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Darker Than Amber (1970) - Best fight scene of all time

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Mollymauk

Member
Darker Than Amber is a great, nearly unheard of, action flick directed by Robert Clouse (Enter the Dragon). It's most noted for the shocking film-ending fight scene between Rod Taylor and (the great) William Smith.

The two actors accidentally struck each other with the cameras rolling, one or both of them became enraged, and both ended up fighting each other. This resulted in the accidental filming of a fight, with real wounds, real lost teeth, and real blood all over their clothing.

From williamsmith.org
I hit that wall so hard, man. That was such a tough fight scene. We didn't use any stunt doubles at all. He broke three of my ribs and I busted his nose. ...After he busted three of my ribs, I hit him with a bottle, a real one. ...He busted three of my goddamn ribs and I couldn't even breath and he was still hitting me.

When he whacked me with that board, he missed the knee pad and hit me right there [indicating a spot just below the knee]. To this day when I talk to him, I accuse him of doing it on purpose. Luckily that was the last take of the whole movie.

Here it is in all its uncut glory. You'll never see another fight scene like this again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aABT-FjR4_M

104rdxc.jpg
 

Mollymauk

Member
William Smith was the real deal :

Child-actor, Korean War hero, intelligence agent, spoke five languages fluently, college teacher, boxer, football star, motocross racer, record setting powerlifter, B-movie superstar, and the last of the Marlboro Men.
 

Beaulieu

Member
I call bullshit. Cant be a real bottle; too perfect with this camera angle and editing. A real fight doesnt look like this.
 

Atrus

Gold Member
Doesn't look like a real fight and the multiple camera angles seem to indicate that the fight was not continuous, as a real fight would be.
 
Atrus said:
Doesn't look like a real fight and the multiple camera angles seem to indicate that the fight was not continuous, as a real fight would be.

It wasn't a real fight, just a few of the hits were actually real by accident.
 
Fake. One guy would either be KTFO, or they'd both be hugging on the floor for ten minutes. Also, there were way too many clean hits without any flinching.
 

Feep

Banned
demon said:
That was nice.

But there is a competitor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXIGP6_fNZk -- one single continuous shot of awesomeness.
I've always thought this was overrated as well.

There's no doubt that it's technically impressive, and an incredible testament to the skill of the cast and crew, but because that shot was so long, the fight choreography had to be incredibly basic. He handles all comers one at a time, with no more than two "moves" for each one, either a basic grapple or a strong kick. (The exception to this is the beginning of the shot, where the scene could be aborted without any real cost.)

From a choreography perspective, it's dull and uninteresting.
 

Teddman

Member
That Protector scene was pretty awesome. When he throws the guy off two stories down into that hut on the ground floor, damn nice stunt.
 

sonicmj1

Member
That fight is pretty incredible in terms of how hard it hits, but I'm still very partial to the drag-out brawl in They Live. Just two guys being angry and trying to hurt each other until one gives in, for about five minutes. It's not refined or graceful, but that's part of what I like about it.
 
hteng said:
why? the guy did the fight in one shoot without any cheap cuts or shaky cameras. I'd say it's pretty flawless.

and incredibly boring. There's no sense of peril at all. He just walks around in that rigid wooden posture delivering straight kicks and tossing people to the side.
 

plasmasd

Member
sonicmj1 said:
That fight is pretty incredible in terms of how hard it hits, but I'm still very partial to the drag-out brawl in They Live. Just two guys being angry and trying to hurt each other until one gives in, for about five minutes. It's not refined or graceful, but that's part of what I like about it.

This. My favorite fight scene of all time. Especially since he just wont put on the stupid glasses.
 
hteng said:
why? the guy did the fight in one shoot without any cheap cuts or shaky cameras. I'd say it's pretty flawless.

It's just extremely clinical clean and boring. The hero just plows through one bad guy after another.... It's just so choreographed, while being impressive for a martial arts film, it doesn't have the real brutality you get with like the OP fight which is what makes it so impressive.
 
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