Top 10 Movie Fights

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he mentioned kung-fu movies... and drunken master is a fine representation and one of the best of the genre.

I am a huge fan of Hong-Kong movies, wu shu movies in particular and I have no problem with his explanation. If you read the opening qualification you can understand why he did it... and b/c he explained it clearly I have no issues with the dearth of kung-fu.
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Note where I said "of all the kung fu movies." Drunken Master was good but there are a plethora of other fights that are better than that one. The second to last fight in "Fist Of Legend." in particular. That scene in drunken master was not even the best of that movie.

I mean its a top ten fight list and John McClane vs Hans from Die Hard is not in it but Gandolf from lord of the rings is. The Baboon vs the Hyenas in "The Lion King" was better than that.


As for the people saying matrix didn't sell the hits and they were robotic movements. They were meant to come off in that fashion.

Transporter 2 - Fire Hose fight (Man wasn't that original)
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No Corey Yuen did it before or something similar in another one of his movies. Can't remember off the top of my head.
 
I am reminded of the James Bond series fights. I remember the one in "From Russia with Love" where Bond fights the big tough blond guy (Donovan Grant was his character) in the private sleeping room on the Orient Express. At the time (1963) it was intense, but I wonder today with all the fighting that has gone on since whether it still has the impact?

Scott
 
Guys, you need to go back and watch some of these fights again with a critical eye. I love the old westerns, the old samurai flicks, the old kung fu flicks, all of them. But I was not ranking fights thinking, "Well, at the time is was pretty sweet." I was thinking, "How does this look today?" A lot of those old fights look pretty damn ridiculous now. I was as surprised as everyone else to see all the top 10 come from fairly modern movies. Just know that I did not just sit and write this list down in an afternoon. The towering stacks of DVDs blocking all the doorways of my house can attest to that (which reminds me...some of those are probably due back.)

Also, keep in mind that if it was predominantly a gun fight, it was not considered. Top 10 Gun Fights is being kicked around, and that list would definitely have some older movies in it.

Everyone has their favorites and you can't please everyone, so I think it's great that you guys are listing them here.

Keep 'em coming.
 
I have to agree with Travis on this one, and not just because I'm his boss. Some of these old movies just don't hold up as well as you might think. From Russia with Love is a good example. I thought the fight scene was great when I first saw it, and it's still good, but it's just not quite good enough to make my top 10 list -- or Travis' for that matter.

Anothewr example is the Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris fight in Way of the Dragon. Seriously, go back and watch this one. It was great in its day and is still very influential, but after seeing some of the amazingly choreographed fights scene of modern film, it looks incredibly dated. Plus, the whole ripping Chuck's chest hair was nasty. And what was with that stupid cat!

Howeva...one fight that isn't dated at all is Flash Gordon vs. Baron in the ultra cheesy Flash Gordon. Wips, retracting spikes, and a tilting platform hovering over an abyss. What more could you ask for?
 
Howeva...one fight that isn't dated at all is Flash Gordon vs. Baron in the ultra cheesy Flash Gordon. Wips, retracting spikes, and a tilting platform hovering over an abyss. What more could you ask for?
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I can't believe I forgot that one.
 
I have to agree with Travis on this one, and not just because I'm his boss. Some of these old movies just don't hold up as well as you might think. From Russia with Love is a good example. I thought the fight scene was great when I first saw it, and it's still good, but it's just not quite good enough to make my top 10 list -- or Travis' for that matter.

Anothewr example is the Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris fight in Way of the Dragon. Seriously, go back and watch this one. It was great in its day and is still very influential, but after seeing some of the amazingly choreographed fights scene of modern film, it looks incredibly dated. Plus, the whole ripping Chuck's chest hair was nasty. And what was with that stupid cat!
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The Bruce vs. Chuck fight scene dated? Two uber martial artists in their prime. No special effects, no props, no confusing camera angles or hyperactive editing. Sure the fight was choreographed, but the skill and technique displayed was extraordinary. To the uneducated, it has to be watched in slow motion to be truly appreciated. Everything before and after pales by comparison.

I'm a fan of chop sockey, Kung Fu movies. I enjoy them immensely. Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Hero, Fearless and the like are very entertaining. I appreciate the talent and imagination that went into them. But with a lot of their fights scenes I come away with the feeling that I've just viewed an exhibition or demonstration, not a fight.

I'd like to think that great fight scenes are like great movies, they'll stand the test of time. Movies like the Seven Samurai, Citizen Kane and Casablanca will always be considered in the upper echelon of movies no matter what the era. I agree with some of the fights on your list but others will be small footnotes in the annals of celluloid fights. Forgotten easily. Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris will live large forever.

Some of my favorite fight scenes that weren't mentioned.

Takeda Sensei vs. Kinjo in The Hunted
Musashi Miyamoto vs. Kojiro Sasaki in Samurai III
Zach Mayo vs. Sgt. Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman (This one is a guilty pleasure. I got drug into this chick flick and the only thing I remembered about it was the fight scene. :lol: )

I didn't care for the fight scenes in Blade II or later iterations of the Matrix. Too much CGI. I thought Spidey vs. Doc Ock should be excluded from the list because of judicious use of CGI on both characters during their fight. Don't get me wrong, I love CGI for super hero movies. I'd love to see super hero movies shot entirely in CGI. IMO, nothing came closer to the visual approximation of comic super powers as the Incredibles did.
 
Zach Mayo vs. Sgt. Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman (This one is a guilty pleasure. I got drug into this chick flick and the only thing I remembered about it was the fight scene. :lol: )
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Man that was a great fight. While most new movie fights are flashier and better choreographed they lack something that some not so flashy movies had. Take the above fight for instance while watching it I could feel every punch that pretty boy Richard received.
Fight club was great in that aspect too.
 
I did like that fight in Goldeneye. It was one of the first Bond fights that was a little sloppy. Speaking of Bond, I do like the fights in Casino Royale going down the stairwell, but mostly because I love seeing Bond stand up with a torn up tuxedo splattered in blood. THAT is an image we've never seen before.
 
The fight scenes listed in the article included some fairly improbable sequences - "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" being the most egregious (yes I liked the movie). I found half of the movies listed to be just lame. They also deviated from 300 which was certainly a war movie, while the included clips were one on one combat sequences. I would suggest considering (in no particular order):

1) The entrance of Daniel Day Lewis into the ambush scene of "Last of the Mohicans" - the kill ratio of native Americans against the Colonial and Europeans in the Seven Years War was on the order of the 26:1 in favor of the indigenous Americans. Tomahawks, knives and muskets rule!

2) “Band of Brothers” (technically not a movie), the hugely under strength Easy Company’s D-Day assault on a German Artillery position is more in the line of 300 as an accurate historical representation of a historical battle. Exciting, historically accurate, demonstrated modern small unit infantry tactics, and a phenomenal bit of filmmaking.

3) Russell Crowe in “Gladiator”. The first gladiatorial combat scene in Rome with chariots was unbelievable. If your heart was not in your throat – you’re dead!

4) “The Matrix”, a very hot Carrie-Anne Moss cleaning house on unsuspecting police and escape from the agents.

5) LOFTR, Boromir’s death – exceptionally well choreographed and filmed, plus great music.

6) “The Last Samurai”. I do not know how this movie was not included in your list. Tremendously well done with lots and lots of good combat sequences. No chop suey martial arts in this one! Tom Cruise taking on multiple armed thugs – phenomenal!

7) “Kingdom of Heaven” – lots of good individual fight sequences in this flick.

8) The final Darth Maul in “Star Wars” scene was indeed great.

9) “Top Gun” – mixing it up a bit with aerial combat.

10) “Unforgiven” you have to have a Clint Eastwood Western - guns or no guns - period.
 
6) “The Last Samurai”. I do not know how this movie was not included in your list. Tremendously well done with lots and lots of good combat sequences. No chop suey martial arts in this one! Tom Cruise taking on multiple armed thugs – phenomenal!
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Probably because it has Tom Cruise in it, and it's fashionable at the moment to make fun of Tom. Doesn't means he's a bad actor though (Jerry Maguire springs to mind).
 
Probably because it has Tom Cruise in it, and it's fashionable at the moment to make fun of Tom. Doesn't means he's a bad actor though (Jerry Maguire springs to mind).
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Agreed. He was quite good in Magnolia and Collateral as bad guys, which is why I thought he'd be a decent choice for Ozymandias in the Watchmen movie.
http://omidr.typepad.com/twitchblog/2007/03/i_just_read_an_.html

And just to let you know, Grindhouse has a couple of really good fight scenes in it (one in each movie). Stay tuned for that review...
 
Probably because it has Tom Cruise in it, and it's fashionable at the moment to make fun of Tom. Doesn't means he's a bad actor though (Jerry Maguire springs to mind).
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It is fashionable to make fun of EVERYONE in "hollywood"! As a group, actors are the least well educated (yet most outspoken), the biggest substance abusers, and arguably most unethical "profession" in America.

You can take Tom Cruise any way you desire, but the rest of the cast of the "The Last Samurai" was superb. The Samurai were certainly the Japanese counterpoint to the Spartan warriors in terms of persuit of excellence in arms. Consider:

Ken Watanabe (Katsumoto) defined the role of a warrior leader.

Hiroyuki Sanada (Ujio) just bad to the bone. A warrior's warrior. This character would spit out Bruce Lee.

Shin Koyamada (Nobutada) again excellent portrayal of the warrior ideal.
 
It is fashionable to make fun of EVERYONE in "hollywood"! As a group, actors are the least well educated (yet most outspoken), the biggest substance abusers, and arguably most unethical "profession" in America.
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So what about lawyers, marketers, politicians, the entire upper management of oil, tobacco, weapons and fast food companies...

As for least educated and most outspoken, I believe that actors would be pipped at the post by by Christian fundamentalists (although that's not really a profession).
 
So what about lawyers, marketers, politicians, the entire upper management of oil, tobacco, weapons and fast food companies...
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You pretty much know whom you are dealing with when it comes to lawyers, politicians and marketers. I do take issue someone under forty today who screams: “I’m fat because McDonalds forced me to eat those whoppers!” or “Phillip Morris shoved that cigarette in my mouth, now I have cancer!” Sorry, I am not a communist and between the freely available health studies and public education on these issues there is a level of individual responsibility - people need to account for themselves here.

Going after “Weapons” are also a tough sell for me. Switzerland has universal conscription, and pretty much every Swiss male has his weapon and ammunition (including belt fed light crew served weapons) in his home. Somehow the Swiss manage not to slaughter themselves like we do in the USA, nor did crime or warfare start when the musket was invented. People kill other people pretty effectively with knives, clubs, spears etc. If you look at the FBI statistics from 1928, when they started recording national data, to date, the violent crime and murder rate in the USA remained pretty flat and was comparable to Europe, until the late 1960s when it skyrocketed to about five times the 1929 rate. Yet firearm ownership in the USA as a percentage was higher in the first half of the last century as the population was: predominately rural, hunting was more common, and boys were taught marksmanship in the boy scouts. Gun control laws are not the principal factor in reducing the murder rate over the last 15 years. The facts is that we in the USA hired almost three times as many police, and now incarcerate people at a rate five times greater than we did in the 1930s.

As for least educated and most outspoken, I believe that actors would be pipped at the post by by Christian fundamentalists (although that's not really a profession).
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Rubbish. Not only are Christian fundamentalists not a profession, they individually have nothing approaching the conduit for their message, the finances to carry that message, or the influence of the media industry; at least not in the USA. And it is hard to make the case that some bible thumper telling your kid to abstain from sex, booze and drugs, is doing more damage than the example of Morton Downey getting busted (again) for drugs, Winonna Rider shop lifting, Woody Harrelson punching out (insert name here), let alone the string of broken families, “casting couch” feminist hypocrites (outspoken women’s right advocates who sleep around to get their job), etc. …
 
Someone mentioned Top 10 gunfights...

The first thing that came to mind..."I'm your Huckleberry..." Think I'm going to go home today and watch that movie. It's been awhile since I seen it.

If you have no idea where that quote came from, you've never seen the best western for my generation. of course...that's just my opinion.
 
If you have no idea where that quote came from, you've never the best western for my generation. of course...that's just my opinion.
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Indeed, a good movie. Although I'd put Unforgiven up there as well for best western of our generation.
 
The first thing that came to mind..."I'm your Huckleberry..." Think I'm going to go home today and watch that movie. It's been awhile since I seen it.

If you have no idea where that quote came from, you've never the best western for my generation. of course...that's just my opinion.
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Hell yes. But what's your preference: the O.K. Corral shootout or the duel between Holliday and Ringo? I'm going with the O.K. Corral. Simply brilliant.
 
Ok....I'll rephrase my statement.

Tombstone and Unforgiven are two of the best westerns for our generation.


Shootout at the O.K. Corral definitely. However, the dialog between Holliday and Ringo can't be forgotten.
 
Tombstone and Unforgiven are two of the best westerns for our generation.
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"Open Range" belongs in this group as well. Robert Duvall and Kevin Costner are great in the final gunfight, and Costner's "reply" (a headshot) to the thug that says, "Yeah I shot him ..." was, well fantastic.
 
"Open Range" belongs in this group as well. Robert Duvall and Kevin Costner are great in the final gunfight, and Costner's "reply" (a headshot) to the thug that says, "Yeah I shot him ..." was, well fantastic.
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Great call. "Open Range" is highly underrated. Not a lot of action but the suspense builds and builds until the amazing showdown at the end. Nothing fancy, just a great, great Western shootout.
 
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