-Sean [in response to Your Stolen Man Song]
Here you go, Sean, off the top of my head, movies that meet my knuckle-dragging heroic standards, and were entertaining, in the order that they come to mind. In cases of multiple versions I always go with the original. Some good recent offerings for masculine flicks—like Mad Max: Fury Road—do not make the cut because of their feminist collective group hug ending.
1. Gladiator—the best by a wide margin
2. Brave Heart—second best by a wide margin
3. Valhalla Rising
4. Battle Los Angeles
5. El Cid
6. Jeremiah Johnson
7. Troy
8. 300
9. Last of the Mohicans
10. The Magnificent Seven
11. Tears of the Sun
12. The Red Sun
13. Hell in the Pacific
14. The Way Back
15. Moby Dick
16. Cold Mountain
17. Sergeant York
18. The Road to Perdition
19. Excalibur
20. Conan the Barbarian
21. The Messenger [my pick for the ladies, about Joan of Arc—minus the part with Dustin Hoffman as the Devil]
22. The Dirty Dozen
23. The Great Escape
24. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
25. Legends of the Fall
26. Twelve Monkeys
27. Planet of the Apes [ I watch it once a week in a futile attempt to develop a normalcy bias]
28. The Guns of Navarone
29. Quest for Fire
30. Man in the Wilderness
31. The Mission
32. King Kong [the ape as the hero of course]
33. Apocalypto
34. Blade Runner
35. The Road Warrior
Addendum
I neglected to include Zulu, Zulu Dawn and The Last Valley, which I have recently reviewed on this site. The reviews, including free movie windows, are available under the video tag.
Looking back over this list, according to my damaged misogynistic mind only four of these movies were released in this century. Of course, I do not watch all movies, and most of the picks from the 80s and 90s I did not view until recently, as I worked from 60-120 hours a week during that period.
For an honorable mention as heroic short film I would like to nominate the Legend of Catcher Freeman, with the link below. Three alternate accounts of the notorious slave are told, with the second account, related by Uncle Ruckus, being the one I equate with my favorite biblical story, of Samson and Delilah. This film has been tragically removed from the public domain. But I leave the dead ghost of a window here as an ode to Catcher Freeman, who fell victim to that no good Jezebel!
James, WTH can you see into my movie collection, Jim Harrisons Legends of the Fall, I can relate to Tristan.
I did not see Legends of the Fall until five years ago and was impressed. The WWI era setting really clinched the subtext.
what! what! no peckinpah and no westerns! The Wild bunch is most excellent. You need to run, not walk, and get this movie.
Also Tarantino's True Romance is really good. I will never be sure why it wasn't his breakthrough film.
I will check both of those out SidVic, and thanks for jogging my mind. I really liked The Long Riders, Unforgiven, and High Plains Drifter. I watched the latter like 15 times, but I regard it as horror, not a heroic movie. I knew there were some westerns—but I did list three above, so please don't kick me out of the club house yet!
Not a bad list. Legends of the Fall and 12 Monkeys were good choices.
Any specific reason you excluded the Bourne series or the new Bond movies?
Dude, I just started writing what came to mind, so have no reason for excluding anything other than Fury Road, which I did think of and considered.
I liked all of the Bourne movies a lot and thought the last one was the best.
As for Bond movies the only ones I like are the recent ones with Daniel Craig, and I liked them a lot, and definitely should have listed them. I am not much of a movie sources, I'm afraid.
13th Warrior
Lawrence of Arabia
Die Hard
Yes, yes and yes.
I read The Eaters of Men, which was Michael Crighten's book the movie 13th Warrior was based on, and was a combined adaptation of an Arab emissary's time among the Rus, accurately depicted until the arrival of Bovi, where the author merged the historical adaptation with one of Beowulf.
I watched the movie three times and really liked it.
I have a copy of Crichton's "Eaters of the Dead," good read. I also have Lawrence's "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" (upon which the movie is based) which is probably the best book I've ever read.
Hell or High Water, a double buddy movie/crime caper set in Deplorable, Texas. I didn't know they allowed Hollywood to make such a high-T movie in the Current Year.
In The Searchers, John Wayne actually plays a dark and somewhat gritty antihero type. By far the best of his westerns.
"I don't believe in surrenders—I still got my sabre. Didn't beat it into no plowshare neither."