Movies That Were Probably Made By a Spasm of Six Year-Olds on Acid: The Top 75 Action Films Poll Results Thread

so it begins

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#75

APOCALYPTO

Mel Gibson
2006
United States
(156 points, 4 votes)

Saw this the other night. Thought I was going to be bored because the capture scene went on a bit, but as it got going it ruled. The city scene is amazing. Costumes deserved triple oscars. Those people with the elaborate headdresses and shaved foreheads!

― Beth Parker

yeah so this basically fucking ruled. I watched it through twice yesterday, once with commentary. gibson is, uh, kind of a crypto-bigot, wow.

― El Tomboto

I just thought it was funny that mel could only remember like three of his actors' names from the whole movie. I mean he did remember a lot of details about so many of the people who worked on the film but clearly in his brain everybody was probably pedro 1, pedro 2, frank, pedro 8, carlito, pedro 26, fast pedro, old pedro, etc.

― El Tomboto

I checked this out of the library and watched it the other night, up to the point where the hero escapes and clambers through the pit of corpses. Right there I could see the entire remainder of the film would be an extended chase scene, so I bailed out.

Mel's POV as a writer and director is simple, simple, simple. The whole plot could be written on a napkin. However, the costumes for this film were utterly, jaw-droppingly fabulous! I can't rave enough about the costumes. The set design, cinematography and editing were all pretty darn good, too, but the costumes were mesmerizing. Loved 'em all.

Bottom line: I still couldn't finish watching the movie. Too reductive and too predictable.

― Aimless

Mel Gibson's APOCALYPTO!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v212/etienne_saint/apocalypto.jpg

lol nice title

luv apocalypto

kinda like digging a chris brown album at this point, but, yeah, that was a good action movie.

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#74

INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM

Steven Spielberg
1984
United States
(157 points, 5 votes)

I'll defend The Temple of Doom as the closest Spielberg came in the series to recreating the absurdity of those Saturday afternoon adventures he loved.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn

first 20-30 mins of temple of doom are unimpeachable. rest of it... impeachable.

― s1ocki

I'm actually starting to rethink my anti-Temple of Doom stance. It's got some pretty intense moments...like the people being lowered into the lava pit has really creeped me out a time or two. And honestly the kid (I'm just gonna call him Data even though that wasn't his characters name in this, I'll always know that kid as Data) was not really that annoying at all. The blonde lady, on the other hand...
― nickalicious (nickalicious)

Indiana Jones LOVE thread

Rank the Indiana Jones Canon

mel gibson is a great artist and is not subject to your petty societal norms xp

Short...Short-something.

would think it would be lower, maybe? another good one though.

this thread is reminding me that recently got thru like half an end of the world movie on netflix and suddenly realized oh shit this is some christian shit! left behind got a lot to answer for.

SHORT ROUND

man why didn't I get my act together, Temple of Doom would have been on my ballot

<3 Ke "Jonathan" Huy-Quan <3

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#73

GOLDFINGER

Guy Hamilton
1964
United Kingdom
(159 points, 6 votes)

Pussy Galore. the best song. girl killed with gold paint. a guy with a blade in his hat. NO, MR BOND, I EXPECT YOU TO DIE! and only 112 minutes.

― Dr Morbius

Goldfinger isn't necessarily the "best" Bond film, but it's the only "good" one, if that makes sense.

― Chuck_Tatum

Goldfinger looks like such a dork in his golf outfit. The golf scene in the film is tedious, but in the book it's three chapters.

― Les centimètres énigmatiques (snoball)

which is the best James Bond movie?

Do you actually suffocate if all your skin is painted and sealed off from this oxygen-bearing world?

yes, if at the same time u do not breathe through your mouth/nose

i kinda like all the bond movies the same. pretty much. i don't love any of them though. they're all very entertaining.

i mean, i like john barry his own self more than any bond movie.

just crashed a helicopter when i saw that the results for this had started rolling out

under a bus.

whole riding a motorcycle.

while riding.

i didn't vote for a lot of recent stuff. sorry recent stuff! in 20 years i will i promise.

Seeing as how I'm quoted in the title of this thread, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that a couple of my favorite WTF THIS MAKES ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE movies made the list.

got lots of statham love and all that. who doesn't? love lots of recent stuff.

my list of recent stuff would be all milla/statham pretty much.

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#72

VANISHING POINT

Richard C. Sarafian
1971
United States
163 points, 5 votes)

Vanishing Point set the standard for anti-establishment chase movies. In my opinion, Kowalski is one of the great anti-heroes in American cinema. The blind soul funk brother DJ, the open road in the American West, the Dodge Challenger into the bulldozers. Badass.

― bryan

In contrast, Vanishing Point is a grindhouse exploitation film that thinks it's Camus on LSD, and the gap between its intent and actuality is massive. I don't mind grindhouse exploitation, but Vanishing Point is pretentious in the worst way possible - stupid convinced that it's smart.

― Edward III (edward iii)

Taking Sides: Vanishing Point vs. Two Lane Blacktop

Bond films basically ripoffs of Hitchcock's North by Northwest

ok

sadly that movie now just reminds me of the horrible band primal scream. thanks a lot, primal scream. i haven't seen it in years. existential road movies aren't really my thing anymore. though i really did enjoy deadhead miles recently.

http://www.snopes.com/movies/films/goldfinger.asp

Regarding the 'painted gold' thing: It's not true.

i'm not a good hipster cuz two lane blacktop always a bit boring to me. though yeah dennis and james look fab in it. the ultimate hipsters.

Vanishing point was my number one pick! I remember talking with a friend about two different movies that had all these different moments that made no sense being in the same film, and then we realized we were both talking about Vanishing Point, and none of the other party goers believed that such a movie existed.

Whenever I think that "TV wasn't actually that good back then", I remember I saw two lane blacktop, Vanishing Point and suchlike on good ol' ITV/BBC back in the days...

i should watch vanishing point again soon. it really has been since i was a teen.

psychomania. that's what they played late at night on t.v. all the time when i was a kid.

Vanishing point was my number one pick!

Are you sure Omar got your ballot? He didn't include # of #1 votes in the results info.

yes, if at the same time u do not breathe through your mouth/nose

it was your #3, AP!

surprised that temple of doom placed so low... also surprised to find myself voting it so high on my ballot. i guess when you have an opening like that the rest of the movie could have feature garfield and i would have voted it high

it was your #3, AP!

― omar little, Monday, February 13, 2012 11:13 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

everyone h8s temple of doom is my understanding

psychomania. that's what they played late at night on t.v. all the time when i was a kid.

And that one, yes!

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#71

DIRTY HARRY

Don Siegel
1971
United States
(165 points, 7 votes)

I have decided I need to see about adopting Inspector Callahan's no-cursing policy of dry sarcasm and cruel disregard for vanity as opposed to my usual sailorstyle shit fuck piss ass bitch banter (starting with muttering "swell" and "marvelous" when receiving, uh, new information).

― El Tomboto

Robinson couldn't fire a gun without screwing his eyes shut and flinching, so they had to stop filming and send him off to a shooting range for a couple of days. Even after that you can still see him blinking whenever he fires. His performance is excellent though, just the simple bit where he's walking across the rooftop tearing up the piece of newspaper does so much to establish that the character is evil.

― snoball

the first "dirty harry" at least is fantastic. i love that shot where the camera just flies back when harry finally confronts scorpio on the football field.

― J.D.

DIRTY HARRY

everyone h8s temple of doom is my understanding

― lag∞n, Monday, February 13, 2012 11:14 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

maybe i was the only one to vote for it

i went to the same school as andrew robinson! for a year. they had a framed picture of him in the school library. he's awesome. now and then.

o damn, its startin already! temple of doom i havent seen since i was a p small kid, but it was real scary to me back then...

i voted for two bond movies, but goldfinger wasnt one of them, but it's a good'un

you're picking great shots for the pics!

i had to check to make sure i didn't vote for all of the first three indiana jones movies but nope no temple, i can breathe easy

surprised that temple of doom placed so low... also surprised to find myself voting it so high on my ballot. i guess when you have an opening like that the rest of the movie could have feature garfield and i would have voted it high

haha this is so OTM

sorry for not voting ;_;

mad max 2 (aka the road warrior) placed didn't it? can't load the thread on my phone but surely.

and AF wow, sit down and watch jaws straight through, you are in for a TREAT. or wait for someplace to show it on the big screen and see it with an audience, it rules. french connection also with scheider and also great. neither one is really full on "action" movie but both classics. the one car chase in french connection is worth the whole movie, and you also get some great cat and mouse detective stuff, and hackman.

Road Warrior was #16. I suspect Fury Road would make the top 5. My guess would be it would have an okay shot at #1. And it might deserve it!

otm to both posts

FC is my favourite ever i think

also gotta say if you enjoy anything about schwarzenegger or OTT ridiculousness in an action movie, you will love commando. get a group of friends together and go to town. i think as a kid the box convinced me it was gonna be heavy and boring, and no aliens or sci-fi stuff to hook me in, but it's basically a quippy, silly, video game, complete with a string of mini-bosses on the way up to the big showdown. fair warning it also has possibly the highest body count of any movie in the whole list, and mostly all in the last like 20 minutes of the movie. he kills so many people!

yeah he does!

also fair warning, the dead people are almost all Henchmen Of A Central American Banana Republic Strongman, which probably qualifies on the racism trope-o-meter.

casting irish lads would have looked funny tbh

i mean ok but cmon but ok

Full list, for anyone who can't load the thread:

75 APOCALYPTO
74 INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM
73 GOLDFINGER
72 VANISHING POINT
71 DIRTY HARRY
69 (TIE) THE HURT LOCKER
69 (TIE) DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
67 (TIE) CON AIR
67 (TIE) BRANDED TO KILL
66 ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13
65 SIN CITY
64 INFERNAL AFFAIRS
62 (TIE) DEMOLITION MAN
62 (TIE) TAKEN
61 MAD MAX
60 JAWS
59 THE FUGITIVE
58 CASINO ROYALE
57 COLLATERAL
56 THE INCREDIBLES
55 ENTER THE DRAGON
53 (TIE) MIAMI VICE
53 (TIE) KUNG FU HUSTLE
52 GET CARTER
51 AKIRA
50 LA FEMME NIKITA
49 DISTRICT 9
48 TOTAL RECALL
47 THE WILD BUNCH
46 THE GREAT ESCAPE
45 COMMANDO
44 THE KILLER
43 THE FIFTH ELEMENT
42 SPEED
41 BULLITT
40 YOJIMBO
39 LE SAMOURAI
38 DAWN OF THE DEAD
37 TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A.
36 THE MATRIX
35 INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE
34 CRANK
33 THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK
32 THE BOURNE IDENTITY
31 THE WARRIORS
30 THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
29 THE BOURNE SUPREMACY
28 ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST
27 BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA
26 THE DARK KNIGHT
25 PREDATOR
24 POINT BREAK
23 BATTLE ROYALE
22 THE THING
21 KILL BILL VOL. 1
20 POINT BLANK
19 THE TERMINATOR
17 NORTH BY NORTHWEST
17 STARSHIP TROOPERS
16 THE ROAD WARRIOR
15 THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY
14 THE FRENCH CONNECTION
13 THE SEVEN SAMURAI
12 ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
11 HARD BOILED
10 BLADE RUNNER
9 LÉON: THE PROFESSIONAL
8 HEAT
7 RONIN
6 CHILDREN OF MEN
5 ROBOCOP
4 TERMAINTOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY
3 RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK
2 ALIENS
1 DIE HARD

I'm surprised at the poor showing of martial arts movies. They don't seem to have been ruled out, since Enter the Dragon is on the list.

there were definitely some in the nominees (see: TOP 100 ACTION FILMS OF ALL TIME NOMINATIONS AND DISCUSSION THREAD ) but they're swamped by stuff closer to the American Blockbuster Action Movie template...

big trouble in little china tbf

Okay, I guess I need to rep harder for Cobra as it ticks a lot of Dr. C's Commando boxes. It's the most ridiculous movie ever. The baddies are satanists who ritually clank fire axes together in an abandoned warehouse. Marion Cobretti is the most overly try-hard badass in history.

Couldn't find an uninterrupted clip of this scene, so you're missing the bit between these two clips when Cobra crams his newspaper inside a bbq grill and tosses his housekeys like a hardman in an attempt to impress all zero people who are watching him:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32sLgUoj91o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SxN_U2H0Xc

All to the tune of Miami Sound Machine. More like Camp-brah, amirite.

i love the OTT final monologue of the Night Slasher, what is he even talking about?

You want to go to hell? Huh, pig? You want to go to hell with me? It doesn't matter, does it? We are the hunters. We kill the weak so the strong survive. You can't stop the New World. Your filthy society will never get rid of people like us. It's breeding them! WE ARE THE FUTURE!

a layup for Cobra:

Marion Cobretti : No!
[aims his gun]
Marion Cobretti : You're history.

separately, i wanted to gauge ILX interest in a crime/thriller/mystery/detective/film noir poll. i don't think it's been done, it would cover all eras, etc...

there are a lot of films that i think slipped through this poll and some others that would be interesting to discuss in a rollout.

that could be cool! i was looking up lists of movies under that basic umbrella recently cause my friend wanted to do a "noir" marathon but they were feeling pretty broad-minded, at one point the shortlist included like, The Getaway and Sugarland Express alongside Midnight Run and Pierrot le Fou. unfortunately we got started late and only got through Chinatown and uh, Brick. anyway though i like it... pretty huge range of things to cover... could be cool, could be unwieldy, probably would be fun. i'd assume things like TLaDiLA and Le Samourai would qualify despite their 'action' placement...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wk-jT9rn-8

xp re Cobra, i love that Miami Sound Machine song.

totally down for a crime poll.

It's funny though how i think culturally Taken is the Neeson action film everyone talks about (understandably perhaps) while in the meantime every single non-Taken franchise action film he's made since is better.

True. I particularly liked Run All Night, A Walk Among The Tombstones, and The Grey. Haven't seen The Commuter yet.

This life's HARD man, but it's HARDER if you're stupid! aka CRIME/MYSTERY/THRILLER/NOIR movie POLL nominations thread

the William Friedkin poll

to live and die in la well discussed in this thread

I'd searched for Warrior with no results, then expanded the entire thread and ctrl+f'd every mention of "mad max" without Road Warrior showing up, so blame Americans for this I guess

yeah Fast Five is the real golden point of the Furiouses

AF: I thought I'd seen Jaws, because I knew every reference well enough to joke about it for decades, but watched a remaster in the cinema five years ago and realised that I'd just read some of the novel and all of the MAD magazine version when I was a kid. It's really good, definitely worth seeing with an audience

Crank is probably diminished bc its mostly shit sequel just tried to recreate it and go one up on everything without doing anything new, but the original is really smug and self satisfied and Statham I think is at his most unlikeable in these films.

this is crazytalk, Chelios is adorable (and tbh more of a real person than almost any Statham character). Spy is probably the only film he's better in? BUT: the biggest crazytalk is thinking that there was any way Crank 2 could possibly go OTHER than one-upping everything. And in fact they do plenty that's new in the course of that, like two characters transforming into kaiju of themselves in the middle of a fight scene.

its no 16 on the list

surely statham career-best in snatch

yeah but as Road Warrior, not Mad Max 2. outside the fold, there was no indication it placed

i had a lot of fun on this thread. back in the day.

i'm a bit Statham-agnostic, i think his brand of brute charisma has its charms but not all of the time. i'm completely down with any style or type of movie but Crank didn't work for me as well as it did on others, ultimately. my beef w/it is ultimately pretty limited, i won't argue much one way or another, not even for Crank: High Voltage which i just couldn't get w/whatsoever. i have no issues w/Crank placing, nothing in this poll for me is a total hard pass.

most Statham films are pretty empty, but he's got to do something to keep busy until Neveldine & Taylor win $113,000 on a scratch-it and make Crank 3 in a weekend with an iphone

ten years since we polled Statham!

hey, this guy knows what's up:

also, Crank 2 is in no way worse than Crank 1 - it just simply couldn't exist without the former, and is openly a distillation and exaggeration of the wondrousness of its predecessor. It is truly a tragedy that this was a box-office flop, and that we shall be denied the otherwise inevitable glory of CRANK 3-D.

― oh sh!t a ¯\⎝⏠___⏠⎠/¯ (sic), Thursday, July 15, 2010 10:35 AM

also day and knight is an unofficial mi imo

Fair.

I have seen most of Jaws, but I think it was something I was paying sporadic attention to as a callow youth, so I missed most/all of the build-up and only remember the gorier later bits.

Possibly similarly with Commado, or tbh I may just have watched a lot of "100 best Arnie lines!" Youtubes. My Arnie shame is clearly Total Recall, made all the worse by the fact that I have seen the remake (on a plane, mind).

I have a to-do item (on the "this list may see me out" list, mind) to catch up on all of these - I'm far more likely to get to it than the Comedy poll, for sure.

this is crazytalk, Chelios is adorable (and tbh more of a real person than almost any Statham character). Spy is probably the only film he's better in?

statham is an absolute fucking treasure in spy, i unironically love that guy

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

many xposts to Dr C but posting vmic I will say that Mad Max is a must-watch.
Especially if you have seen and/or enjoyed Fury Road.
If you’ve seen Fury Road then it is worthwhile bc Mad Max pulls off a similar level of vehicular intensity & creativity with absolutely no money & no cgi, just pure gonzo creativity. And Immortan Joe = the same actor that is Toecutter in Mad Max.

Though caveat: Mad Max is a no-budget 70’s movie and is paced as such. Lotta weird sidetracks (saxophone!) so it does have a bit of an Mst3k-fodder feel at times.

if i may counter in the interests of balance

mad max 2 is the movie you will recognise in fury road

mad max one is just an australian dildo biker gang documentary with little enough action

i'd always avoided it because i'd heard it starts with some horrible act of violence against his family or something?

yes, also SPOILER SPOILER a dog ;_;

ah no that doesnt happen til like an hour in

nothing at all happens before that

srsly its an interesting movie but it really isnt as marketed

it's true that max's family don't make it out alive (spoiler alert) but it's not a particularly graphic end iirc?

veg very much otm that mad max is both fantastic and also a bit of a victim of the circumstances of its shoestring production

mad max is kinda the proof-of-concept, mad max 2 is a phenomenally exciting sharpening of miller's vision, thunderdome is an odd, charming but undeniably inferior quasi-kids-movie and fury road is takes all the good parts of the previous three and turns them into the gleaming, machine-tooled apex of the whole thing

yep

also lotr villains spotting iirc

Touchez pas au Grisbi
Classes Tous Risques
The League of Gentleman
The Silent Partner
The Anderson Tapes
Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion
Milan Caliber 9
Cash on Demand

Wrong effing thread!

yeah bizarro otm

MM1 does show some pretty awful violence against women. Partly because it is an exploitation movie and partly because the story is intended to push Max beyond sanity in the worst ways imaginable. but it’s def not entirely a “fun watch”

i just dont like ppl skipping 1 and going straight to 2. it bugs me.

Has anyone put together a reel of all the scenes in Wild Bunch with the bunch just collectively laughing maniacally?

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, February 15, 2012 11:10 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i believe sam peckinpah did, it was called "the end of the movie the wild bunch"

― the jazz zinger (s1ocki), Wednesday, February 15, 2012 8:15 AM (six years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i lol hard every time i think of this post

I finally watched Red Dawn over the break (it's on Amazon Prime). Back when I was an actual spasming 6-year-old, I had seen tv commercials for the network premier of Red Dawn and gotten all worked up about it and my parents agreed to let me watch. But within the first few minutes when the teacher and all the students started getting killed, I was horrified and made them turn it off. This time around I made it all the way through! A very stupid movie, but kinda a blast.

it’s so bananas but a deep favorite

pour one out for William Friedkin #14 and #37 in our action poll, #1 in our uh hearts?
or cars, maybe.

https://imgur.com/dKJr4NV

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