>> Speaker 1: There's nothing quite like the heart racing adrenaline of
a high-speed pursuit.
And cinema has them in spades.
These are the top ten chase scenes of all time.
>> [MUSIC]
>> Speaker 1: [SOUND] From the very get-go, there's no denying that
the past few decades have seen some incredible car chases.
But what might come as a surprise is that a whole lot of them are actually
remakes like Gone in 60 Seconds which is best known from the year
2000 despite the 1974 original's 34 minute chase scene
that involved actual 100 mile per hour stunt work and 128 foot jump climax.
Or the Italian Job which you might know from Mark Wahlberg's Mini Cooper
tube heist, even though it originated in 1969 with a far more elaborate chase that
took them from the sewers all the way to the rooftops.
Or even The Fast and The Furious,
which is a very loose remake of a 1955 B-movie that sees an on-the-run criminal
enter into an underground street race in order to escape the country.
But if you're a fan of chase scenes,
you've got to love the quiet tension of Drive's initial police chase.
So for our number ten we're honoring the film that inspired it with The Driver.
Now we're not sure if it's completely fair to call Drive a remake
in the strictest sense, but we'll let you decide.
They both follow a strong silent character known only as the driver,
as he drives get away vehicles in and
around Los Angeles until one of his jobs eventually goes wrong.
Whether the movie itself is a remake or not, the police chase certainly is.
Shot in the same silence, the same light, with almost the same coverage,
they even got the same tense moment of lights off hiding as the driver waits for
the police to pass by.
It's incredibly high energy chase with loads of top speed, complex stunt work and
crashes to boot, and for that it's definitely worth a watch.
>> [MUSIC]
>> Speaker 1: Now, we love car chases,
but not all great chase scenes involve automobiles.
Now there's a whole world of alternatively-vehicled pursuits that we'd
like to honor on our list, so for our next pick you're looking at bicycles.
And while you should definitely check out Premium Rush for
some New York bike messenger madness, take look at the Transporter 3 for
a bad ass bicycle chase and a series of superlative chases.
And hit up Jackie Chan's Project A for some hilariously
ingenious two-wheeled choreography that only he could have come up with.
Our number nine pick goes to the absolutely unforgettable bicycle
chase from ET known best for
iconic flight over the setting sun actors actually called it a pretty
boring scene to shoot despite the awe and excitement that it creates on screen.
Henry Thomas who played Elliot described it as sitting on a bike
attached to a camera crane as it dipped up and down on a blue screen over and over.
But we don't want to forget the awesome off road choreography that leads up to it.
Early in pre-production when Spielberg mentioned the stunts he was planning to
his bicycle mechanic, he got laughed at for
thinking that the kids would be able to pull it off.
So the next day producers whet to a local BMX track to pick out stunt riders.
The advice paid off and ET will forever live in our memories as the most
memorable bicycle chase to ever hit the silver screen and
an inspiration for kids everywhere to pick up a bike and take it off the road.
Of course, it wouldn't be a Cinefix movie list if we didn't take a look
back at the classics.
And for classic chases, it's only right we looked at classic vehicles.
And of course,
if we're thinking classic vehicles, the obvious choice has to be horseback.
We could pick the epic and ground breaking, if more than slightly racist KKK
chase from the end of Birth of the Nation or the absolutely insane stuntwork of
Yakima Canutt from the chase in Stagecoach but we're not much for obvious choices.
So as awesome as those are we're not going with either of them, or
even horseback chases for that matter.
No, for our number eight we're going with the awesomeness that is a train on
train chase from Buster Keaton's 1926 The General.
In addition to foot, handcart, and bicycle chase The General has two
train chase scenes that put Unstoppable to shame.
Based on a true story Keaton plays the Confederate train engineer of the General,
who, after his train is stolen by Union soldiers pursues it on train,
recaptures it, and
returns it home while Union soldiers pursue him on a train of their own.
In the first chase,
Keaton most notably hops off a train while it's still in motion and
stands in front of it as it closes in, trying to clear its path of railroad ties.
But our pick is the second chase and it accommodates in an absolutely
epic fashion with the bridge collapsing with a train on it.
It ended up being the most expensive stunt in the silent era.
It's an incredible visual, and the best possible finish to an incredibly
unlikely chase, one that any Chase buff owes it to himself to see.
>> [SOUND] >> Speaker 2: So
good of you to come see me, Mr. Bond.
Particularly on such short notice.
>> Speaker 3: If you can't trust a Swiss banker, what's the world come to?
>> Speaker 1: Now if there's a series known for its unusual chases,
it's gotta be the James Bond franchise.
There's hardly a single film that doesn't feature at least
one world-class chase scene.
>From cars to skis to motorcycles to skydiving,
007 has pursued ne'er-do-wells in just about every way possible.
But four our number seven, we've got to give it to The World is Not Enough, for
a boat chase.
Now this isn't the only boat chase to ever hit the screen.
Honorable mentions like Face/Off, Indiana Jones, and bunch of other Bonds, Live and
Let Die, Quantum of Solace, just missing our list, but it's certainly our favorite.
With a handful of explosions, plenty of crashes, ridiculous afterburners and
insane aerial barrel rolling, underwater dive, and
a brief segment that actually included boating on land.
The scene finally concluded with an absolutely
ridiculous jump off of the boat and onto a hot air balloon.
35 different boats were used in the filming of this Thames river sequence over
the course of six weeks, but the most notable of them all is Bond's Q boat,
of which there were 15 different kinds for
different purposes including the final jump, barrel roll, and the dive.
But the four functional models used massive 5.7 liter V8 engines that
delivered up to 350 horsepower and
propelled the craft over 80 miles per hour along the water.
All the speed and power is absolutely palpable in
its unforgettable chase that makes it one the best of all time, epic.
>> Speaker 4: Just for the record,
I wasn't really going for my [NOISE] >> Speaker 1: If you like James Bond
chases, you're probably a big fan of the airplane pursuit from Quantum of Solace.
And we enjoyed it too.
But when it comes to airborne chases, our pick lies elsewhere.
And we've got a couple prime choices.
>From Top Gun, to North by Northwest,
film makers have been chasing things in a skyward fashion for decades.
But for our number six, we're looking even higher still and a long,
long time ago with the asteroid chase from Empire Strikes Back.
>> Speaker 5: Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid
field is approximately 3720 to 1.
>> Speaker 6: Never tell me the odds.
>> Speaker 1: Painstakingly composited over the course of many months It's for
Industrial Light and Magic's sophomore effort, with each approaching asteroid
being shot individually, the scene has all the staples of a classic chase.
Creative use of environment and
the missiles, fortuitous explosions, comedy, and a final harrowing finish.
There's a reason that Star Wars is one of the best known series of all time.
And its ground breaking, gripping and hilarious scenes like these that have
propelled into the history books and lists like this the world over.
>> Speaker 7: All right, let's hit it.
>> Speaker 1: Now, we've seen planes, trains, and automobiles, but
sometimes there's nothing like the thrill of a motorcycle.
And filmmakers have exploited the danger of these two-wheeled death machines for
some action packed chase scenes for years.
>From Mission Impossible 2, to the Matrix Reloaded, to the Dark Knight,
to Terminator 2, to The Great Escape, some of cinema's best cat and
mouse games have taken place on motorbikes.
But our number five goes to something even more awesome,
if a little unexpected, with Akira.
Yep, our number five chase scene is actually animated.
And while there obviously won't be death-defying tales of harrowing stunts to
recount for this film, that doesn't make it any less significant or gorgeous.
If you don't know,
Akira is a dystopian cyberpunk anime about Neo-Tokyo Post World War III.
Few would dispute that the best part of Akira was its opening motorcycle chase
scene that sees two rival gangs square off in a duel.
And does exhilarating game of chicken to finish it off.
Ends in one of the most imitated images in Japanese anime with
his kinetic slide to a halt.
It's gorgeous and meticulously crafted.
And for that, we love it.
Here's to Akira and crazy bike chases everywhere.
>> [MUSIC]
>> Speaker 1: Vehicles are pretty cool, but
sometimes there's something special about the ridiculous acrobatics involved with
brilliantly choreographed foot chases.
We're talking gymnastics, free-running, and parkour.
And we've seen a lot of good stuff over the years.
Casino Royale's pre-title sequence, District B13's opening chase,
Bourne Ultimatum's run through Morocco, and most movies with Jackie Chan,
athletic stuntmen have been playing high-stakes games of tag for years.
But for our number four, we're giving it to a slightly less known but
no less impressive chase scene from Ong Bak.
Check this out.
Tony Jaa's Muay Thai National phenomenon has a chase scene through the alleys of
Bangkok that perfectly combines the humor of Jackie Chan,
the gymnastics of free running and the ruthless efficiency of Jaa's martial arts.
And just like the rest of the movie, Jaa used no wires or
CGI to help him along and he performed all his own stunts.
Honestly the whole movie is worth a watch, with scene after awesome scene of
ridiculous chases, fights and choreography.
If you're an action film buff, do yourself a favor and check this foreign joint out.
>> Speaker 8: Okay guys it's emergency sanitation.
>> Speaker 1: Okay, so crazy acrobatic chases are great,
but they're pretty far from reality.
And when it comes to action, sometimes gritty is key.
And as far as gritty foot chases go, while we like the Third Man as a classic,
we don't wanna dance around it.
Point Break is pretty much the most visceral, realistic foot chase ever shot.
The kineticism of the camera, and the energy of the editing,
the slice of suburban life as they cut through, the pitbull as a weapon.
This scene has a lot going on here, but it really comes down to this.
So how about I stop talking and
just let you bask in its balls out glory?
>> [MUSIC] >> Speaker 1: We only got two spots left
so you can bet we're narrowing in on the classic.
And for our number two spot,
we wanna honor the phonetic work of director William Friedkin.
And of course we could be choosing his full throttle
gun battle of a chase in on coming Traffic from To Live and Die in L.A., but
our number two goes to the absolutely classic French Connection.
This is simply one of the best chase scenes of all time,
and it's not hard to see why.
Gene Hackman chases an elevated subway car through the streets of New York from
beneath as his [INAUDIBLE] holds up an entire train.
The first thing you'll probably notice about the sequence is how
absolutely raw it is.
This movie was shot on a dime and Friedkin basically just said, fuck it.
We'll do it live and shot the whole thing like a documentary.
He didn't even tell the cameramen what to expect half the time and
just figured they'd find it in the moment.
And those extras in the background?
Those aren't really extras.
Those are just pedestrian, walking around New York City,
going about their normal days.
And those collisions?
Mostly unplanned accidents that happened when the near misses they
choreographed turned out to be a little more near and a little less misses.
Yeah, the whole thing was basically Hackman barreling through New York streets
inches from out of control at up to 80 and 90 miles per hour as a bunch of
cameras and stunt drivers did their best to keep up.
And we're okay with that.
Because even more than 40 years later, we can't stop re-watching this epic chase.
>> [SOUND] >> Speaker 1: And
finally counting down to number one, how could we not pick Bullitt.
The speed, the roar, the cars, the city, the stunts, the precision, the rhythm,
the ending, Bullitt is everything we could ever want
out of a car chase in a perfect ten minute package.
It is the yardstick by which all other chase scenes are judged.
It's the model and inspiration of so many that have come after it.
It's expertly made without a single wrong turn or false note, and it's absolutely
riveting, which is why it's our pick for the best chase scene of all time.
[SOUND] So, what do you think?
Do you disagree with any of our picks?
Did we leave out one of your favorite chases?
Let us know in the comments below,
and be sure to subscribe for
more Cinefix movie lists.
>> [MUSIC]