Greatest Action films of All Time?

[AffectionateDan]

THAT reminds me...

There was a great film back in the late 60's/early 70's, called simply, "Duel". I *think* it was one of either Spielburg's or Lucas's first few movies before they made it big. Good action for the day, and very suspenseful. Dennis Weaver (used to love "McCloud" back then, too) versus the mysterious truck driver in cowboy boots. Good flick.

 

[BigJim]

Stock footage from that movie was used in an Incredible Hulk episode called Never Give A Trucker An Even Break. (The one where David Hulks-out in a phone booth.)

 

[Ticklebell]

Aagh! My guy friends made me watch Duel once. I wanted to put my head through a wall! I can't take the tension! I just can't! Mwah!
-Bell

 

[CurtWild]

fist of legend
return of the dragon
drunken master 2
die hard 1
once upon a time in china(1,2,4)
commando

i hate threads like this....my mind always goes blank😀

 

[TklDuo-Drew]

Did anyone mention "Breakdown" with Kurt Russell or "The Hitcher" with Rutger Hauer?
Those were both two good ones.

Drew

 

[buggs]

Die Hard 1 and Die Hard With A Vengance (3). I don't consider Die Hard 2 to be a true Die Hard movie. Renny Harlin really f'ed it up in my opinion. John McTiernan was supposed to direct it, but he was finishing up work on THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER. He had a few weeks of post prodution left, and the producers didn't want to wait. I honetsly would have loved to have seen a John McTiernan Die Hard 2. I think the acting would have been more believable, the action would have been fast and furious with that touch of implied realism that McTiernan does so well, and the script would have been much more polished. In short, it would have been light years ahead of what we instead got. Here's to wishfull thinking.

 

[buggs]

Duel was spilbergs first television movie assignment after doing a few episodes of Night Gallery. He shot it like a movie and it was so good for it's time that it created an instant buzz. A side note, when the truck finally goes over the cliff at the end, and when the shark in jaws sinks to the bottom after being blown up and it's fin emerges from the bloody water have the same sound effect in it. Spielberg liked a tyranosaurus rex scream from some low budget movie and used it in both occasions. Also , the hulk used alot of stock footage from their movies in their TV shows, and The Hulk saw alot of that. On the episode wiht the Hulk on the 747 airplane, most of that was lifted from Airport 75. This was common before computer special effects came along in the 90's and shows could make their own effect. I remember the episode of Knight Rider where Micheal was using explosions to stop the raging water from a damn that had just burst. Micheal had to jump the car from one side of the massive ravine to the other. You see the car speed to the edge of the cliff, then a shot of Superman from Superman 1 flying from one side of the ravine to the other, and kit landing on the other side.

 

[buggs]

Oops. I almost forgot my other pick for biggest action film of all time. Well it was a movie within a movie. In the 70's there was a comedy movie released called DRIVE IN. It was a comedy, kind of like Porky's, but it took place one night at a local drive in when they where popular. I can't recall off the top of my head, but I think the movie they were watching was either called DISASTER 75 or 77. Let me see if I can remember the events that happened in it in chronological order as the movie kept cutting back from the actual movie to "Disaster". First a 747 is hijacked, and the hijackers fly it into the newly built largest building (This was way 1 1/2 decades before 9-11. It was a spoof of the current disaster movies that had come out in years prior.), and the building catches on fire and all the people are trapped in it trying to escape. Then a roller coaster goes off its tracks and this starts a massive earthquake, which sinks all of California. AT the end, the sheriff, who seems to be the only one who survived the sinking, is floating out in the middle of the ocean. A shark starts chasing him and he has this furious race to beat the shark to a little island that is the last remains of California. He makes it to shore alive and stands on the beach, scanning the small island (it was really small and had one coconut tree in the middle of it like all the clichés) and he says "Whelp. I guess I better start rebuilding humanity". The movie ends with a long helicopter shot leaving the island as he just stands on it, in the middle of the ocean. I also recall (I saw this movie 1 time when I was 7 at a drive in so forgive me for my recall) that the same sheriff was on the plane that crashed, and in the building when it was burning, and on or near the roller coaster when it went off the tracks, and running through LA during the earthquake. That makes Disaster the greatest action movie of all time, and that sheriff the most kick ass action hero ever in my honest opinion.

Critics panned the movie, but they all loved “Disaster” and made note of it in their reviews. I think a few of them said that they had wished Disaster had been made into a full movie and released instead of DRIVE IN.

 

[buggs]

See I ain't making this up about drive in or Disaster &^

From a review

http://www.imdb.com/Title?0074433

'"Drive-In" is a B movie about a night out at the local drive-in. It's a comedy that isn't terribly funny with acting that is less than stellar. But there are two reasons to watch it anyway. One is the movie within the movie which is showing on the screen called "Disaster 76." It's a send up of all the disaster films of that era and is very funny. Maybe the filmmakers should have filmed that film instead.'

http://www.category.org/browse/video/161577/

"The main characters of "Drive-In" were forgettable, but I'll NEVER forget "Disaster '76," the "movie" that's showing at the drive-in that's the subject of "Drive-In."

"Disaster '76" was a parody of every Seventies disaster movie from Jaws to Airport '75 to The Towering Inferno and more. "Campy" was an understatement.

If you're old enough to have suffered through Seventies disaster flicks (and maybe even if you're younger), you'll chuckle at the tacky special effects and deliberately bad scripting of "Disaster '76." I wouldn't be surprised if the writers of "Airplane!" (1980) found some inspiration in this earlier flick."

 

[buggs]

Oops. Damn me. Drive in was 2 1/2 decades ago. My bad.