# Movies where one good guy picks off a group of bad guys one by one. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 17, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332 "2009-02-17T23:05:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/1 "2009-02-17T23:05:41Z")
I love movies like this. I had NEVER EVER seen _Die Hard._ Simply because I didn’t think I’d like it. But I’m watching it now…and I love it! Bruce Willis is like a one man army. There’s, what, 12 bad guys and he’s picking them off one by one by one. I love movies like that. Reminds me of two others like that that I really enjoyed (where just one guy slowly whittles down a huge group of bad guys): _Air Force One_ was a lot like that. So was _Cliffhanger_. And _The Rock_ was just like that too…only it had two guys doing it (Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage). Give me more movies where this happens! Where a person is obviously trapped in a situation or place with many bad guys and yet, in the end, wins based on taking them all out one by one by one. I know there’s got to be hundreds of them. ---
**Author:** ![3acresandatruck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/e79b87/32.png) [@3acresandatruck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/3acresandatruck)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/2 "2009-02-17T23:17:02Z")
Here’s a couple: Mr. Majestyk (Charles Bronson) Blind Fury (Rutger Hauer) ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/3 "2009-02-17T23:24:01Z")
Blind Fury is pretty awesome. There were a lot of movies that were made after Die Hard came out. There were a lot of “Die Hard on a…” type movies involving boats, trains, in schools, and even on a cargo plane with a stealth fighter in it. Die Hard kind of established a sub-genre of action movies. There’s also Commando where Arnold mows through about 5000 bad guys armed with only Rae Dawn Chong, a heavy machine gun, some gardening tools, and his wits. Most Segal movies. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/4 "2009-02-17T23:26:10Z")
_Under Siege_ (Steven Segal movie, but it’s good) _Batman Begins_ _First Blood_ and _Rambo_ ---
**Author:** ![Garula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ea666f/32.png) [@Garula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garula)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/5 "2009-02-17T23:36:09Z")
If _Die Hard_ were told from the terrorist point of view, it would be a horror flick. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/6 "2009-02-17T23:39:08Z")
_Pale Rider_ ends with Clint Eastwood singling out and picking off the baddies. I just looked this movie up on Wikipedia to make sure I wasn’t confusing it with _High Plains Drifter_. The Wiki article was illuminating. All the times I’ve seen _Pale Rider_, I never noticed all the parallels to _Shane_. Duh. ---
**Author:** ![Claptree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58f4c7/32.png) [@Claptree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claptree)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/7 "2009-02-17T23:39:10Z")
> [@Garula](#): > > If _Die Hard_ were told from the terrorist point of view, it would be a horror flick. This may actually be the best idea for a movie I’ve ever read. Make it happen! ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/8 "2009-02-17T23:39:27Z")
For certain values of “good guy”, _High Plains Drifter_ may qualify. Eastwood’s character is…not really a nice person at all…but he does pick off some arguably worse guys one by one. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/9 "2009-02-17T23:40:33Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > For certain values of “good guy”, _High Plains Drifter_ may qualify. Eastwood’s character is…not really a nice person at all…but he does pick off some arguably worse guys one by one. For that matter, he’s no Boy Scout in _Pale Rider_ either. ---
**Author:** ![emarkp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3be4f8/32.png) [@emarkp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emarkp)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/10 "2009-02-17T23:45:58Z")
Paul Blart, Mall Cop. Very funny, and fits the theme. ---
**Author:** ![Dignan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f07891/32.png) [@Dignan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dignan)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/11 "2009-02-18T00:00:50Z")
Kill Bill vol. 1 & 2. The Bride hunts down and kills the members of the gang of assassins to which she used to belong. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/12 "2009-02-18T00:54:33Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > I love movies like this. I had NEVER EVER seen _Die Hard._ Simply because I didn’t think I’d like it. > > But I’m watching it now…and I love it! Bruce Willis is like a one man army. There’s, what, 12 bad guys and he’s picking them off one by one by one. I wish I’d seen _Die Hard_ in the theater, but I didn’t because of their stupid ads. The poster said “The odds are 12 to 1 . . . that’s just the way he likes it!” Which sounded pretty stupid. Turns out, the great thing about the character is that he _doesn’t_ like it; almost getting killed twenty times is a huge pain in the ass, and he’d love it if the cavalry could ride in and save the day. But they can’t, so he’s stuck with what is truly a shit job. And as you expressed, the great thing about his method is its simplicity. No matter what kind of criminal or technical genius the main badguy is, no matter how clever his plan, McClaine’s response is to start killing his henchmen, one by one (or in small groups), until there’s nobody left. A similar approach is taken in another movie in which Alan Rickman also plays the bad guy: _Quigley Down Under_. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/13 "2009-02-18T01:02:25Z")
_Quigley Down Under_. Tom Selleck plays a wild west sharpshooter who takes a job in Australia. Damn, I may need to watch that again tonight. It’s one of my favorite movies. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/14 "2009-02-18T01:14:44Z")
There’s a scene in _Tears of the Sun_ where a couple of sharpshooters (at least one of them a bona fide sniper, maybe both), start picking off bad guys marauding a village from a distance one by one while the rest of the team moves in to mop up the rest. A few cool shots of bad guys getting aced right before they’re about to kill some random innocent person. _Taken_ has Liam Neeson killing half the city of Paris one by one while trying to recover his kidnapped daughter. As for all of the best examples I could think of, they’ve already been called, most notably _Air Force One_ ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/15 "2009-02-18T01:47:34Z")
The classic: **[Yojimbo](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055630/)**. Toshiro Mifume picks off two gangs of bad guys, one and two at a time. (It’s based on Dashiel Hammet’s novel **Red Harvest** , possibly the template for this sort of story) The movie has also been remade many times. Some include: **For a Fistful of Dollars Django Last Man Standing** **[Bad Day at Black Rock](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047849/)** also owes a lot to it. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/16 "2009-02-18T01:59:41Z")
Another one with two guys taking out the trash: Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds in _City Heat_. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/17 "2009-02-18T02:02:44Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The classic: **[Yojimbo](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055630/)**. Toshiro Mifume picks off two gangs of bad guys, one and two at a time. (It’s based on Dashiel Hammet’s novel **Red Harvest** , possibly the template for this sort of story) > > The movie has also been remade many times. Some include: > > **For a Fistful of Dollars > Django > Last Man Standing** Huh. I wondered about this: I saw Last Man Standing, then years later read Red Harvest and assumed the former was closely based on the latter. Then I saw LMS again and realized how different (and inferior) it was, but figured there must be a connection. Thanks! _Payback_ follows this method, I think, as do any number of computer games. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/le_ministre_de_l_au-dela/32/12181_2.png) [@Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/18 "2009-02-18T02:15:20Z")
Bruce Lee Game of Death. (Well, not all of it is Bruce Lee, but that’s another story.) It’s a terrible film, but fits the OP. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/19 "2009-02-18T02:21:32Z")
Speaking of classics, [High Noon](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Noon) falls in the category, if you don’t count the temporary assistance sheriff Gary Cooper got from his bride, Grace kelly. ---
**Author:** ![chacoguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/50afbb/32.png) [@chacoguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chacoguy)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-one-good-guy-picks-off-a-group-of-bad-guys-one-by-one/486332/20 "2009-02-18T02:31:24Z")
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