so much that is great about this sequence, but to name a few things:
- the flow from the introduction of the Surprise as it's own world at sea;
- the build up of tension;
- the immediate characterisation of Hollom that plays out throughout the film;
- the introduction of a number of characters but Aubrey and Maturin in particular;
- the sound design and mix, from the creak of the hull, ropes and sails as tension builds, through the rocketing of the cannonballs and the splintering of wood, through to the eerie "silence" once more when they get into the fog bank;
- the kinetic energy of the desperate fight to first to come to terms then simply to survive;
- the tension of the flight to the fog and the release as they make it with the literal pulling together of the crew;
- the tactility and authenticity, and the fabulous timing of the way it's edited and shot.
It's a microcosm for the entire film, a masterclass in immersion, character and filmmaking, and it's only the first ten minutes of the movie.
73. Transformers: The Movie (directed by Nelson Shin, 1986)
"One Shall Stand, One Shall Fall"
Prime certainly did it. He turned the tide. Great pick, Art!
*walks off singing "you got the moves, you know the streets..." to himself*
81. Starship Troopers. Dir. Paul Verhoeven. 1997.
"This is Roughneck Two-Zero-One. I request retrieval now. This place crawls, sir!"
The grunts' (no offense) belief that "M.I. does the dying. Fleet just does the flying" gets put to the test during the ambush at Whiskey Oupost on Bug Planet "P." There's a lot more waiting for Rico and chums than a brain bug, that's for sure. It's still gripping and gorgeous thanks to some of the finest SFX ever and a truly unique blockbuster director to match.
PURE fun. Takes its 'boys playing with Hot Wheels' spirit and makes real world physics moan like a whore... as it ravages it again... and again... And then there's Matthew Fox's shit-eating grin.
This is the only clip I could find. No sound FX, but it does highlight Giacchino's awesome work in the film.
Michael Mann keeps the whole thing rolling tense and tight throughout, but the high point of the film, as many will agree, is the clusterfuck that Vincent starts up at a Koreatown nightclub, dragging Max down right with him. Notably, the scene is very reminiscent of a post-Woo shootout canvas, but Mann's magic night-noir touch makes it an exhilarating, unpredictable turning point in the film and an assurance that this is not your average action movie.
I can't find any YouTubes of this one unfortunately.
85. The attempted assassination of Shimada Toranosuke - Sword of Doom (1966) d. Kihachi Okamoto
To preface, Sword of Doom is in my top ten films of all time, so I'm going to gush a little here.
Samurai films, the good Samurai films, tend to be defined not by their action but by their characters inaction. Samurai are inherently violent figures, warrior lords in a country dedicated to strength and honour, and the best Samurai films frame that backdrop against the waning morality of their protagonists. To partake of violence, to become a part of the everyday brutality of life, is the conflict within Samurai films, not the clash of steel. Such is the case with Sword of Doom which plays almost like the 'gangster movie' version of a Samurai tale, it's protagonist a sociopathic savant with the blade and his antagonists the reflective, honour bound, characters that usually star in these sort of films. As such when Ryunosuke Tsukue (played with genuine menance by Tatsuya Nakadai) acts the results are often horrifying rather than gratifying. He's a primal force of nature, setting out to kill and maim rather than achieve honour. He's a character who is spoiling for a fight and so it makes his inaction, and almost terror, during the assassination of Shimada Toranosuke (the towering Toshiro Mifune) that much more interesting. Tsukue is a destructive force, pure sociopathy, and yet even he is rendered inert by the spectacle of Mifune at his prime.
The scene plays out like an archetypal Samurai moment, Toranosuke is ambushed on a snowy night by a couple of dozen men (including Tsukue, who holds back) they charge at him first in ones and twos (such is the way with movies) and he dispatches them effortlessly. Panicked the entire group attack at once and the stoic Toarnosuke becomes a storm of energy, with the camera watching in almost stunned revery as he destroys his attackers. It's a moment of cinematic bliss in a film packed with iconic moments.
You can see a few moments from the fight in this trailer
Beautiful cinematography and some excellent stunt work.
About the first 5 min or so of this clip (could only find it in English dub, sorry):
I'm not a big fan of Yimou's later stuff, but I remember being blown away by the visceralness of the last twenty minutes of Curse of the Golden Flower. It's amazing, and brutal. Really excellent pick.
