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Ask someone to pick the best battle scene in a film, and some pick this, and some pick that, but (IMHO) they seldom do pick the best, as they mainly pick from today's films, and seldom yesterday's films. It is as if, they know of no films made before they were born.

So, here are (IMHO) some of the best battle scenes put onto film.

Best Battle in the Trenches
"All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930)

Best Comedic Battle
Seldom are battles funny, even in films, but here is one that is.
"Babes in Toyland" (1934)

Best Surprise Battle
Most people rightly remember the chariot race, but I think they forget how good was the naval battle that preceded it. So here is
"Ben Hur" (1959)

Best Battle with Pies (Tie)
"Bugsy Malone" (1976)
"The Great Race" (1965)

Best Battle on TV
And proof that if you know how to use the camera, then you don't need alot of extras.
"Culloden" (1964)

Best 2nd Looks as Good as the 1st
Most everything fades after the first time because you've seen if before, but here is one that doesn't. The naval battles in
"Damn the Defiant" (aka) "HMS Defiant" (1962)

Best Lit. Best Shot
With the sunlight filtering down through the tree leaves, the opening battle in
"Fall of the Roman Empire" (1964)

Best Inspirational Battle
Of course
"Glory" (1989)

Best Siege
Even after 90 years, it has been equalled, but never excelled, the siege of Babylon in
"Intolerance" (1916)

Best Battle with Animals (Tie)
The animal men vs. the animals
"Island of Dr. Moreau" (1970)
Man vs. bull. Man vs. elephant. etc.
"Sign of the Cross" (1932)

Best Animated Battles
"The Lord of the Rings" (1978)

Best Street Battles
"Romeo and Juliet" (1968)

Best Western Gun Battle
"San Antonio" (1945)

Best Aerial Battles
"Star Wars" (1977)

Best Battle with Pirates
"Swiss Family Robinson" (1960)

Best Slo-mo Cavalry Charge
"Waterloo" (1970)

Best Cavalry Charge at Regular Speed
"Young Winston" (1972)

Best Battles in a Sequel or Prequel
"Zulu Dawn" (1979) Prequel to "Zulu" (1964)

And one non-battle
With the Indians inside the encircled wagons, and the U.S. cavalry riding around on the outside
"Hallelujah Trail" (1965)

And what are yours?

Good topic BoyScoutKevin..............

I like the early battle scene in GLADIATOR with the Roman Legion vs those Barbarians.

Other films I liked were WWII movies like TO HELL AND BACK, PORK CHOP HILL, A BRIDGE TO FAR, and BATTLE OF THE BULGE.

I liked the first big battle in Braveheart. It was big, epic, yet seemed to convey the utter horror of such things.

How about best CGI battle?  :teddyr: My vote would go to The Battle of Pelennor Fields in Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

Best Musical Battle:

Ralph Macchio vs. Steve Vai at the end of "Crossroads"

(that counts right?)

Best Man vs. Animal Battle - ???? Jaws maybe.

Battle of Algiers, Blackhawk Down, Enemy at the gates for urban combat.

Castle Keep has a great final siege/holding action.

Stalingrad for winter combat.

Heaven and Earth great Japanese feudal combat in a movie with a completely forgettable plot.

Western Gun Battle: Final fight in The Wild Bunch, or The Magnificent Seven.

Battle/Fight in service of a caper film: thetank assault on the trainyard and the attack on the bank town in Kelly's Heroes.

Special mention: any large scale fight in a Lone Wolf and Cub film. There's one in the fifth film that's great and another one Ogami Itto gets injured very badly in in one of the middle films (third? fourth?) that stand out.

CROSS of IRON(1977): the final Battle in the film is mind blowing! One of the best WWII movies I have ever seen! I saw it on TV,just before the plug got pulled on our cable(sigh.)I gotta get a dish set-up soon....
The fighting in EXCALIBUR(1981) was far-out too! Lotsa mud and blood!The opening battle in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN (1998) is down right scary!

I really liked the battle of Helm's Deep in Lord of the Rings 2:  The Two Towers.  For something more reality based, the battle in Midway was pretty interesting.  Best Kung Fu battle would be Bruce Lee, pretty much all of Enter the Dragon and Return of the Dragon.  Best gunfight would be Clint Eastwood in Pale Rider, at the end when he knocks off all the marshalls.  But the whole Man With No Name trilogy is so full of great gunfights as well, it's hard to pick one.  Best spaceship battle would Kirk vs. Khan in Wrath of Khan.  Submarine battle would be Das Boot, that movie left me exhausted.  Honorable mention to the rebels vs. walkers battle in the beginning of Star Wars:  The Empire Strikes Back.

The final charge in Glory was a thing of sad, glorious beauty.  I admit it: it brought me to tears (in large part because of the absolutely perfect James Horner score, but still).

I'm kind of surprised nobody's mentioned the landing at Omaha Beach in Saving Private Ryan, though.  That was just...damn.  We'll never see something as openly grim and visceral as that again, I imagine.

While it's a hell of a lot smaller-scale...can I squeeze in the bank heist-turned-running gunfight from Heat here?

The naval battles, gundeck scenes, from Captain Horatio Hornblower (1951), Saving Private Ryan, any of the battle scenes, ditto for Band of Brothers, Blackhawk Down, The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), Zulu, Zulu Dawn, I could go on for a long time, some are better than others but all are good.
 Not to change the subject but has any one noticed that in the opening battle scene of Gladiator, the Germanic tribesmen are performing the same chant and song that marks the beginning of the final attack in Zulu.

Saving Private Ryan had some great and intense battles. I know a few WWII vets that will not watch the movie because the invasion battle was 'to real'

Other movies with great military battles ...
Teagukgi
Paths of Glory
Glory
Stalingrad
Patton
Kingdom of Heaven
Braveheart
Henry V
Gladiator
Napoléon
Lawrence of Arabia


The list could go on and on.

STARSHIP TROOPERS (1997) has got some awesome battle scenes.
Best mano to mano: Jake Lamotta vs. Sugar Ray Robinson in RAGING BULL (1980). Simply awesome!
Cheeziest: DRACULA vs.FRANKENSTIEN(1970) Dracula pulls Frankie's arms off...and finally his head! A classic of trash cinema by the late,great Al Adamson!

Best battle filmed in one shot would have to be Oldboy.

Someone mentioned MIDWAY...didn't MIDWAY use real footage from the BDA cameras?

I'd also like to second a vote for A BRIDGE TOO FAR.  The sequence with Robert Redford's character was incredible (when he's running on the road in various running firefights with Germans as they pop up here and there).

HAMBURGER HILL has some good scenes depicting small unit conflicts in mountainous terrain.

For cheese hand-to-hand, how about Roddy Piper and Keith David in THEY LIVE?

3 words:TORA,TORA,TORA!((1970) This kick-ass movie shows the attack on Pearl Harbor-and it won an Oscar for FX.One of my favorite war movies ever!!!

Oh yea, TORA TORA TORA.

I remember when PBS use to show that every Pearl Harbor Day.

I'll also second MIDWAY which I saw at the theater where the theater had some kind of new speaker system that made the battles feel more real. I'm sure it dosn't compare to what theaters can do now, but that is what I remember about MIDWAY.

Thank-you for the suggestions. Most of which I have not seen. I need to make a list of them and watch them at some future date.

As for Sensurround, "Midway" was the second film released with this sound system. The first was "Earthquake" in 1974. Two more films would be released in Sensurround, "Rollercoaster" in 1977 and "Battlestar Galatica" in 1979.

It was suppose to give the viewer a more enhanced viewing experience, but I think all it did was to give viewers a headache.

Sensurround was an Universal Studios product. Other competing studios had their own version of Sensurround.

That was the system when I saw Midway.

Thanks BoyScoutKevin.

I have always enjoyed naval battles in movies. As far as the best I think that would have to go to Master and Commander. It had some really intense naval action.

Barry Lyndon was the first movie i saw, where i thought "it might have very well been like that". Next one was "Saving private Ryan".

I recall watching EARTHQUAKE(1974) at the ol'Strand in PawPaw,Mich.,and it was advertised in 'SENSURROUND!".Of course,the sound system in the old joint was barely equipet(I know I spelt that wrong...sigh) for regular sound....

my favorite battles has always been in Shogun Assassin 2 (which is episodes 3 & 4 of the Lone Wolf series). The guy takes down a huge army all by himself, must be seen to be believed!

For best trench battle, I'm going to have to pick the battle in Paths of Glory.  It is still a haunting vison of war.

Thank-you again for all the suggestions. I'll have to check them out.

Best over all greatest battle scene(s):SUPER INFRAMAN!!

Best swordfight, for me, would be the lightsaber battle (Luke vs Vader) in Return of the Jedi (which, for whatever reason, is still my favorite Star Wars movie.....does that make me a freak? I know everyone always says Empire Strikes Back, but....). Anyway, that's my pick.

I liked the first big battle in "Braveheart."  Lots of chopping and slashing, ending with a few still standing and many injured lying on the ground.  A literal pile of bodies.

The charge of the Rohirrim at Pelennor Fields was quite good.  They packed that whole scene into the beginning, rather than how it comes across in the book (it seems like the riders cast aside all hope of survival after Theoden's death).

The ambush of the withdrawing British in "The Last of the Mohicans" (Daniel Day Lewis version) is one I remember as being good.

The opening scenes of "Saving Private Ryan" as they hit the beach are very good.  Likewise, the "Band of Brothers" episode "Day of Days" and the assault on the German artillery position is an awesome small unit action.