The Greatest Action Movie EVER MADE Back In Print!

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Meh.

"The Road Warrior" is the best action flick ever. Guns, explosions, and the best ever car chase scene on film.
 
I don't like the crazy acrobatic action films. Crazy, gritty, knock-down action is what I like (think: the fight scene with the huge mechanic under the airplane in Indiana Jones: ROTLA) I like Die Hard because of the attitude, and the Americanness of the protagonist.

Never been a big fan of Asian action films. Their violence seems to be devoid of a certain quality of moral determination usually present in a decent US action film.
 
Woo is NOT overrated.

John Woo is an artist. He took elements from opera, dance, theater, and action to create some of the most memorable moments in action movie history, period. Some discredit him for his over-the-top gunplay, the unrealistic shooting, or the doves even for that matter; but the fact remains that with movies like Hard Boiled, the Killer, and A Better Tomorrow, he paved the way for modern action today and didn't even stop to reload once.
 
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John Woo is an extremely talented and innovative artist and I can appreciate that is his work.

I just like more wizards and dragons in my fantasy movies and less magic in my action movies. My personal preference is for action movies that don't depart too far from the way things work in the real world. I don't like working too hard to suspend my disbelief.
 
Just watch a Chinese martial arts movie, and Hard Boiled will seem pretty realistic. People fly around, for gosh sakes.

Woo does make use of unusual camera shots, visual effect and other techniques that makes his stuff different. Wind Talkers is probably his most 'realistic' movie to date.

If you want realism, Hollywood (and it's internatiuonal analogues) is probably the wrong place to look. Reality is actually pretty boring.
 
The problem I have with most action flicks, all of them, is the way firearms are portrayed. People who are not gun owners and have no real life knowledge of guns see the gun fights in these movies and think thats how it is in reality. For example, people getting shot and flying 20 feet backwards through a plate glass window just doesn't happen in reality, but it happens all the time in action movies. Also, the poor/unsafe gun handling in most of these movies just drives me crazy. I used to like action movies when I was a teenager, but then I grew up.
There are few action movies I like anymore, in fact I can't really think of any at the moment, but I'm sure there are a few I'd like, this one is not one of them.
 
Been there, done that. You can get fixated on trigger control, presentation and realism, but you won't have much fun. And this point I've done a 180 in my whole approach to movies. I don't really want to see real shootouts on screen, at least not in a fun action film. They're horrific things. And after awhile you realize even realistic film shootouts such as "Heat" as full of cinematic trickery and drama as anything from a John Woo supercop showdown. You have to get over it and stop nit picking. These are just MOVIES. Once you get over the hangups, you can appreciate them on their own merits. I know perfectly well shotgun shells don't blow cars up, but it's still extremely cool. "Hard Boiled" takes out all the stops. Yes, it's melodramatic. It's in a long tradition of melodramatic Hong Kong crime drama. No, the heroes aren't American and they only use English to curse each other. Just open your mind and go with it.
 
Cosmo, you and most others here(hopefully everyone here)on THR know the difference between how guns are portrayed in the movies and how they really work in reality. The problem is many people don't know the difference. I've met plenty of people who think that shotguns can blow up cars, and that people go flying through the air when they get shot because of what they see in these movies and on TV. It tends to make some of these people anti-gun because they think firearms are way too powerful to be in the hands of us lowly civilians. The unsafe gun handling is dangerous when people who are new to firearms try to emulate their favorite action movie hero because they don't bother to get any real training. I've also met some of these people, and I've helped some of them. Its pretty sad when a young person who is new to firearms only knows what he saw in a movie, instead of from a parent or other positive role model.
 
John Woo is an artist. He took elements from opera, dance, theater, and action to create some of the most memorable moments in action movie history, period. Some discredit him for his over-the-top gunplay, the unrealistic shooting, or the doves even for that matter; but the fact reamains that with movies like Hard Boiled, the Killer, and A Better Tomorrow, he paved the way for modern action today and didn't even stop to reload once.
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I'm Chinese American, in the early '90s, I heard there were incredible action movies directed by Woo starring Chow Yun Fat, so I sat down with other Chinese friends and watched A Better Tomorrow, we thought it was pretty bad-but we made excuses for him like "Well, American action movies from that period weren't too good either ",etc. Then we watched The Killer ( pretty overrated in my opinion) and Hard Boiled, Hard Boiled is the best of the three.
It's interesting that many people call Woo an artist, I find him somewhat "slobbish", and not really capable of cool amazing iconic imagery- he always repeats the same type of corny shots-running, diving, 2 handed pistol shooting, spinning around, doves, characters pointing guns at each others heads, and Mexican standoffs. None of it looks particularly cool, imho.
Now, some might laugh, but I thought MI:2 had some of his best imagery, and was fairly well paced and choereographed-hated that dumb motorcycle duel though, lol.
 
You can get fixated on trigger control, presentation and realism, but you won't have much fun.
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Cosmoline, you're forgetting: This is the int3rtub3z, which makes it very serious business. Fun isn't allowed here, and we must nitpick the most mundane details of any movie.

We must all have our serious faces on. -> :fire::fire::fire::fire::fire:
 
I dunno

as far as I am concerned, you cant get much more graphic and fun than the Wild Bunch....

Love that film.

That's my vote.
 
Band of Brothers is my favorite, though not really a film as such. There are gun flubs in it to be sure, but not one freaking spark off of a hit of a bullet allegedly striking flesh.

I'll give Woo some points for influence, but several directors way outclass him in staging action scenes involving guns.
 
I'll give Woo some points for influence, but several directors way outclass him in staging action scenes involving guns.
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Do realize that his HK stuff was done on budgets that, but Hollywood standards, are considered peanuts.

He didn't have the ability to spend months of pre-production time storyboarding everything out just so.

Also, the sparks from the "bullet hits" are actually the detonations from the squibs being set off. Again, even with something as big as Hard Boiled, they probably didn't have the ability to do very many re-takes of each scene.
 
I thought I was gonna see one of those nutty 'Crouching Tiger' type stuff, with people hopping 20ft into the air for no apparent reason.
Looks interesting. Fun to watch, anyways.
 
Im just curious, has anyone seen the Boondock Saints? 2 Catholic irish brothers who kill everyone in the Boston Mafia (and a cat) with the same 2 silenced pistols. If you havnt seen it then you probably havnt heard of it and it has the best use of dark humor Ive ever seen in a movie. Once you see it a few times of course, the irish brothers have thick accents. Not to mention an ending scene I want to make a room dedicated to. As a matter of fact, think Ill watch it right now
 
Cosmoline said:
"Man on Fire"? I think you're smoking something. And "Heat" is a drama, not an action flick.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama
"Drama is a literary form involving parts written for actors to perform. It is a Greek word meaning 'action'..."

Cosmoline said:
These are just MOVIES. Once you get over the hangups, you can appreciate them on their own merits.
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I insist all movies, to be considered decent, have a few elements (at a minimum):
  • Plot
  • Character Development
  • Acting better than that found on highschool stages

The gunplay can be, ah, "fanciful" and be part of a good movie. The Woo stuff I have seen barely had a plot, had one dimensional characters, and acting that looks like something Ed Wood would be satisfied with.

I appreciate action flicks. I just need more than trigger incontinence and squibs.

In the same way, scifi flicks need more than ray guns and latex glued to faces to make them worth my time.
 
El T,

What you said is more accurately translated, "I understand a little Cantonese," as "tang" means listen, not speak. Pretty damn good, though. ;)

And, although it ain't "Citizen Kane," "Hard Boiled" is undoubtedly one of the more influential action flicks of all time. Chow Yun Fat in his leaner, meaner days. :cool:
 
he always repeats the same type of corny shots-running, diving, 2 handed pistol shooting, spinning around, doves, characters pointing guns at each others heads, and Mexican standoffs. None of it looks particularly cool, imho.
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He INVENTED a lot of that, so he gets to repeat it. Hollywood stole it from Woo, not the other way around. If you think MI2 was better than Woo's Hong Kong classics, you amaze me.

. It tends to make some of these people anti-gun because they think firearms are way too powerful to be in the hands of us lowly civilians.
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I understand what you're getting at, but at the same time I think we all need to learn how to ease up a little. Realism and lectures usually end up ruining movies. Besides, I seriously doubt "Hard Boiled" turned many people anti-gun.

I think a lot of Americans just don't understand how to watch foreign films. They assume anything different is bad. Indeed I've noticed some even have a hard time watching classic American films because they look different from modern movies, and the acting is very different.
 
The funny thing is, they frequently curse in English. They say "yes sir" and have a range of four letter English words they use even though they're speaking mostly in Cantonese. I guess it's a leftover from having Brits in charge for a hundred years.
 
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