Greatest Chase Scenes
in Film History


Part 3

Introduction: Although there are many different kinds of chase (or rescue) film scenes, the most frequent type of film chase is the car chase. It is almost always between a protagonist/hero (or criminal) and the police (or authority figures), with more than a few vehicles involved in the most spectacular examples. The fast-moving scenes of the car chase, typically found in action films, very often feature high-speed maneuvering, crashes, and point-of-view perspectives to enhance the action. For variety, tanks, semi-trailer-trucks, snowmobiles, buses, and other unusually large vehicles have been employed. Having the characters move from one vehicle to another or fight atop the accelerating vehicles adds to the excitement.

The films with car chases are marked by this icon:

Note: The films that are marked with a yellow star are the films that
"The Greatest Films" site has selected as the 100 Greatest Films

Greatest Classic Chase (or Rescue) Scenes in Film History
(chronological, by film title) - Part 3
Introduction | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4
Film Title and Description of Chase (or Rescue) Scene
Example
The Cannonball Run (1981)

Another chase film from Hal Needham (similar to his earlier The Gumball Rally (1976)), featuring a cross-country, car-crashing road-race from Connecticut to Southern California with the tagline: "You'll never guess who wins". The race was based upon the real "Cannonball Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash." With Burt Reynolds, Dom DeLuise, Jack Elam, Jamie Farr, Farrah Fawcett, Jackie Chan, Roger Moore, Ratpackers Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin, and more. Followed by Cannonball Run II (1984) and Speed Zone (1989).

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

A desert chase scene in which Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) raced after a speeding truck by mounting a horse and overtaking the vehicle. He leapt onto the vehicle, forced his way into the cab, tossed the guard from the passenger seat, kicked out the Nazi driver onto the road, and took control of the wheel. As he drove, there were some hair-raising attempts of Nazi guards in the back of his truck to oust Indy from the wheel; he was weakened when one guard shot him in the left arm. The last remaining guard reached the truck's cab from above. Indy was tossed through the windshield and ended up hanging from a hood ornament in the front of the fast-moving truck. When the ornament bent and cracked off, he grabbed onto the grill. The grill bars snapped one by one as Indy clung to the fender of the front tire.

To avoid being rammed in the back of the car ahead, Indy lowered himself under the truck's engine where he clung tenuously beneath the vehicle. He (oftentimes stuntman Terry Leonard) made his way between the vehicle's wheels to the truck's rear wheel axle - he even was dragged behind the truck while attached by his bullwhip. Eventually, he pulled himself forward and lifted himself up onto the rear of the truck, crawled alongside and back in to the cab, and jumped into the driver's cab. Angered, he threw the driver out through the already-broken windshield. [This stunt paid homage to the stunt performed by Yakima Canutt in Stagecoach (1939) - see above.]

Another famous "chase" scene was in the opening sequence, with an escape from a trap-laden ancient South American temple, including a rolling gigantic spherical boulder, and Indy's subsequent getaway from Rene Belloq (Paul Freeman) and the Hovitos tribe by running to an awaiting airplane.



The Road Warrior (1982) aka Mad Max 2 (1981, Aus.)

This post-apocalyptic film was the sequel to the grim revenge/action film Mad Max (1979). It featured a spectacular, 12-minute chase sequence in the finale, in which "Mad Max" Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) in a semi-trailer fuel-oil MACK truck-tanker was pursued and viciously attacked at breakneck speed by a convoy of bizarre vehicles, souped-up cars and motorcycles, and a marauding savage band of punkish desert vandals wearing hockey-like masks; during the hot chase across the outback, the nomadic warriors flung grappling hooks at the truck, and arrows were shot from crossbows while pursuers lept from vehicle to vehicle; even a fire-bombing gyroplane hovered above the action; the climax occurred when the 40-foot tanker crashed into Lord Humungus' (Kjell Nillson) car -- also killing Wez (Vernon Wells), who was clinging to the front fender of the tanker -- and the giant tanker (filled with sand) rolled over onto its side.

Earlier in the film, Mad Max drove a super-charged Ford Falcon XB Coupe. This film was followed by Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985).




Christine (1983)

With the famous scene in which the evil red 1958 Plymouth Fury named Christine chased one of Arnie Cunningham's (Keith Gordon) bullies, Moochie Welch (Malcolm Danare), into a narrow alleyway and crushed him into a wall.
Project A (1983, HK)

In this Jackie Chan martial-arts action film, a long fight and chase scene featured a foot chase, cycling through crowded, narrow Hong Kong alleyways, a climb up a flagpole, and climaxed with a climb up a clock-tower with a duel and classic plunge from the top by director/actor Chan himself as Navy Master Sergeant Maillong, known as Dragon. The three-story fall was broken by various awnings and other projections along the way. [The film contained a tribute to Harold Lloyd's Safety Last (1923).]

Return of the Jedi (1983)

The famous scene in which Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) and Princess Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) battled with Imperial Stormtroopers on flying "speeder bikes" at breakneck speeds through a dense forest on the planet Endor.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

With a thrilling roller-coaster-like chase in which Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford), American singer Willie Scott (Kate Capshaw) and Indy's young sidekick Short Round (Jonathan Ke Quan) were chased by cultish Thuggees in underground mine-shaft carts, including a tense tug-of-war with Short Round suspended over a lava flow between two carts.

Also, the climactic "bridge" scene in which the heroes were pursued onto a rope bridge and surrounded by Thuggees and the villainous high priest Mola-Ram (Amrish Puri) -- Indiana Jones growled at Mola-Ram: "Prepare to meet Kali... in hell!" and then cut the bridge.


The Terminator (1984)

With the suspenseful scene of the unrelenting pursuit of Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) by the killer cyborg from the future, the Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in a stolen police car, through an underground parking lot and then onto the public highway. Later in the film, they were also chased by the Terminator riding a motorcycle and shooting at them with an assortment of weapons; their truck crashed and ended upside-down, while the Terminator's bike also crashed - and the indestructible cyborg was run over by a tanker-truck, but was able to revive and commandeer the oil truck to continue the chase, until the truck was blown up.


Back to the Future (1985)

The memorable scene in which Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) created a makeshift skateboard ("It's a board with wheels) from a little boy's scooter and evaded bully Biff Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson) and his gang chasing him on foot and in their car by hanging onto the back of a pickup truck; he eventually caused them to crash into a manure truck (they screamed "Shit!" as they crashed into it, in this PG-rated film, and Biff vowed: "I'm gonna get that son of a bitch") -- this scene would be referenced in variations in the next two sequels.


To Live and Die in L.A. (1985)

A most- and well-remembered car stunt and chase sequence was the one in which undercover US Treasury Secret Agent Richard Chance (William L. Petersen) drove his tan car up LA's 710 freeway exit ramp directly into multiple lanes of oncoming traffic - and at top-speed near-missed every one of them - yet caused the jack-knifing of a tractor-trailer! (One astonishing shot was an over-the-shoulder driver's POV shot of the entire freeway, showing the oncoming cars from far ahead.)




Akira (1988, Jp.)

This Japanese anime film contained some of the most kinetic sequences in animation history. In the film's opening scene set in Neo-Tokyo in the year 2019 following WWIII, two rival gangs of cyberpunks attacked each other through the streets of the dystopic, futuristic metropolis, culminating in a game of chicken between teenaged delinquent hero Kaneda and the rival Clown gangleader.


The Abyss (1989)

With a thrilling underwater chase scene between two submersibles, one manned by Bud and Lindsey Brigman (Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio), the other by the pressure-sick Lt. Coffey (Michael Biehn), culminating in Coffey sinking into the Abyssal Trench, screaming as his submersible imploded, with Bud and Lindsey left stranded in a leaking vessel.


Back to the Future, Part II (1989)

With two Hoverboard scenes, including a reprise of the Hill Valley skateboard chase scene around the town square in the future year of 2015, and another tense scene in which Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox), riding a hoverboard, retrieved Grays Sports Almanac from young Biff Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson) in 1955 as Biff drove his vehicle (with Marty hanging on for his life) into the river road tunnel. Earlier in the same sequence, Marty was being chased by Biff and his cronies at the Enchantment Under the Sea dance -- he was distracted by another Marty playing "Johnny B Goode," forcing the first Marty to figure out a way to eliminate Biff's goons without interfering with history.

And the earlier chase scene in 1985 in which Marty was chased to the top of Biff's high-rise casino "Pleasure Paradise" by Biff's goons and by Biff himself wielding a gun to murder him. Marty seemingly stepped off the building to commit suicide (he actually stepped atop the flying DeLorean time machine-car and was whisked away by "Doc" Brown (Christopher Lloyd)).

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)

The memorable "Young Indy" scenes in which a teenaged Indiana Jones (River Phoenix) was chased by treasure-hunters over a circus train, with Indiana acquiring his trademarks: his phobia about snakes (by falling into a snake-filled car), the cut on his chin (using a whip for the first time) and his fedora (given to him by the head treasure-hunter); the speedboat chase that culminated when an adult Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) was stuck on a speedboat with his pursuer as the boat was chewed up by the screws of a tanker; also, the escapes by Indiana with his father Henry (Sean Connery), especially when German fighter planes were chasing them -- one was dispatched when it entered a tunnel with them, shearing its wings, and the other when Henry wisely used his umbrella to frighten a flock of seagulls that pelted the plane and caused it to crash (Henry proudly said: "I suddenly remembered my Charlemagne -- "Let my armies be the rocks and the trees... and the birds in the sky"), and the scene in which Indiana had to rescue his father being held inside a tank while on horseback - at one point, a jeep was blown off the tank, and Indiana and the tank commander fought on the tank's treads.


Back to the Future, Part III (1990)

In the finale, mad scientist Emmett "Doc" Brown (Christopher Lloyd) raced against time to save schoolteacher and romantic interest Clara Clayton (Mary Steenbergen), as she inched along the about-to-explode train locomotive's engine, which was pushing the DeLorean in an effort to get it to 88 mph to return Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) from 1885 to the future year of 1985 - "Doc" and Clara were saved at the last minute by Marty's hoverboard that he sent alongside them. Although the locomotive was destroyed as the tracks came to an end and it exploded in the ravine, the DeLorean time machine successfully attained 88 mph and was zapped "back to the future."

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

This film had a high-speed, electrifying chase - a showdown between a mini-bike, a semi-tractor-trailer cab and a Harley Davidson motorcycle. The T-1000 Terminator (Robert Patrick) stole and commandeered a big-rig truck, rammed cars, crashed through a barricade and landed down below in the concrete-sided, flood control drainage channel in Los Angeles. He was in pursuit of young John Connor (Edward Furlong) on a small motorbike. Chasing both of them on a Harley motorcycle was the T-800 Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger). The truck crashed down 15 feet from an upper highway onto the canal.

The T-800 Terminator followed the action from above them on a service road which ran parallel to the canal. The big-rig became a 'convertible' when the top was sheared off by one of the overpasses. The T-800 sailed his bike down into the canal, miraculously keeping the bike upright when it bottomed out on the ground. He caught up to John, swept him off his motorbike and swung him onto his own Harley, while firing his rotary-cocked rifle at the truck's tires behind him. Too big to fit through a concrete abutment, the big rig at full speed crashed into the divider which bisected the canal into two channels - the small Harley passed through one of the channels ahead of the massive truck.

The rig exploded into flames that came from ignited gasoline after the collision. From the inferno, the figure of the T-1000 emerged from the flames as a smooth, chrome-surfaced man - a featureless, liquid mercury-like shape. With each step, the human features and colors of the shape emerged on the surface - chameleon-like, it was transformed back into the human cop.

(Chase scenes from Grease (1978) and Repo Man (1984) were also filmed in the same location.)

In another sequence, the T-1000's motorbike smashed through the upper-story glass wall of a building - then, the rider leapt onto a hovering helicopter as the bike fell.








Greatest Classic Chase (or Rescue) Scenes in Film History
(chronological, by film title) - Part 3
Introduction | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

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