The 10 greatest battle scenes of all time
Throughout cinema history, as the technology for capturing motion pictures evolved, so did our ambitions concerning what to capture with it. As celluloid film was enlarged and frames expanded to widescreen, so too was our own scope widened. Suddenly, the boundaries of a theatre screen seemed limitless, and our wildest ideas about what to project on it were infinite. However, correlating almost directly with this outward expansion was our passion for large-scale conflict.
The bigger the image, the larger the body count. As we transitioned from silent to talkies, black-and-white to colour, the medium of cinema transformed into something ever more luminous, vibrant and spectacular. It was less a specific genre and more a distinct approach, but by the 1950s, culminating in 1959’s sword-and-sandal epic, Ben Hur, a new experience was brought to audiences in the cinema.
Moviegoers could be treated to dozens, hundreds — no, hundreds of thousands of people filling the screen, jostling among themselves, swinging swords, and flinging spears. From the long-forgotten corners of ancient history to the far-flung frontiers of fantastical imagination, the cinema was now where you could watch battles.
Of course, as cinema grew and matured, directors and audiences alike would settle down. The thirst for blood would be satiated, and our own interpretations of what constituted battle would be continuously rewritten and redrawn. It became less about the scale of conflict and more about how the filmmakers explored it. This is why, in this list, alongside the more classic examples of battles, you might find some leftfield examples which made us laugh, gasp, or cry.
The 10 greatest battle scenes:
10. Battle of the Bands – Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (Edgar Wright, 2010)
We start things off with something of an alternative choice, the battle of the bands scene from the fabulous comic book adaptation of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World by director Edgar Wright. A magnificent vision, Wright’s film pops with vibrancy and personality, starring Michael Cera as a teenager who has to defeat his girlfriend’s eccentric and fantastical seven evil exes in order to win her heart.
Perfectly translating the energy of live performance, the scene effortlessly mixes fantasy and reality to make for a riveting sequence. Slamming drums and twinning guitars like they’re slapping, kicking and punching their enemies, Cera’s Scott Pilgrim and his bandmates end up defeating their ethereal enemies, the Katayanagi Twins.
9. Fighting the skeletons – Jason and the Argonauts (Don Chaffey, 1963)
For many born before 2000, this 1960s fantasy adventure was a staple of their childhood, a balls-to-the-wall action adventure that drew upon Greek mythology. Based on the story of the hero Jason and his quest to find the Golden Fleece, Don Chaffrey’s film transported viewers to the vibrant and wondrous world of Ancient Greece, aided by vivid colour photography and exquisite production design.
The highlight, however, was this particular creature encounter: the Children of Hydra. Made in collaboration with stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen, this scene was ground-breaking at the time, blending it with live-action to create a nail-biting and nightmarish battle between Jason, the Argonauts and terrifying skeleton soldiers.
8. The news anchor brawl – Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (Adam McKay, 2004)
When it comes to the greatest comedy movies of the 21st century, the Adam McKay flick Anchorman is certainly among the very best. Properly announcing Judd Apatow’s comedy troupe to the industry, the likes of Paul Rudd, Will Ferrell, Steve Carell and David Koechner each quickly climbed to prominence as a result of the film that told the story of an anchorman whose role at the top of the news team is endangered.
An undoubtedly silly movie, McKay doubles down on the nonsense in one of the final movies, depicting a brawl of different news anchors from other American networks. A carnival of cameos, the sequence is a sheer joy to behold, seeing Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, and Luke Evans collaborate with the lead cast.
7. The prison riot – The Raid 2 (Gareth Evans, 2014)
The 2011 movie The Raid is considered one of the greatest action films of the 21st century. It tells the story of a group of police officers who attempt to seize a tower block from a drug gang. Despite the success of the first movie, the sequel simply didn’t receive the same amount of love, despite featuring some excellent moments, namely the insanely intense prison riot sequence.
Coming towards the start of the movie, the scene shows Iko Uwais’ Rama defending Uco (Arifin Putra) from an attack whilst in prison. The attack leads to a wild brawl among the inmates, which later turns into a battle between the convicts and the prison wardens, resulting in some violent consequences. It’s intense stuff.
6. Arikara attack – The Revenant (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2015)
A year after the multiple Oscar-winning Birdman, Mexican director Alejandro Iñárritu blessed audiences with yet another kinetic and visceral spectacle — this time applying his trademark aesthetic to the snow-capped wastes of 1823 Montana. For the second year running, Iñárritu won ‘Best Director’, and The Revenant also cinched Leonardo DiCaprio his first ‘Best Actor’ award, as well as cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki the ‘Best Cinematography’ award.
It’s fitting, then, that this particular battle scene showcases all three elements at their peak. Upon waking from an exhausted slumber, DiCaprio’s Hugo Glass is thrust into a fierce and visceral battle with the Arikara Native American tribe. With minimum editing and a flowing, swooping camera motion, it’s hard not to hold your breath as Hugo narrowly escapes death by gunfire or arrow.
5. Over the trench – All Quiet on the Western Front (Edward Berger, 2022)
The most recent movie on our list, Edward Berger’s immersive adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque’s novel All Quiet on the Western Front is one of the most impressive depictions of war ever put to film. Framing the conflict of WWI as if it were a horror movie, Berger dedicates a remarkable amount of time to making the trench scenes feel as authentic as possible, from the sloppy mud of the terrain to the mist of blood that fogs no man’s land.
Capturing the intensity of war in the scene in which the German soldiers go over the trenches, Berger fuses each element of cinema to make the moment utterly terrifying. From the sound design to the cinematography to the lighting, the scene in which the German troops attack the French trenches is pure horror.
4. Battle in Germania – Gladiator (Ridley Scott, 2000)
At one point in time, the British director Ridley Scott was actually a respected filmmaker, helming such classics as Alien, Blade Runner and Gladiator as opposed to such recent critical and commercial flops as House of Gucci, Alien: Covenant and Exodus: Gods and Kings. Yet, one can’t forget just how great Scott’s earlier movies were, with Gladiator being an essential historical epic, telling the story of a former Roman General who swears revenge on the corrupt emperor who imprisoned him.
With some truly excellent fight sequences towards the end of the movie, many people forget just how great Gladiator begins. The Battle in Germania that kicks the film off is a piece of movie magic, seeing Russell Crowe’s Maximus at the height of his powers as he leads the Roman army to victory in a sequence that speaks to the scope and violence of war, partly thanks to a brilliant soundtrack from Hans Zimmer.
3. Omaha Beach landing – Saving Private Ryan (Steven Spielberg, 1998)
When this film was released, its opening scene’s sheer brutality and mercilessness utterly shocked audiences and rocked them to their core. Over 20 years later, Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan still contains one of the most honest and no-holds-barred depictions of warfare ever to grace (or curse) the screen. Starting in one of the boats arriving on the shores of Omaha beach, the minute the gangplank is lowered, an unrelenting torrent of bullets rains down on the allied soldiers.
What follows is a near-ten minute sequence of non-stop barbarity. Within seconds, the sands of Omaha are drenched in blood and littered with quickly mounting corpses. While there had been movies presenting war in all its horror before, it was Speilberg’s movie that really hit a nerve – and kept hitting it until it was almost too much to bear.
2. The castle attack – Ran (Akira Kurosawa, 1985)
Like a painting in motion, this famous seige in Ran, the magnum opus of the career of Akira Kurosawa, was all about the colours, fluidity and tone. Scored by stunning orchestral music, which makes you feel like you’re watching a ballet, the castle attack presents the audience with breathtaking tableaux filled with swarming armies, volleys of arrows, bodies piled atop each other, and hundreds of horses galloping down the mountain.
Based on Shakespeare’s King Lear, this adaptation combined the tragedy and melodrama of the play with the distinct aesthetic and meticulous choreography of Japanese cinema, resulting in a jaw-dropping marriage of music and imagery that stands out amongst an already exquisite movie.
1. The Battle Of Helm’s Deep – The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers (Peter Jackson, 2002)
This climactic battle at the end of the second of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy is so groundbreaking and iconic that even a fleeting snippet of the music will transport you back to the mud-soaked battlefield of Helm’s Deep. Just when we thought they’d seen it all with the clash in the Mines of Moria in The Fellowship of the Ring, Jackson upped the ante more than we could have even fathomed.
As the tension built up and Aragon announced to King Theoden that over 10,000 orcs were approaching, nothing could prepare us for what happened next. With literally hundreds of thousands of figures on the screen, we were subjected to the greatest spectacle of battle ever put on celluloid: a collision of armed forces so epic and definitive that even the Seige of Gondor in the finale of Return of the King couldn’t live up to its expectations.
