The best shoot 'em up movies of all time

Photo credit: David Lee

Anyone attempting to list the best gun movies of all time has to deal with what I'll call The Heat Test. The 1995 Michael Mann film includes cinema's finest gun battle. But the movie isn't really dedicated to gloriously choreographed shootouts. It's an operatic tragedy that happens to be set in a criminal world.

The Heat Test eliminates a lot of the films on one's short list. Raid: Redemption is a kung fu flick with guns. The Matrix is a sci-fi film with guns. The Wild Bunch is a western with guns. Boondock Saints is a revenge flick with guns. In fact, almost no director sets out with the explicit goal of firing as many bullets as possible over the course of 90 minutes.

Too, one has to grapple with whether to include war movies. By definition, there are guns in war. But while Saving Private Ryan lets fly a whole lot of ammo, it's not exactly a shoot 'em up.

Finally one has to decide just how much one cares about authenticity. There's something to be said for precise tactical execution. But there's also something wonderful about reimagining violence as a surreal ballet. Hence, number six on my list:

6. Equilibrium. Gun katas are patently ridiculous but so, so cool. A martial art dedicated to the mathematical flight of bullets and the most likely locations of men moving with firearms? Yes, please.

5. Hard Boiled. Choreographically stunning and exhaustingly loud, with a 2:42 set piece that was almost certainly the inspiration for everything from Philips ads to True Detective.

4. Collateral. Tom Cruise spent months training with SAS and LAPD weapons experts for his role as a hitman sent to L.A with an HK USP and a list. The speed with which he executes complex tactical moves is something else. And unlike, say, Antonio Bandaras, he doesn't flinch every time that chunk of metal in his hands makes a loud banging noise.

3. Wanted. By the end of this movie, Wesley is so dependent on his HK USP Compact he can't even open the trunk of a garbage van without it. But with it, he shoots the wings off a fly. He breaks the laws of physics. He knocks bullets out of the air. And he mows down about a million assassins in one of the most exhilarating sequences ever filmed.

2. Way of the Gun. The climactic gunfight between our antiheroes and The Association Of Retired Bagmen is, by itself, enough to land this film on this list. But the reason it's placed so highly is its attention to detail. The IWB holsters. The malfunction clears. The brass checks. The one-handed reloads. It all feels so gritty, so raw, so real.

1. John Wick. I started making this list last week because I saw this movie and joygasmed. Jesus. Just, Jesus. It's so pretty. It's a tribute to raw physicality and precise choreography. Watching Keanu Reeves reload in the middle of lightning fast, close quarters combat is surreally fun. Every gunfight happens within grappling distance and every kill ends with a headshot. It's one of those movies you watch with a thumb on the rewind button. It's that good.

All these films share one thing. Great editing. If the stars and cinematographers and choreographers have done their jobs, you don't need to hide the dance behind a frenzy of jittery cuts. You let the audience see the actors work. And the bodies fall. And the bullets fly.

That's the list. It's completely exhaustive and guaranteed accurate. Want to argue for A Better Tomorrow or Shoot 'Em Up? Tell it to someone else.

Casting American Tabloid

[Ed. - I suppose there might be spoilers in here for the novel American Tabloid by James Ellroy. If you haven't read it, you might want to turn off your computer and punch yourself in the face.]

American Tabloid is about the bad men who write history. Its supporting cast? JFK, Howard Hughes, J. Edgar Hoover and Jimmy Hoffa. Its stars? Three shady characters who think they can use violence, coercion and lies to manipulate the mafia, the CIA, the President, Cuba and the media itself. But at the end, Pete Bondurant, Ward Littell, and Kemper Boyd find they aren't nearly as powerful or as clever as they'd believed.

It's a book that begs for a movie or a miniseries. But like Blood Meridian and Winter's Tale, it may be unfilmable. (Yeah, I know they made Winter's Tale into a movie. Did you f'ing see it?) Partially, that's because of its sprawling plot. And partially it's because if you mess up the casting, even a bit, the whole thing would be doomed.

But the Internet has made a game of it. And I want to play.

Boyd's the easiest. Smooth, cool and charismatic, he's also capable of extreme violence. He's narcissistic. He has an unhealthy obsession with JFK. Oh, and he's handsome enough to make women weep. Sounds like a lot of Hollywood. But Christian Bale showed he can do shallow in American Psycho, violence in The Dark Knight, and sleaze in American Hustle. Matthew McConaughey is an equally brilliant and obvious pick, with the added bonus of having Boyd's Southern accent.

Too easy. Let's move on.

Littell is trickier. At the beginning of the book, he's idealistic and intelligent. But by the end, the world has dragged him into its gutters. And while he's a runt compared to the other two guys, he's no wallflower. He's bold enough to burgle a crime boss's home and cold enough to commit murder. Dream pick? Edward Norton. Runner up? Aidan Gillen. (No one who's seen The Wire is going to disagree with me.)

Finding a Pete Bondurant is just a nightmare. The man's a wrecking ball, a shakedown artist, a brutal killer whose sheer size terrifies everyone around him. There just aren't a lot of huge actors in Hollywood who can, you know, act. Vince Vaughn is an intriguing choice; we'll know soon enough if he has enough darkness inside him to pull it off. Alexander Skarsgard is big and scary, but he's too pretty to be Bondurant. I know this'll be controversial, but I think Vin Diesel might be able to do it.

The wildcard? Timothy Olyphant could play any of the roles. The guy makes everything he's in better.

But the best choice is to be patient and let a couple younger actors age up into the roles. How about Ryan Gosling as Boyd, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Littell, and Tom Hardy as Bondurant? Yes, we'd have to wait until they all get into their 40s, but that cast would be worth it.

So there it is. Anybody got any other ideas?

The awards the Academy would have given if it didn't hate genre movies

Best Film: The Dark Knight. Duh. Too easy. The exclusion of Christopher Nolan's Batman sequel led the Academy to reconsider the nominating process and expand the field of Best Picture contenders from five to 10. Let's move on.

Best Screenplay: Scream. It's hard to find a great mystery. It's hard to find a great horror movie. It's hard to find a great comedy. It's hard to find a cultural critique that's self-referential without being self-indulgent. Scream is all four, and a fabulous popcorn movie with smart dialogue, engaging characters and creative plotting, too.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Fight Club the book is a mess of childish angst that reads like the fantasies of an 24-year-old eunuch. Fight Club the movie is a work of genius that describes the mind of man without being preachy or precious.

Best Actor: Christian Bale for American Psycho. I thought Patrick Bateman was an unfilmable character. Not because of his sadism, but because of his cartoonishness. Bale, in his best performance ever, brought the monster to the screen, and found a way to communicate the horror of his preening and the meaning of his butchery.

Best Actress: Naomi Watts for Mullholland Drive. Watts' twin performances are so stunning that some people miss that the jaded Diane and her idealized projection betty are played by the same actress. It's perhaps the deepest, bravest performance in the history of American film.

Best Direction and Cinematography: Miami Vice. For all the reasons I already gushed.