1980's Cinema saw the rise of amazingly cheesy blockbuster films.
But big budgets meant big chases and crazy action.
Here are the top 10 greatest car chase scenes from the 1980's.
Starting off the list at number 10 is "Against all Odds" from 1984.
This classic chase involves two jocks racing a red Porsche 911 SC and black 308 GT Ferrari.
And... a dog.
Anyway, the two drivers are testing the size of their cojones
("just seeing if you still got balls, Terry.")
although the dog clearly wins because it's not even wearing a seatbelt.
Both cars were specially tuned to have more power and handle faster speeds for the film
which made this chase through the busy streets of Los Angeles as intense in real life
as it seems in the movie.
The most impressive part about all of this is that neither car was damaged or crashed
throughout filming.
And for that amazing feat alone, it deserves a spot on our list.
Number Nine is the opening chase from "Beverly Hills Cop" from 1984.
This truck is absolutely smashing through the streets
while Eddie Murphy is hanging on for dear life out of the open trailer.
We're suckers for a good car crash, and anytime a semi truck is involved
you know there is going to be some real carnage.
Sprinkle in a bunch of loose cigarettes and exploding vegetables and you've landed yourself
squarely in to an 80's blockbuster chase scene.
Coming in at number eight is the Corvette chase from "The Junkman" in 1982.
I mean check out the chops this guy has.
Those bad boys could have easily put him at the top of our list out of fear alone.
Facial hair aside, we love everything about this chase scene
from the modern mounted camera angles, to driving down a packed sidewalk,
to driving on top of cars like that one fight scene from "Ong Bak".
Except, with cars, obviously.
To top it off, the Vette takes a gnarly wreck into an old lady
completely severing her car in half.
And she still drives it off like nothing happened.
Congratulations old lady, you managed to put an end to one of our favorite chase scenes
from the 80's, and you have no idea what happened.
Number Seven in the motel chase scene from 1984's "The Terminator"
Permanently baked in the mind of every child from the 80's
is being chase by the Terminator himself.
That dude is scary.
Scary as f*#%.
Obviously, the only way to get rid of him is to chuck homemade bombs
out the window of your Chevy C10 Pickup.
Nope.
Watching him drive his motorcycle through each blast looks like
it's straight up out of a nightmare.
He ends up crashing his bike pretty viciously
but the Terminator just gets right back up and jacks a semi truck to continue the chase
Yup, now he's in a semi truck.
That is scary on top of scary.
Be afraid, be actually very afraid.
Number six is the chase scene from "Cobra" in 1986.
Sylvester Stallone, another one of my most favoritest dudes,
stars in this intense shootout chase driving and awesome custom built 1950 Mercury Monterey.
The car itself is enough to make your upper lip sweat
I mean check out Sylvester's
they had four custom built Mercurys for this scene,
and three of them were completely destroyed during filming.
That makes me cry a little bit.
The stunt driving in this film is awesome.
Not to mention plenty of massive explosions,
and sawed off shotguns which cause those massive explosions.
They also managed to squeeze in some special cameo appearances
by Santa Clause and a flock of ducks.
Keep it classy in Cobra town.
Vegetables and semi trucks are back in full effect
for this chase from "License to Kill" in 1989 coming in at number five.
I get nervous watching a semi truck even driving down a mountain road at speed limit
let alone two of them trying to kill each other at the same time.
Not to mention, they look like they are carrying something highly explosive.
Sh*t gets real when a bad guy launches a rocket at Bond's truck.
He manages to avoid the rocket by amazingly driving on two wheels
Wait excuse me... Five wheels
and subsequently blows up one of the other bad guys
when the rocket passed underneath his semi truck.
Bond does a wheelie and gets away.
And obviously, this chase lands pretty high up on our list.
The chops are back at number at number four with "Blues Brothers" from 1980.
Two brother are being pursued by what seems like every single cop in the state of Illinois.
I mean, that's a lot of cops and cops make me nervous.
The sheer number of cops are actually doing more harm than good
as the cops are constantly wiping out and crashing into each other.
There is this strange joy in watching cop cars crash, though.
Maybe it's how nervous they make me
and the fact that they are wrecked and they can't pull me over anymore.
I don't really know.
But as long as those wrecks don't involve people getting hurt
I'm super happy to watch them all happen.
And there is a lot them in this scene, it's awesome.
The overall scene is super long and entertaining.
With high flying wrecks, driving through a crowded mall and completely destroying everything.
They were reaching over 115 MPH under that bridge.
I didn't even know that jalopy could drive that fast.
This high speed action, the insane amount of cars wrecked while filming,
and the overall comedic factor
is what landed this movie high up on our list of greatest car chases from the 80's.
We've made it to our top three and it starts off with the original chase
from "Back to the Future" in 1985.
No it's not the longest chase on our list,
yes, both cars are terribly slow in real life,
but it is a high stakes car chase, and it's as 80's as you can get.
And this is an 80's count down after all.
MJF in Nikes and a yellow jump suit evading Libiyans in a Delorean?
Plus, it's back to the future, it's one of the most memorable chase scenes in history.
And that's why we chose it as our third best car chase scene from the 80's.
Sorry, not Sorry.
If you are upset about the last one, grab a tissue and wipe up your tears
because we are getting back to business.
Number two is "To Live and Die in LA" from 1985.
Director, William Friedkin, told Stunt Coordinator, Buddy Joe Hooker:
That if they could come up with a chase scene better than that of "The French Connection"
that it would make it in the film.
Well this chase is completely insane, so of course it made it in the film.
The chase took and amazing 6 weeks to film and was the last thing they shot for the movie
They did this incase something bad happened to any of the principle actors
so they would still have enough of the movie completed to make back their money after releasing it.
That's right, they shot it last incase someone died!
That pretty much explains the badassness of this scene in itself
and it's definitely a movie to watch if you haven't scene it already.
And that brings us to our number one greatest and most favorite car chase scene from the 80's.
It's "Mad Max 2 : The Road Warrior" from 1981.
The filming of this scene was as dangerous, if not more dangerous, than the stunts themselves.
Cinametographer Dean Semler shot one sequence bound to the side of a truck with a bungee cable.
That's right he was dangling off the side of a truck.
The camera shook so much that he couldn't use the eye piece of the camera.
Leaving him to rely on his badass film making skills to eyeball the shot.
And let's not forget about the scene where the tanker rolls over.
It was so dangerous that it had to be done in one take
because they pretty much expected the stunt driver to end up the hospital.
So they made sure he didn't eat for 12 hours prior filming just incase he did end up in the ER needing surgery.
It's films like these that make me happy I have never gotten into the stunt driving business.
I'm totally kidding, though,
I really wish I was a stunt driver.
If you guys are looking for a young talented stunt driver
please send me an email, I got nothin' to loose.
But in all seriousness this chase covers all the bases for a great car chase scene.
There's risky camera work.
There's insane stunts.
There's so many explosions.
And of course there is a scary ass semi truck.
It has everything and all the makings of one of the greatest car chase scenes, almost ever in history.
And for that, it tops our list as the number 1 greatest 80's car chase scene.
like always, we'd love to hear your thoughts about our list.
If there is any other movies you think we should have included.
If you have a phobia of semi trucks, let me know, I'd love to talk about it with you.
It might help me feel a little bit better...
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