From the intense fisticuffs of The Raid franchise to the slapstick hilarity of Bridget Jones’ Diary, there’s a fight scene in some capacity in just about every movie. Crafting an effective fight scene takes a strong command of suspense and an editor with a sense of the rhythm of stylized violence. It also helps if the actors do their own stunts, otherwise, the director is forced to cut around stunt doubles.

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Thanks to the countless generic fight scenes that audiences have had to sit through, the really well-directed ones tend to stand out amongst the crowd. These fight scenes are the best in movie history.

Updated on February 6th, 2022 by Colin McCormick: Even as movies continue to grow in terms of the spectacles of CGI, there are few things more entertaining than a well-made fight sequence. From one-on-one battles to massive brawls, the best fight scenes in movies deliver thrills and laughs along with the punches. Whether it is in a big blockbuster even movie or a smaller, lesser-known gem, some amazing fight scenes just stand out in movie history.

Elevator Fight - Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

The elevator fight in Captain America The Winter Soldier

There are some who make valid complaints of MCU action sequences being overdone with CGI which can make them feel like a loud mess without any real stakes. However, Captain America: The Winter Soldier brought some more grounded action to the franchise with some fun results.

One of the best examples of this is the close-quarters brawl between Captain America and a gang of mercenaries. The scene speaks to the theme of the movie as Cap finds himself surrounded by enemies, he thought were his allies. But he doesn't back down from the challenge and takes them all out in the cramped and chaotic brawl.

Bathroom Brawl - Mission: Impossible - Fallout (2018)

Mission Impossible Fallout Bathroom Fight

The Mission: Impossible series is known for its death-defying stunts, courtesy of Tom Cruise. So it is quite surprising that Mission: Impossible – Fallout delivers one of the best sequences with a brutal and visceral hand-to-hand fight in a public bathroom.

Ethan Hunt and his partner Walker corner a suspect in a bathroom only for the man to have much more fight in him than they expected. From a pipe being pulled right out of the wall to Henry Cavill cocking his fists, it is a bombastic and brilliant moment.

Neo Vs Agent Smith - The Matrix (1999)

Neo and Agent Smith jumping at each other firing guns in The Matrix

In the first The Matrix, audiences were introduced to a world where the laws of reality could be broken. That made for a mind-bending story as well as some truly incredible action sequences.

When Neo comes face-to-face with the seemingly unstoppable Agent Smith, he is able to embrace the impossibilities of this world for a thrilling fight. It combines the grounded and stylized choreography of kung-fu movies while also introducing wire work to modern action movies.

The Bride vs The Crazy 88 - Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003)

The Bride holding a sword in Kill Bill.

Quentin Tarantino combined a lot of different genres into a wild ride for his Kill Bill movies, from exploitation movies to Spaghetti Westerns. However, the first movie embraces the kung-fu movies of old which leads to the glorious climactic battle.

Armed with only a sword, The Bride chops her way through the gang known as the Crazy 88 in spectacularly bloody fashion. It is certainly over-the-top, but the skills of Tarantino's action direction and the stunt performers are wildly impressive.

Market Fight - Legend Of The Drunken Master (1994)

Legend of Drunken Master Jackie Chan as Wong Fei-hung drinking alcohol as fast as possible

There is perhaps no actor better at delivering great on-screen fights than Jackie Chan. Not only is he an incredibly skilled martial artist, but he is also a brilliant physical comedian, and he combined those talents to make his own genre of action comedies.

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The Legend of the Drunken Master is one of the best examples of this and the hilarious market fight proves why. Chan is simultaneously a badass and a goofball as he takes on a gang of villains while getting drunker as he does.

Cliff Booth & Brandy Vs. The Manson Murderers - Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019)

Brad Pitt pretending to point a gun in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Quentin Tarantino’s films are notorious for their graphic violence. He broke the mold with Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which has minimal violence throughout. Then, in the glorious finale, Tarantino unleashes a whole movie’s worth of violence in a single brutal smackdown. Similar to killing off Hitler in Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino tweaked history in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Instead of going to Sharon Tate’s house and killing her and her friends, the Manson murderers go next door to Rick Dalton’s house and get a taste of their own medicine when Cliff Booth and his pitbull Brandy deliver swift vigilante justice set to Vanilla Fudge’s “You Keep Me Hangin’ On.”

Chaney Vs. Street - Hard Times (1975)

The final fight in Hard Times

Charles Bronson gave one of his career-defining performances in Walter Hill’s directorial debut, Hard Times. He plays Chaney, a bare-knuckle boxer whose unbeatable fighting style attracts the attention of a hustler named Speed who takes him under his wing.

After winning matches left and right in New Orleans without a problem, Chaney finally faces an opponent who actually stands a chance against him in the climactic smackdown. As a sleek, athletic fighter, Street offers a unique challenge to Chaney’s brute force.

Rocky Balboa Vs. Apollo Creed - Rocky II (1979)

Rocky vs Apollo Creed in Rocky II

Rocky Balboa and Apollo Creed engage in two of the most iconic fight scenes in movie history. The final fight in Rocky subverts genre expectations and defines the movie as a love story above all when Creed defeats Rocky and he doesn’t care, because Adrian is at his side no matter what. In Rocky II, when the two face off in a rematch, Stallone subverts the audience’s expectations again. Rocky wins this time, but not with a glorious slow-motion K.O. shot.

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A few rounds into the fight, Rocky and Apollo are both exhausted. Rocky only wins because when Apollo passes out from exhaustion, he’s (barely) still standing. His victory by knockout is a victory of sheer will and determination.

Yu Shu Lien Vs. Jen Yu - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

Yu Shu Lien pointing her sword in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

The martial arts sequences made Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon an international hit; the acrobatic, ballet-like fighting style used by the movie’s characters made it stand out.

The showdown between Michelle Yeoh’s character Yu Shu Lien and Zhang Ziyi’s character Jen Yu is the movie’s highlight. Lien keeps switching weapons to keep up with the precision of Yu’s Green Destiny sword. Throughout the fight, the two hit each other with verbal blows as well as physical ones.

Indiana Jones Vs. The Mechanic - Raiders Of The Lost Ark (1981)

Indiana Jones and a Nazi mechanic in Raiders of the Lost Ark

After turning down Pat Roach for the role of Darth Vader, George Lucas recruited him to play a handful of burly side villains in the Indiana Jones movies. His bulky physique as a wrestler made him a physical threat of comical proportions opposite Harrison Ford.

In Raiders of the Lost Ark, Roach played a mechanic working on a Nazi plane. While Marion is taking out the pilot, Indy fights the mechanic down on the airfield. The “fortune and glory”-seeking archeologist gets clobbered. As the mechanic cockily prepares to deliver the final death blow, Indy notices the plane’s rotating propellors approaching behind him and cowers. It’s too late for the mechanic, who’s caught in the propellors and sprayed across the wing of the plane.

The Sauna Attack - Eastern Promises (2007)

Viggo Mortensen in the sauna scene in Eastern Promises

The bathhouse fight in Eastern Promises is a sensational display of violence. Since the Chechens don’t know what Kirill looks like, Semyon lures Nikolai down to a bathhouse in the hopes that the Chechens will think he’s Kirill and kill him.

However, when the Chechens attack Nikolai with linoleum knives, he fights back. He’s stabbed a handful of times and it’s a very close call, but he manages to kill them both, scuppering Semyon’s plans.

Lee Vs. Han - Enter The Dragon (1973)

The hall of mirrors fight in Enter the Dragon

After taking on Han’s army of henchmen singlehandedly in the final act of Enter the Dragon, Lee confronts Han himself in his private museum. The two engage in a spectacular climactic fight.

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Han flees to a hall of mirrors, where Lee can’t tell which one is the real Han until he breaks them all. Then, he kills him.

John Nada Vs. Frank Armitage - They Live (1988)

The fight scene in They Live

A common pick for one of the greatest fight scenes ever filmed, the alleyway brawl in John Carpenter’s They Live is spectacularly staged. For the scene in which John Nada and Frank Armitage fight over a pair of sunglasses that allows wearers to see the world for the brainwashed, alien-infested dystopia it really is, Roddy Piper and Keith David were determined not to hand over the reins to a stunt team.

The fight was only supposed to last for 20 seconds, but Piper and David decided to fight for real on the day and Carpenter was so impressed that he left the entire fight in the film uncut at five-and-a-half minutes long.

James Bond Takes On Red Grant On The Train - From Russia With Love (1963)

James Bond watches as Red Grant points a gun at him in From Russia with Love.

Midway through From Russia with Love, the second-ever Bond movie, Red Grant, a SPECTRE assassin played by Jaws’ grizzled antihero Robert Shaw, confronts Sean Connery’s 007 on the Orient Express. He initially has Bond at gunpoint, but after Bond uses one of Q’s gadgets to disarm him, the two engage in one of the most shockingly brutal fights in the entire franchise.

This disturbingly violent sequence still has the ability to stun audiences after more than half a century, thanks to director Terence Young’s command of tension and Connery’s convincing portrayal of a Bond who’s fearing for his life despite his suit of plot armor.

Hallway Fight - Oldboy (2003)

The hallway fight in Oldboy

The hallway fight scene in Park Chan-wook’s revenge thriller masterpiece Oldboy is truly breathtaking. Wrongly imprisoned Oh Dae-su taking on a hallway full of henchmen in an opera of ultraviolence floors viewers on every rewatch. It’s impossible to become desensitized to it.

The crew nailed this scene in 17 takes over the course of three days and there are no hidden edits or CGI except when Oh Dae-su is stabbed (Choi Min-sik was committed to the role, but not enough to take an actual knife in his back).

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