Originally published at: What makes a movie sword fight good? | Boing Boing
…
5 Likes
This is a really nice analysis of how Jackie Chan choreographs his fights.
14 Likes
What makes a good movie sword fight? Basil Rathbone.
All great sword fights have him. One of the finest fencers in Hollywood
24 Likes
Actors doing their own stunts is becoming so commonplace that it’s really downgrading fight scenes and action sequences in general.
In some of the superhero movies, some of the actors can’t even run convincingly.
10 Likes
11 Likes
I’m gonna go with “swords”.
24 Likes
100% technically correct.
17 Likes
7 Likes
4 Likes
What, no Captain Blood?
13 Likes
What makes a movie sword fight good?
I have nothing against ornately choreographed samurai sword fights; along with their ofttimes obscure and serpentine plotline politics, I love samurai films. But realistic sword fights can also be good in the sense that they are much more frightening to watch, such as in Ridley Scott’s The Duellists.
8 Likes
Indeed, the maker of the video seems well aware of old Japanese movies with good sword fights but unaware of old Western movies with good sword fights.
Why not just call this “I Didn’t Like the Sword Fights in Star Wars”
7 Likes
The key to a good sword fight is primarily the dramatic arc. The choreography needs to serve the plot, and the moves need to be consistent with the characters. While I love really cool choreography with “accurate” and innovative moves and syncopation, it all needs have an arc of it’s own.
Boring fights are boring because the drama isn’t there. Even the bad sword fighting in The Adventures of Robin hood is good, within the context of the move.
I’d point to the work of William Hobbs as inspiration for what the best sword fights in movies look like - they aren’t always perfectly historically accurate, but they give the impression they are. The characters have styles appropriate to them. The fights are a bit sloppy, not perfectly clean. They serve the plot and build the characters. The Richard Lester Three Musketeers is a good example. And The Duelists, which is kind of dry, the the sword fights fit perfectly into the film and fit the characters.
15 Likes
Mandy Patinkin
16 Likes
21 Likes
The best kind of correct.
4 Likes
Tenacity.
17 Likes
When I took fencing back in college to fulfill my physical education requirement, our tutor was often a consultant for film productions wanting to choreograph a sword fight. He pointed out the difference between a good dramatic move and a good fighting move. They were often not the same. Still, it was hard to resist doing something dramatic now and then when an opportunity came up. Everyone in the class had been raised on movies with dramatic sword fights.
A lot of the allure of fighting with swords in drama is that the action can be filmed on a time scale that people can follow. In real fights with swords or otherwise, the real action takes place in milliseconds. It’s over before a spectator can notice something happening. Who wants to pay money to watch that. Fencing can be shown believably at a modest pace that lets the audience see the attacks and parries.
9 Likes
It’s why I don’t watch Olympic fencing. It’s too fast for me to enjoy in real time. And the replays, when they bother, aren’t nearly slow enough or of enough of the action.
5 Likes
Style.
14 Likes
