Not quite, as I recall. Both Smith’s character & the little girl are trapped underwater–in separate cars as I recall. The robot evaluates the situation, decides that Smith’s character has the greater chance of survival, and saves him rather than the child. Smith’s character, understandably and correctly, is horrified by this.
But what shall we call the trope on tvtropes?
Should the trope be, “He’s doomed anyway; come with me”?
No, 'twas Madeleine Stowe.
No, it was Madeleine Stowe.
Isn’t it Boromir that grabs him in the movie?
IIRC there is a scene like this in the first Resident Evil movie when they are waiting for an elevator so they can escape the advancing zombies. The elevator opens and it is already filled with zombies, who grab one of the good guys and pull him in. One of the other good guys (Michelle Rodriguez, maybe?) is trying in vain to free him, but is pulled away by her companions.
In the first X-Men movie, there’s a flashback to Magneto’s childhood. As his parents are being dragged to a concerntration camp, family friends are holding back young Magneto because they know if he fights, the Nazis will just take him too.
In Angel when Doyle dies, someone is holding back Cordelia.
I know we’re talking about tv and film here, but I wanted to point out that that scene comes straight from the book:
Don’t bother me with facts. They’re actually the same person. Note that they’re never photographed together.
Angel is probably touching her, I think. But he’s not trying to pull her away from Doyle, though. It was more of a shared-comfort hug.
The BBC did a conspiracy thriller mini-series a few years ago about the new UK Ambassador to Washington, played by Jason Isaacs, called “The State Within”. Early on there’s a commercial jet crash onto a freeway, and the Ambassador has a narrow escape. He tries to rescue a conscious and relatively unharmed young woman who is trapped in her car, but he can’t get the crushed door open, and she can’t get her seatbelt off. The flames from the crash reach the car, and he keeps trying, but his aide drags him away as it becomes engulfed, and she starts screaming. A truly horrific sequence, particularly for a TV show.
In “The Poseidon Adventure” Jack Albertson is led away from his dying wife, played by Shelley Winters, after she heroically swims underwater to, er, do something (locate a passageway?)and suffers a heart attack.
There are two in Aliens: first, someone (Hicks?) holds Vasquez back when she tries to bolt from the vehicle after the first attack to save another soldier (Drake, I’m pretty sure).
The second doesn’t involve a death, but: when Newt vanishes while Hicks is cutting through the floor to reach her. Ripley tries to go after her, but Hicks pulls her back and into the elevator. Given that an alien attacks them in the elevator, incapacitating Hicks, it seems likely that Ripley would have died had Hicks not pulled her away. Of course, Newt is later rescued, so that disqualifies this one.