posted
All right, out of all the movies you all know and love, which one has the best fight scene?
My favorite is the one at the end of Snatch, with Brad Pitt and that really, really big guy, because it was super macho and at least seemed realistic. It was also directed really well.
Posts: 2258 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Roddy Piper in the backstreet fight in They Live . Boards, knuckles and all in an attempt to put sunglasses on a guy.
Posts: 2848 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Although by modern standards it is cheesy I still like the swordfight at the end of the 1938 Robin Hood. For its time and history it was quite groundbreaking as an action movie.
Watching it recently it felt much more like a theater play than a movie, but I still liked it.
posted
I don't really have one favorite. Too many to choose from. I like the scene in Game of Death where Bruce Lee fights his student Kareem Abdul Jabbar. When Kareem lands a good kick on Bruce's chest, the footprint left on the shirt looks frickin' HUGE!
They Live is a fun action movie. Carpenter's The Thing is my favorite horror film. Alas, he's really gone downhill lately IMHO.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Escape From New York was another of Carpenter's classics and my overall favorite. Great fight and shootout scenes in it. And Snake Pliskin, what a great anti-hero.
Too bad they went to L.A.
Posts: 2848 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
The final swordfight between Tim Roth's character and Liam Neeson's in Rob Roy. Even though I knew how it would turn out, it was still cool. I can't believe no one's mentioned ANY fight scene in The Matrix yet.
posted
Ok...the Matrix. My favorite/unfavorite fight scene is the one in the old building between Morpheus and the agent...it's my favorite because it's cool, it's my unfavorite because of the bone-crunching sound effects. Makes you wince. ::winces::
Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
If anyone wants to know, the name of the song from the Snatch fight scene is "Fookin in the Bushes" by, believe it or not, Oasis. They need to start playing that before any huge football or basketball games as the players are running out on the field. Instant adrenaline. Pardon my french.
Posts: 2258 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Different age, but I think a classic fist fight is in the old John Wayne movie, The Quiet Man between Sean Thornton and Red Will Daneher.
Posts: 440 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
The sword fight scene from "The Princess Bride" between the dread pirate Roberts and Inego Montoya. "I know something you don't know, I am not left handed"
and the second one...
The last fight scene in "Fight Club" with Tyler Durden fighting "himself"
Posts: 172 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm a fight scene connoisseur, and a kung-fu movie fanatic. Here are my all-time top five, in no particular order:
**Bruce Lee vs. Ohara in Enter the Dragon It's short, but I've never seen anyone move as fast as Bruce did in that scene. His punches seem to hit before they were even thrown.
**Bruce Lee vs. Chuch Norris in Return of the Dragon The best thing Chuck has ever done in his life.
**Jackie Chan vs. Benny "The Jet" Urquidez in Dragons Forever Jackie himself prefers his fight with Benny in Wheels on Meals, but I think this one is far better. An absolutely phenomenal end to one of the best kung-fu movies ever made. The scene also features Yuen Biao doing the most jaw-dropping, pants-soiling acrobatic stunts ever captured on film, and Jackie's stunt team doing things that make your head bleed just watching them. It's such an amazing scene, I can't even describe it. If you haven't seen this movie, do it now. It will change your life.
**The final fight scene in Fist of Legend This movie is the reason that Yuen Woo Ping got hired to choreograph the Matrix, and if you watch it, you'll see why. Every fight scene in this movie is better than the last. And the final scene is phenomenal. The combination of Jet Li's skill and Woo Ping's imagination manifests itself as one of the most epic fight scenes ever. It just keeps going and going, and it never gets dull. I've seen the scene hundreds of times, and it still blows my mind.
**The courtyard fight in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Yuen Woo Ping does it again. Of course every fight scene in the film is brilliant, and it's difficult to choose between this one, the Yellow Hill fight, the restaurant scene, the Michelle Yeoh multi-weapon scene, and all the others. But the initial fight in the courtyard was my favorite. It's like they say about musicals... the best ones use the songs to tell the story, rather than pad the movie. This film did the same thing with kung-fu. Not only was this a flawlessly liquid, hypnotic fight scene, perfectly choreographed, performed and directed, but the moves told a story, and I felt like I understood the characters better from the way they fought. What's more, it was the only time I've ever seen a fight scene in the theatre that induced a spontaneous round of applause from the audience. Just perfect.
Okay, these are my favorite kung-fu fight scenes. I left out my favorite fight scenes of other genres, and many otherwise great kung-fu scenes as well, for the sake of brevity. Perhaps I'll come back later and finish it off.
posted
A different kind of fight scene- the battle between Gandalf and Saruman in The Fellowship of the Ring. This was the first magical fight I have seen that made me think Now that's what two wizards fighting would really look like!
posted
Okay, I forgot one. I've got another favorite, but it's a favorite for idealistic reasons rather than purely technical reasons. It's the final fight in Lethal Weapon IV.
See, one thing really bugs me about American action movies. A lot of times, people put American pretty-boys in the lead roles, and then they realize that they can create a crossover kung-fu draw by casting an amazing martial artist as the bad guy. It works just fine until the end, when they inevitably have to fight. They have to make the pretty-boy look heroic, even though everyone knows that in real life he'd get torn apart and eaten alive. So usually, the director decides to either make the antagonist suddenly and inexplicably fight far worse, or use cheap and unconvincing camera tricks to make it look like the protagonist is fighting better. Some of the many examples I can think of off the top of my head are The Quest (let's face it, Van Damme's a pansy, and everyone else in that movie could have killed him), and Grosse Point Blank (even though I liked the movie), where John Cusack fights Benny "The Jet" Urquidez, one of the best martial artists ever.
Anyway, after having seen all those movies, I was really shocked at how they handled the final fight in Lethal Weapon IV. Seems like the director actually realized that no one would believe that either of the leads could survive 5 seconds in a fair fight against Jet Li. So he gave up the idea of making them look heroic, and let them cheat. They ganged up on him. They used weapons. They hit him from behind. They stabbed him. Eventually they shot him with a machine gun. And in the next scene, they were sporting bandages and casts and walking with canes. It was still an amazing, exciting and dynamic fight scene, but it was really great to see it done with a sense of humor, and some respect for the antagonist. And just for that, I've always considered it one of the best fight scenes I've ever seen.
By the way, speaking of Jet Li, sure his Chinese movies were classics, but I really think he's done some good stuff in some of his American movies. At least the ones that he's choreographed with Cory Yuen. Although the movies themselves weren't that great, I really liked some of the action scenes in The One and Kiss of the Dragon.
posted
Book, I did want to know who did the song from Snatch, thanks. I'm shocked it was Oasis. That song would set the dead to tapping their feet. Unless they were Indian , then they'd be too depressed.
The reason film is my favorite art form is the way it can take the best out of music, dance, writing, acting. and visual art and combine them. Scenes like that where all of the different arts come together and just mesh are all too rare but are electrifying, mesmerizing, stunning. . .I'm going to watch for more stuff from Guy Ritchie. I still haven't seen Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm kinda with Jaxxon, except a different scene from FotR. My favorite fight scene is the scene between Gandolf and the balrog. I'd never read the book before, and it just killed me to see Gandolf fall. The scene had wonderful special effects, and was incredibly intense.
Thou shalt not pass!
Uh, if only Sir Ian McKellan was some 40 years younger and not gay. Posts: 701 | Registered: Jul 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
I don't think he said "thou," Belladona. I think that would have been just a little too KJV, ifya know what I mean.
Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think he simply said "You shall not pass!!" McKellan delivered it with such authority!
The wizard fight was way cool, but the Balrog scene was my favorite scene in LotR the movie, and one of my favorite parts in the book. I was so relieved the screenwriter left "Fly, you fools!" as is. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had changed it. Sometimes simplicity is the most eloquent form of expression. I often tend to overlook this in my writing, I need to watch that.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
The fight between King Arthur and the Black Knight in Monty Python's Holy Grail. "What are you going to do? Bleed on me?"
I'm only listing it because it was hilarious, and all the other ones I would have listed have already been listed by someone else.
Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sep 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
My favorite was the fight between the two women in Crouching Tiger. It just takes my breath away how amazing that fight is. I want the Green Destiny, its almost as cool as a light saber.
Speaking of which, the fight between Luke and Vader in RotJ would probably be up there pretty high on my list.
Also if you splice out the annoying kid accidently saving the planet, and the annoying alien acidentally killing a bunch of robots, the Darth Maul vs the two jedi was one of the best in my opinion. I'd also include the Yoda fight, but it was too short.
I'm gonna use this thread, and especially Speed's picks to get some cool rentals sometime soon .
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Vin Diesel giving Brucker a sound ass whooping in Knockaround Guys.
Edward Norton whipping his own ass in Fight Club.
Bruce Lee ripping Bob Wall a new one in Enter the Dragon.
Westley making Inigo look like he's standing still in Princess Bride, then choking out a very kind and fair minded Andre the Giant shortly thereafter.
Queen Latifah toe to toeing the racist white chick in Bringing down the House.
Arnold Schwarzenneggar pointing at Satan and saying "You think you're bad?! You're a choir boy compared to me! A ****ing CHOIR BOY!" in End of Days. (not a fight, but still awesome)
and of course, Bruce Lee's "fighting without fighting" in Enter the Dragon.
Posts: 2532 | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Gonna second Fist of Legend and the Darth Maul vs. Obi-Wam and Qui-Gon scenes. I got to see a large chunk of the latter acted out live and in person by the stuntmen involved and it was incredible. Ray Park is way cool.
The Princess Bride swordfight was just plain beautiful.
Gonna add two:
The swordfights in the first Highlander were great and Jackie Chan wins best use of props by a wide margin in the gang's hideout in Rumble in the Bronx.
Posts: 2112 | Registered: Sep 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
The brawl/war at the opening of Gangs of New York . Completely brutal, reasonably realistic and operatically shot.
Johnny Dep squaring off with the bad guys at the end of Once Upon a Time in Mexico . He's crazy, he's blind... but it was just shot and performed with such glee that it carried.
That is, of course, in addition to the wonderful fight scenes already mentioned.
In the category of LEAST BELIEVABLR FIGHT SCENE that was still a load of fun to watch, I nominate the first time Charlie's Angels fought Crispin Glover in the first Charlie's Angels movie. To the tune of 'Smack my bitch up'. It was wild and funny and utterly unbelievable.
I can't really place it now, but I seem to remember a really believable fight scene where the combattants could barely stand up and still kept trying to smack on each other. Eventually crawling towards each other and stuff. I'll think of it later.
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote: Jackie Chan wins best use of props by a wide margin in the gang's hideout in Rumble in the Bronx.
That may be my favorite Chan fight. I love the way anything in his environment becomes a lethal weapon in Chan's hands. He could probably kill me with a dust mite, pine needle or whiffle ball
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
The stickfight between Robin Hood and Little John in Men in Tights, when the sticks keep breaking in half and they resort to thwacking each other on the hand with a six-inch length of wood.
posted
Hero (Jet Li, Zhang Ziyi, Tony Leung...) - the fight scenes in this movie are so fluid and dance-like. They are arguably even better than Crouching Tiger (I still can't decide).
Fight Club - the fight in the basement with Edward Norton beating the blond guy. The office scene of him beating himself up was also pretty good.
Posts: 99 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Dang. People mentioned almost all the right ones before I could inform you of them. But for those of you who are curious to know if you were right or not:
Jackie Chan's Rumble in the Bronx and Dragons Forever. (Nod to Analog Kid, who mentioned some other good ones, and Speed, who mentioned some other great ones.)
Roddy Piper's fight in the alley from They Live. (Kudos do Sopwith, who rocks. I reccomend you do a landmark.)
The ladies' fight in the hall with all the different weapons in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. (Good judgement on the part of Xavier.)
However, you have all missed the final scene from Kung Pow: Enter the Fist. Go back and study some more.
Posts: 1894 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Blushing]](graemlins/blushing.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
.
![[ROFL]](graemlins/rofl.gif)
