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LesterGroans
Jun 9, 2009

It's funny...

You were so scary at night.

1st_Panzer_Div. posted:

What are people's top action movies from the past 5 years? It seems like the comic bubble has kinda taken over the genre. John Wick 1&2, Fury Road, and that's really it? (Raid was 6 years ago already)

I've got to check out Killzone 2 apparently per some in this thread, but I'm hoping I've missed more, it feels like an action drought going on.

The recent Planet of the Apes trilogy. Hanna. Haywire. Brawl in Cell Block 99. You mentioned The Raid, but The Raid 2. Fasts 5, 6 and 7. Snowpiercer. Boyka: Undisputed. Redeemer. 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi.

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MrBling
Aug 21, 2003

Oozing machismo
Fast & Furious 6 and 7 are definitely up there for stupid fun action movies in the last five years, even if they're sort of a thing of their own.

FancyMike
May 7, 2007

Since 2012:

Drug War - for fans of cop/triad heroic bloodshed films. One of the very best of the genre while rejecting convention and reinventing it. Also a good intro to Johnie To who is fantastic.

Dredd - Sure it's based on a comic but it's more of an action movie than recent comic book spectacle.

Resident Evil: Retribution and The Final Chapter - I liked this series and the last two were the best. Kind of need to watch all six though

Killzone 2 - Martial arts choreography on par with the Raid films imo

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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Dredd is probably my favorite movie of the past 5 years, it’s violent, slick, brutal, and a hell of a lot of fun. The cast is awesome, and Urban is the best possible Judge Dredd.

Neo Rasa
Mar 8, 2007
Everyone should play DUKE games.

:dukedog:
Oh my God Laurence Fishburne's homeless people god/game show host performance in John Wick 2 is incredible. This movie rules almost as much as the first one.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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Historical question: I just rewatched Commando, and I gotta know; what’s the first action movie of this breed? The genesis of what everyone mocks in 80s action movies? Commando’s the earliest I can think of, but there’s gotta be at least a couple before it.

SimonCat
Aug 12, 2016

by Nyc_Tattoo
College Slice

X-Ray Pecs posted:

Historical question: I just rewatched Commando, and I gotta know; what’s the first action movie of this breed? The genesis of what everyone mocks in 80s action movies? Commando’s the earliest I can think of, but there’s gotta be at least a couple before it.

First Blood really pushes the idea of a Special Forces Soldier as a one man army. Going back further than that, Billy Jack also deals with Green Berets as invincible. It just kept building and I think got exponentially more outlandish as time went on.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

Neo Rasa posted:

Oh my God Laurence Fishburne's homeless people god/game show host performance in John Wick 2 is incredible. This movie rules almost as much as the first one.

Certainly better in some ways. The locations are bigger(I suppose it's debatable if that's a good thing but I love it), the villains are better, especially the addition of Common, and Keanu's choreography is even I think improved over the amazing stuff they did in the first one. Some people like a simpler revenge story though, which I can understand, and the original is very streamlined in that way.

I also think the soundtrack is slightly better in John Wick 2, which maybe puts me in the minority? I know the music playing in the Red Circle is great in John Wick, but I think the sequel's is more consistently great throughout.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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SimonCat posted:

First Blood really pushes the idea of a Special Forces Soldier as a one man army. Going back further than that, Billy Jack also deals with Green Berets as invincible. It just kept building and I think got exponentially more outlandish as time went on.

First Blood is a great movie, but not really what I’m looking for. I guess I want to know what the patient zero is for action movies becoming huge, absurd spectacles a la Commando or Rambo: First Blood Part II.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

X-Ray Pecs posted:

First Blood is a great movie, but not really what I’m looking for. I guess I want to know what the patient zero is for action movies becoming huge, absurd spectacles a la Commando or Rambo: First Blood Part II.

I think the answer really is Arnold to be honest, and Commando may be the first one where he took on that specific persona. I'm not sure, but I don't think anyone was making that type of action film until Arnold came along.

Neo Rasa
Mar 8, 2007
Everyone should play DUKE games.

:dukedog:

Basebf555 posted:

Certainly better in some ways. The locations are bigger(I suppose it's debatable if that's a good thing but I love it), the villains are better, especially the addition of Common, and Keanu's choreography is even I think improved over the amazing stuff they did in the first one. Some people like a simpler revenge story though, which I can understand, and the original is very streamlined in that way.

I also think the soundtrack is slightly better in John Wick 2, which maybe puts me in the minority? I know the music playing in the Red Circle is great in John Wick, but I think the sequel's is more consistently great throughout.

Actually I agree with all of this and I hope Common is back in Chapter 3. But I feel like the plot kind of goes off the rails very slightly towards the end which "lowers" it to me regarding it as highly as John Wick 1 instead of better. Specifically, after he completes the job and ends up back in NYC, it did feel like they had to kind of stretch things a bit to get the homeless folks army to help him out at all. Like why do they give a poo poo who has a seat on the table or whatever? Like yeah Santino betrays John personally but was he really some super devious evil guy compared to like, anyone else that would have been running things in that position? It just felt weird because the movie actually brings this up but it ended up not mattering. I don't know, it made it feel like they somehow did not enough world building but too much world building at the same time compared to how the first one.

Anyway the movie's awesome so I'm super hype for whenever Chapter 3 happens. I still have to see Atomic Blonde too.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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Basebf555 posted:

I think the answer really is Arnold to be honest, and Commando may be the first one where he took on that specific persona. I'm not sure, but I don't think anyone was making that type of action film until Arnold came along.

Commando and Rambo: First Blood Part II (the Rambo naming scheme is so dumb I have to use the full name every time) both came out the same year, there must have been something in the water. The funny thing about Commando is that’s the public perception of Arnold, but his most famous role is completely different, the Terminator (especially in the first movie) is loving chilling, while in the rest of Arnold’s famous roles, he’s way goofier.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

X-Ray Pecs posted:

Commando and Rambo: First Blood Part II (the Rambo naming scheme is so dumb I have to use the full name every time) both came out the same year, there must have been something in the water. The funny thing about Commando is that’s the public perception of Arnold, but his most famous role is completely different, the Terminator (especially in the first movie) is loving chilling, while in the rest of Arnold’s famous roles, he’s way goofier.

Yea his Terminator 2 performance has basically overwritten what he did in Terminator in pop culture, people are always surprised when they go back after many years and watch it again, just how scary he is in that movie. It's really a brutal film.

Neo Rasa posted:

Actually I agree with all of this and I hope Common is back in Chapter 3. But I feel like the plot kind of goes off the rails very slightly towards the end which "lowers" it to me regarding it as highly as John Wick 1 instead of better. Specifically, after he completes the job and ends up back in NYC, it did feel like they had to kind of stretch things a bit to get the homeless folks army to help him out at all. Like why do they give a poo poo who has a seat on the table or whatever? Like yeah Santino betrays John personally but was he really some super devious evil guy compared to like, anyone else that would have been running things in that position? It just felt weird because the movie actually brings this up but it ended up not mattering. I don't know, it made it feel like they somehow did not enough world building but too much world building at the same time compared to how the first one.

Anyway the movie's awesome so I'm super hype for whenever Chapter 3 happens. I still have to see Atomic Blonde too.

I can agree with that. Having watched the movie several times it's clear they're trying to establish that Santino is a loose cannon with huge ambition compared to his sister, who is a competent and shrewd leader. So I guess the idea is that if Santino gets a seat at the table he will own New York and that will be very, very bad for anyone else who has a stake there. But they cover that so quickly with like 3 lines of dialogue so it's really not established well enough or sold to the audience properly. And I like Santino as a sniveling rear end in a top hat villain but he doesn't really come off as a guy who could take a whole city by storm and rule over people effectively.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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Basebf555 posted:

Yea his Terminator 2 performance has basically overwritten what he did in Terminator in pop culture, people are always surprised when they go back after many years and watch it again, just how scary he is in that movie. It's really a brutal film.

There’s a reason I watched it for the October Challenge thread, it really plays out like a slasher movie, but with action setpieces instead of chase scenes. Arnold’s just so goddamn big, he’s incredibly menacing.

I love how much of Commando was obviously written just for Arnold and how big he is, like ripping a seat out of a car, picking up a whole phone booth, breaking chains with his bare hands, it’s awesome.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

X-Ray Pecs posted:

There’s a reason I watched it for the October Challenge thread, it really plays out like a slasher movie, but with action setpieces instead of chase scenes. Arnold’s just so goddamn big, he’s incredibly menacing.

I love how much of Commando was obviously written just for Arnold and how big he is, like ripping a seat out of a car, picking up a whole phone booth, breaking chains with his bare hands, it’s awesome.

The T-1000 was scary when I was 10 years old, but now looking back he's more of a goofy sci-fi villain compared to how Arnold was presented in the original. The original Terminator had no fancy tricks to ooh and ahhh at, he was a shabbily dressed behemoth that just walked in and put a shitload of bullets in you, end of story. T-1000 has a little bit too much personality to be the same kind of scary, but of course I still love both.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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I’d argue that in T2, the T-800/T-100 is still scarier than the T-1000, just for that scene where he walks through the tear gas and blasts all the SWAT guys in the kneecaps :stonk:

Neo Rasa
Mar 8, 2007
Everyone should play DUKE games.

:dukedog:

X-Ray Pecs posted:

I’d argue that in T2, the T-800/T-100 is still scarier than the T-1000, just for that scene where he walks through the tear gas and blasts all the SWAT guys in the kneecaps :stonk:

This ruled.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe
I'd also argue that Sarah Connor is a scarier character in T2 than the T-1000. The scene where she tries to assassinate Dyson is really very intense and disturbing.

ynohtna
Feb 16, 2007

backwoods compatible
Illegal Hen
I'd say one of the prototypical roots of the 80s action movie are those over-the-top, cartoonish war adventure films starring crowd-pleasing larger than life characters dodging ridiculous quantities of blanks (before they die nobly in order of ascending fame).

The Dirty Dozen, Kelly's Heroes, The Wild Geese, etc.

FancyMike
May 7, 2007

This is one hell of a cast
https://twitter.com/tonyjaaofficial/status/928426948925128704

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

ynohtna posted:

I'd say one of the prototypical roots of the 80s action movie are those over-the-top, cartoonish war adventure films starring crowd-pleasing larger than life characters dodging ridiculous quantities of blanks (before they die nobly in order of ascending fame).

The Dirty Dozen, Kelly's Heroes, The Wild Geese, etc.

You're not totally wrong, but those films were always more about a team of heroes all pitching in to win the day, whereas Arnold and Stallone ushered in the whole One Man Army era of over the top action movies.

The Expendables series is definitely an homage to those though, moreso than Rambo or Commando.

ynohtna
Feb 16, 2007

backwoods compatible
Illegal Hen
Yeah, absolutely.

The one (good?) man against an army concept possibly has roots in westerns. I'm under-educated in that genre, but the Django films sure taste similar to me.

X-Ray Pecs
May 11, 2008

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Basebf555 posted:

You're not totally wrong, but those films were always more about a team of heroes all pitching in to win the day, whereas Arnold and Stallone ushered in the whole One Man Army era of over the top action movies.

How many people were in Where Eagles Dare? Because iirc it’s about only 3 or 4 people destroying a German castle and village, all without ever reloading their assault rifles. I remember it being fun, and it’s probably where the Wolfenstein games got their cable car fights from.

ynohtna posted:

The one (good?) man against an army concept possibly has roots in westerns. I'm under-educated in that genre, but the Django films sure taste similar to me.

Django pulling a machine gun from his coffin and mowing down an entire attacking force is definitely the blueprint for Commando’s finale.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

ynohtna posted:

Yeah, absolutely.

The one (good?) man against an army concept possibly has roots in westerns. I'm under-educated in that genre, but the Django films sure taste similar to me.

Oh yea, all of these subgenres have mixed together over time and you can see elements of them in the others.

The lone hero who's just passing through but decides to help people in need is probably one of those timeless stories, but the earliest version of it on film that I can think of is Yojimbo, and then Leone adapted that with Eastwood for his Man With No Name.

I think what made stuff like Commando and First Blood II different is the military aspect. These super elite soliders are products of the best military in the history of the world, the infallible perfect USA. Which of course makes First Blood II pretty funny because First Blood was like the polar opposite of that but it's not the first time the tone of a sequel was changed to fit the tastes of audiences.

Megaman's Jockstrap
Jul 16, 2000

What a horrible thread to have a post.
I watched Security on Netflix on the recommendation of OutlawVern, who claimed that it was a decent genre DTV action film. It starts Antonio Banderas.

I'm sorry to say that I didn't like it very much. It's shot ok, although there's some terrible cuts around Big Action Moments that they obviously couldn't budget or figure out how to stage.

It's in an ugly mall set that looks very artificial. The performances and characters are ok, the action is mostly very uninspired, and the bad guys feel like mooks (which is really bad when they're supposed to be threatening). The story is uneven, I dunno this just didn't work for me. None of the emotional moments really connected.

Banderas is the highlight, but the direction of him is uneven, sometimes he seems depressed and sometimes he seems like a wise-rear end and it's very inorganic.

Anyway it's not the worst thing ever and as a DTV action-watcher I've definitely seen lots worse and it's not unwatchable but...well just beware, is all I have to say.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

X-Ray Pecs posted:

How many people were in Where Eagles Dare? Because iirc it’s about only 3 or 4 people destroying a German castle and village, all without ever reloading their assault rifles. I remember it being fun, and it’s probably where the Wolfenstein games got their cable car fights from.

It's funny when you think about it, the subgenres within the action genre can almost be broken down into categories based just on how many people there are in the "crew". One Man Army is like it's own subgenre, then you have Buddy Action, then after that a small group of 3 or 4 is often a Heist or Escape film, and then larger groups are usually more in the War movie mold.

I'm just making all that up but it seems to work for the most part.

Davros1
Jul 19, 2007

You've got to admit, you are kind of implausible



X-Ray Pecs posted:

Historical question: I just rewatched Commando, and I gotta know; what’s the first action movie of this breed? The genesis of what everyone mocks in 80s action movies? Commando’s the earliest I can think of, but there’s gotta be at least a couple before it.

You could probably throw in things like Death Wish and the Dirty Harry films too.

Megaman's Jockstrap
Jul 16, 2000

What a horrible thread to have a post.
BTW one of the dudes responsible for John Wick's stunts is taking a crack at directing a movie called 24 Hours to Live with Ethan Hawke.

I've always liked Hawke and he never phones it in so it might be pretty good. Both of the early reviews I found from the trades say it's a mixed bag but a more genre site really loved it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh8kIybhPUo

MacheteZombie
Feb 4, 2007
So it's Crank with Ethan Hawke and less debauchery

FancyMike
May 7, 2007

Watched The Villainess tonight and really enjoyed it. Rented through Vudu, it said $4 on the site but was just $1 when I went through the app on my tv.

LesterGroans
Jun 9, 2009

It's funny...

You were so scary at night.
I did an Antonio Banderas double-feature tonight and watched Security and Acts of Vengeance. Both of them are worth a look.

Acts of Vengeance is the type of DTV action movie that takes itself seriously and it works because it's straight-faced. It also gives Banderas some really good tough-guy cliches (dead family, cage-fighting, vow of silence, befriends a dog). The seams show a bit when you realize they must have only had a few days -- or hours, in Robert Forster's case -- to shoot with some of the supporting cast. But that's okay because we're following Antonio Banderas around the entire movie and he and his voiceover can easily carry it.

Security is a goofier DTV action movie, played a little less straight. It's a classic Die Hard situation and has Ben Kingsley as the villain. He's just cashing a paycheck, but he's still putting in a little effort. There's one pretty impressively tense scene early on that's sold completely by Kingsley and Banderas's talents. The supporting cast is good, Cung Le plays a henchman and Spartacus from the Spartacus show plays another security guard. Spartacus is definitely better at playing gruff and dour than goofy douche, but he gets to show both in this, which is nice. The set look like some cheap Saved By the Bell mall but there are some good gunfights and explosions.

Antonio Banderas even gets to fire a gun a couple times in that cool, dancerly way he does as El Mariachi.

LesterGroans fucked around with this message at 10:33 on Nov 18, 2017

Name Change
Oct 9, 2005


X-Ray Pecs posted:

I’d argue that in T2, the T-800/T-100 is still scarier than the T-1000, just for that scene where he walks through the tear gas and blasts all the SWAT guys in the kneecaps :stonk:

I'll remember him shooting a guy in the spine with a tear gas grenade til my dying day.

CelticPredator
Oct 11, 2013
🍀👽🆚🪖🏋

Okay now it's the season for Die Hard

got any sevens
Feb 9, 2013

by Cyrano4747
Shane Black season

Lobok
Jul 13, 2006

Say Watt?

Shane Black Friday

Small Strange Bird
Sep 22, 2006

Merci, chaton!
I hadn't seen the car chase from the Italian/Canadian Dirty Harry knock-off Blazing Magnum before, and I'd highly recommend it. (It's on YouTube.) It's a weird mix of good stuntwork (it was done by Remy Julienne, the stunt driver of The Italian Job, a bunch of Bond films and many, many more movies with car chases), low-budget corner cutting (done an impressive stunt? Now show it all over again from several different angles!) and the "eh, whatever" attitude of a lot of exploitation cinema (awkward camerawork, reactions and blocking in the pre-chase confrontation, and just drop in some funky elevator muzak at random points in lieu of a score). But the best thing is that it epitomises the 1970s car chase: two huge wallowing barges with ludicrously large engines smashing the crap out of each other on grimy, run-down streets while tyres scream and innocent bystanders get their cars flipped over.

Lobok
Jul 13, 2006

Say Watt?

I really don't mind showing off an impressive stunt multiple times. Maybe from watching martial arts movies? I'm thinking of how some movies use slow-mo or speed-ramping and there are probably lots of times where I would have preferred shots from different angles but it has to be reserved for something really drat impressive.

FancyMike
May 7, 2007

Lobok posted:

I really don't mind showing off an impressive stunt multiple times.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMlG-EVoqFw&t=414s

Lobok
Jul 13, 2006

Say Watt?

Yep, I was thinking almost exclusively of Jackie Chan when I said that.

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Wandle Cax
Dec 15, 2006
Yeah thats the classic action movie editing, nowadays you see a stunt once and you blink and you miss it. A lot of it is CGI anyway. in the old days a lot of effort, risk and skill went into stunts so you're going to see them over and over from every angle and you drat well enjoyed it

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