15. “Outlaw King” – Final Battle
It’s a scene almost guaranteed to appear in David Mackenzie’s “Outlaw King,” wherein Chris Pine’s would-be king stands in front of his severely outnumbered army, looking for words of confront, as they stare down Edward II (Billy Howle), his vastly superior warriors and their impending death. After a series of small skirmishes in which Pine’s outlaw attempted to take back the Scottish land castle by castle, the two forces finally meet. Bruce (Pine) looks at his soldiers and declares “today we are beasts.” What follows, the ten-minute climatic battle, is anything but noble. The Battle of Loudoun is a realistically dirty, muddy, and disorienting affair, as Edward’s troops gallop towards Bruce’s, only to realize that Bruce’s army has hidden pikes in ditches, cutting off their frontal assault. As horses fly the air and men are impaled right and left, Mackenzie captures the confusion, as Bruce’s soldiers fight on all sides, often overwhelmed by the sheer amount of bodies in close proximity to each other. When Edward and Bruce finally do square off, well after Edward’s army has retreated, it’s a slow and arduous battle, both men heaving and they attempt to gather strength for another blow. Unlike other battle scenes, Mackenzie shows how tiring the process of rebellion is. While Bruce’s victory finishes the film, he and the audience are exhausted knowing this isn’t the end and the threat of war is always relentless. – Christian Gallichio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05gGgejyfmo
14. “Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse” – The Last Act + The Fight At Aunt May’s House.
At this point you’ve probably heard that ‘Spider-Verse’ is arguably the best superhero movie of the year (out of a staggering nine of them) and the best Spider-Man movie to hit the screen and this is not wrong. It’s subversive, irreverent, meta and yet nails the heart of Spider-Man. It also features some breathtaking, groundbreaking, next-level animation. To cheat a little bit, there’s at least two spectacular action sequences in ‘Spider-Verse,’ one, where the Spider-Verse team (six characters, including Spider-Ham) face off against six of the Kingpin’s henchmen including the Prowler, Dr. Octopus and more and utter mayhem ensues inside Aunt May’s house much to her chagrin. The other is the ending finale where Miles Morales takes on Kingpin to the death. Both are drastically different, the house fight is outrageous comedy and pandemonium and the ending is visually bonkers, a kaleidoscopic psychedelic extravaganza as Kingpin and Spidey fight while the universe is imploding with stereoscopic revelry and grandeur worthy of ‘Space Odyssey’-like consideration. ‘Spider-Verse’ is astonishing and these two sequences alone should leave your eyes popping and your brain buggin’. – RP
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uTzY8cTQaI
13. “Roma” – The Riot
Alfonso Cuarón’s “Roma,” a sincere masterpiece, is not an action film in any way, shape, or form. But this being Cuarón, we should’ve expected a little genre-bending in his memory-driven drama about his upbringing in Mexico City and the woman who raised him. In an emotionally pivotal moment in the film, we’re shown the rumblings of the 1968 deadly student riots while a few of our central family members, including Cleo the beloved caretaker, shop for furniture. At first, Cuarón sets the vantage up from the second floor of the shop to show the rush of students clashing with the oppressing forces and the increasing rush of alarm the audience and characters feel in unison. Something horrible is about to happen, everyone can feel it and nothing can be done about it. It’s a shocking image—this panic of students and rising tide of violence— if only for the number of extras used, but the orchestration is simply symphonic. Then the threat of violence spills into the furniture shop and beyond as Cleo and company try to escape. It’s all at once a rush of blood to the head and an upsetting jolt into a different film entirely. You aren’t spared from some of the carnage and fear of the moment, but it’s not entirely visually gruesome either. It’s nearly on par with the car assault in “Children of Men” for action scenes Cuarón has staged, and will leave you feeling just as shaken. – CW
12. “First Man” – The Opening Crash
Damien Chazelle’s claustrophobic, dire, and terrifying opening to “First Man” is viscerally tense and sets the stage for grueling sequences to come. Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) is testing an X-15 experimental aircraft which ends up flying too high and two-thirds of the way to the edge of space. The fight to bring it down to earth and then land it safely is is nail-biting and exhausting. Chazelle’s overwhelming and absorbing use of sound pulls you into the experience—perhaps one of his unsung aces up his sleeve throughout the whole movie—and the orchestration of tension is amazing. The increased heavy breathing communicates the consequences of failure setting in the tight shots in the cockpit, and the violent rattling of equipment all bleed together in one panicky experience. Chazelle brings an intimacy to terror as if you are there with Armstrong. The chaos shakes you, but the scariest moment arrives after the cacophony transforms into the silent dread of almost reaching the no man’s land of space. There’s harmony in those few moments, a taste of what’s to come. With Armstrong’s engine off and his altimeter increasing, your gut drops. Twisting the plane, he finds a way to descend, and the perilous landing becomes a kind of perverse reward from the near-escape of floating off into orbit. What’s wonderful about the sequence is how it sets the stage and tone of the film, showcasing a man constantly willing to push to the edges of death to get America deeper in the space race. It also acts as a fantastic hook for the audience, wondering what other crazy stunts Armstrong pulled before reaching the Moon. – Jason Ingolfsland
11. “Upgrade” – The Apartment Scene
On a purely technical level, there’s nothing in the incredible apartment fight scene from Leigh Whannell’s sci-fi action film “Upgrade” that you can’t see in a number of other films. But what this particular fight scene has that really elevates it above so many other action set-pieces is its storytelling. For those that missed the criminally-underrated Blumhouse film, “Upgrade” tells the story of a man out for revenge after his wife is murdered and he’s left paralyzed. He’s aided by an AI that takes over his body and allows him to walk. Oh, and STEM (the AI) allows him to become a one-man killing machine whenever our hero asks it to. Just watch actor Logan Marshall-Green’s face during the fight. He’s basically the audience, acting shocked, horrified, scared, and ultimately disgusted by the actions taking place once he allows STEM to do its thing. It’s at once a well-choreographed and shot scene (camera tricks and lighting give a normally bland environment an edge) but also disturbingly funny and a perfect encapsulation of the film’s tone. “Upgrade” isn’t the best film of the year, but this apartment fight scene says/does more in two minutes than any Gerard Butler-starring, generic action flick can do in two hours. – Charles Barfield
