If you are a fan of action, then you will surely love our list of 8 best movie fight sequences that offer high-octane action involving some of our favourite actors. Needless to say, all these are choreographed, but the reason they have made it to our list is that they are very spontaneous.
Action needs to be cohesive with the atmosphere that the story of a movie sets. If this doesn’t happen, the action fails to have the intended effect on the audience and remains as a separate sequence shot in a manner different from the rest of the movie. The following ones follow the cohesive rule big time and thus raise the bar of action.
8 Best Movie Fight Sequences
Kill Bill Volume 1
If you haven’t already seen it, the final fight between Uma Thurman and the Crazy 88 in 2003’s Kill Bill Volume 1 is one of the greatest action sequences in the history of world cinema. And I’ll tell you why – it takes place completely using swords, including Thurman’s katana, the legendary sword used by the Samurai. Director Quentin Tarantino pretty much laid the blueprint for gruesome and gory action with this fight sequence.
John Wick Chapter 3 Parabellum
I had to do a lot of brainstorming while opting for a single fight sequence from the John Wick franchise and ended up picking this one due to the sheer concept of throwing knives at each other. Keanu Reeves’ John Wick throwing knives at his enemies is a visual treat both due to his precision as well as due to the carelessness with which he does it. Director Chad Stahelski, who is himself a stuntman and a stunt coordinator, knew exactly what he was doing and gave us one of the most popular action film franchises of all time.
Old Boy
Going old-school now with Park Chan-wook’s 2003 South Korean neo-noir action thriller featuring Choi Min-sik’s Oh Dae-su. The famous corridor fight scene has inspired many other similar corridor fight sequences, but none have been able to match it in its rawness. It is a divine coincidence that this movie and Kill Bill Volume 1 were released in the same year. With one long take and so many people involved in the fight, the sequence is my personal favourite on this list because of its raw energy and fierceness.
Ip Man 2
Other than the fact that this is hands-down one of the coolest fight sequences out there, I had to incorporate this one because it involves two of my favourite martial artists of all time, i.e. Sammo Hung and Donnie Yen. The energy exchange and the dynamic between the two actors is off the charts. For those of you who have seen it, I’m sure you are thinking about the moment when both of them are launching fists at each other in sync. It’s almost like a dance, isn’t it? The movie has been directed by Wilson Yip.
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Inception
A big thank you to director Christopher Nolan for giving us the most cohesive fight sequence for the mind-bending thriller that is Inception. Joseph Gordon-Levitt going hand-to-hand against two guys while the world that they are in rotates (because it’s a dream), is utterly surreal. And the best part is that the scene isn’t CGI-d in any way. Nolan built a custom rotating set within which he shot the sequence. This is why it appears so real. Because it is real. Another testimony to the director’s filmmaking mastery.
Kingsman The Secret Service
The Kingsman franchise is very dear to my heart because of the great Colin Firth. And to see him plunge that axe into the neck of that woman in Kingsman: The Secret Service is, pardon my sadism, so satisfying. It’s a oner, i.e. a long sequence with multiple hidden cuts. But I don’t mind it because it’s so cool in the way it has been delivered for the audience to make the most of. Director Matthew Vaughn really decided to alter Firth’s popular impression as Darcy (from 1995’s Pride and Prejudice series) by giving him a suave avatar that we can’t imagine anyone else in, really.
The Matrix
There is no way to overstate the effect that this fight scene between Keanu Reeves’ Neo and Hugo Weaving’s Agent Smith and his clones had on us cinephiles, right? It is the very definition of coolness that director duo Lana Wachowski and Lilly Wachowski provided us with, and we cannot thank them enough. I admit the graphics don’t look that convincing anymore, but they did back then, and the effect still holds. The background score, the camera work, the fighting techniques, everything was spot on.
Police Story 2
This one is the most deserving and honourable mention in this list and perhaps in any other list of best movie fight sequences ever. Jackie Chan is a god of stunts that he seamlessly incorporates into all his movies while ensuring that each one is unique. The playground fight sequence in Police Story 2 that came out in…wait for it…1988 remains unmatched in its spontaneity, speed and even humour, an aspect that only Chan has been able to pull off in fight scenes. He is also the director of the movie. Take a bow, legend.
Which of these 8 best movie fight sequences have you seen and liked the most? Let us know in the comments below.