The 1986 fantasy flick Highlander repeats throughout that “there can only be one”. It’s unsurprising therefore that it all muddles down to an epic finale between the two remaining members of the Immortal race to decide that one: the one who claims “The Prize” upon cutting off the other’s head. No viewer phone-ins, coin-tosses or democratic elections to choose here. It’s decision by decapitation (after an epic sword-dual to the death first of course.

Can Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) emerge victorious over The Kurgan (Clancy Brown)? Sparks fly as the two lock in steel-clashing combat upon the roof of Silvercup Studios in New York. The lightning flies and the fearsome nun-frightening Kurgan (who at this point is looking extremely ugly after a haircut) and MacLeod find themselves taking their battle through the ceiling into an open empty space. The blue-tinged silhouette sword fight that follows was undoubtedly lifted by Quentin Tarantino for the House of Blue Leaves massacre in Kill Bill, and the unfolding action in the dark makes for such aesthetically-intriguing sequence in Highlander.

It all makes for a supercharged, pretty spectacular denouement that is certainly memorable. Whether it resounds more in memory than the sight of a bronzed, katana-wielding Sean Connery unashamedly camping it up in Renaissance-era costume though is debatable…

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

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Low-budgets don’t matter when you’re backed by the sublime Vincent Price and such solid source material as the writing of Edgar Allan Poe.

Marking the first of eight immensely-lovable, loose film appropriations of the literary legend’s work, 1958’s House of Usher is a typically dramatic delight from Roger “King of the Bs” Corman. A ripping yarn about the cursed Usher family and the haunted mansion in which the family traditionally resides, House of Usher has all the phantasmagorical features you’d expect from this kind of old-school horror. It is also has Vincent Price with blonde hair delivering an intensely powerful performance as the hypersensitive, unhinged Roderick Usher whose enigmatic nature is as central to the story as the oppressive eponymous house.

It’s classic ham and heart-stopping suspense when the fragile and fraught Roderick Usher faces down the incensed inquiries of blue-eyed Philip Winthrop (Mark Damon). I’d be upset as well if I’d journeyed out to the most discomfiting dwelling in the middle of nowhere to find my lover in cataleptic ill-condition that subsequently encourages her barmy brother to inter her alive. Winthrop wants answers and, with a few accompanying uncanny flourishes in the visuals and music, he gets them in full-on thesp fashion from the manically inconsistent Mr. Usher.

The film throughout is atmospheric and gloriously creepy, conjuring up a great sense of the miasmic malevolence of the Usher Mansion. Edgar Allan Poe would probably approve of the kind of sinister tension and terror presented in this particular snippet, and it stands as a tantalising taster of how effective Corman and Price’s adaptations are.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

Franco’s Spain meets fairytales in El laberinto del fauno (though Pan’s Labyrinth is the perplexing title for the film’s shipping for the English-language market). Guillermo del Toro’s incredible creation impressively combines heartwarming, hopeful fantasy with surreal horror and brutal period-realism to conjure up a modern masterpiece of cinematic storytelling. Amongst many memorable moments, the sequence featuring the Pale Man is probably the most unforgettable of them all.

As instructed by the Faun of the title, our young heroine Ofelia must complete three tasks before the next full moon in order to prove her essence and take her place as Princess Moanna in the underworld realm. Having successfully surmounted her first challenge (claiming a key from an excellently unpleasant giant toad), Ofelia enters the lair of the odd-looking, child-eating Pale Man to claim an ornate dagger for her second objective.

All is going well, until Ofelia ignores the Faun’s rules and takes two grapes from Pale Man’s plentiful table. The gruesome host - fantastic fleshed out by prince of prosthetics, Doug Jones - subsequently awakens, swallows a couple of Ofelia’s fairy friends and chases the little girl who makes a narrow escape thanks to her magic chalk.

Pale Man’s outlandish appearance with his sagging white skin and eyeball hands adds to the overall bizarre charm of El laberinto del fauno, and his segment provides a prominently shocking and gripping moment amidst del Toro’s magical drama. Ofelia’s exciting encounter with the bizarre monster makes for another terrific sequence in the tremendous Academy Award-winning film from 2006.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

Tap-dancing to the title tune in a rain-sodden street, Gene Kelly takes the plaudits, but the Make ‘Em Laugh number featuring Donald O’Connor is possibly the most impressively physical sequence in Singin’ in the Rain. Totally surrendering his body for the sake of slapstick and song-and-dance showboating, O’Connor as Cosmo Brown busts out a jaw-dropping array of stunts and sight gags.

Amidst the show-stopping scenes that comprise the classic 1952 Hollywood musical, Cosmo’s crazed explosion stands as a nifty oddity that goes all out for comedy instead of dance number perfection and as such offers a light break from the bigger and bolder spectacles. It’s a sequence that delightfully combines the incredible action of silent movies with the audible possibilities of talkies, all played out with enthusiastic gusto by O’Connor.

Though it’s a tribute to optimism and light-hearted outlooks on life, the scene was by no means great fun during filming according to anecdotal reports. The scene was so demanding that O’Connor allegedly had to rest in bed for a week to recover from the strain and stinging carpet burns, only to have to do the whole thing again when the footage was lost in an accident. Cosmo’s pain is our pleasure though, and Make ‘Em Laugh is a magnificent number guaranteed to make even the most stoney-faced spectator crack a smile.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

In 1964 Stanley Kubrick released his black comedy masterpiece Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb against the unstable backdrop of the Cold War.

As the whole world was poised on the brink of the destruction, Kubrick’s satire powerfully illustrated the ludicrous nature of the communist East/capitalist West dichotomy and highlighted the imminent apocalyptic potential in an unnervingly funny manner.

That the end of the world can be precipitated by, amongst other things, paranoid generals obsessed with bodily fluids and mad scientists with lustful ideas about future Aryan underground races succeeds on a comic level. At the same time though, the film puts forward scary truths about the fragility of the Earth’s existence in the modern age. The scene where befuddled British RAF man, Captain Lionel Mandrake (just one of Peter Sellers’s numerous roles in the movie) has to deal with Colonel “Bat” Guano, a by-the-book American trooper played by Keenan Wynn, is one of the most inspired examples of insanity in Dr Strangelove.

Mandrake needs to call President Merkin Muffley (Sellers again) to try and divert disaster but runs out of change and impotently insists that Col. Guano break into a Coca Cola vending machine to get the coinage. “You’re gonna have to answer to the Coca Cola company,” warns the unreceptive American; just one classic line of many in this sublime satire.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

To all you travellers currently packing your suitcases in anticipation of a summer expedition: take heed of the Oliver Stone-scribed movie Midnight Express. Directed by Alan Parker and released in 1980, the prison thriller serves as a timely reminder that jetsetters should exert caution when choosing what souvenirs to bring home off holiday.

When American student Billy Hayes - played with perfect intensity and impressive perspiration by Brad Davis - tries to smuggle hashish out of Istanbul airport, the climax of his exotic holiday descends into what will be a living hell. Silly Billy…

It’s inevitable that Billy is going to get caught and end up confined in the cataclysmic culture shock of overseas incarceration, but the sequence leading up to his arrest remains unbearably tense for viewers. The anticipation is amped up by the thudding heartbeat, the communication barriers at every close-call with security and Billy’s sweat-drenched face - altogether making for a nail-biting cliffhanger at customs.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

Hero’s narrative unravels in the court of the King of Qin as a nameless assassin recounts his successful spate of murders before the wary royal counters with his own version of events. Boasting esteemed stars of the Asian screen such as Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi and Tony Leung all backed by bold colour-scheme backdrops, each flashback segment is amazing to watch.

It’s possible though that, for martial arts fans at least, the standout scene is the goe-house duel between kung fu legends Jet Li and Donnie Yen, playing the characters of the nameless assassin and Sky respectively.

Zhang Yimou’s sublime direction and sense of style enhances the physical action, and it’s the underlying suspense of the scene that makes it all the more breathtaking. As raindrops drip over the darkly-coloured courtyard and a blind old man plays a traditional tune whilst the combatants visualise the fight in the depths of their minds, it’s clear that this is no knockabout chopsocky. This is martial arts cinema that definitely doesn’t drop the ‘art’ component, and it’s a beautiful marriage of imagination and physical expression performed by two of the genre’s prime actors.

Incredible action choreography, epic tales of mysterious warriors engaging in fantastical duels and an overwhelming aesthetic experience that can’t help leave you slightly agog: it’s what wuxia films are all about.

You can view all our Greatest Scenes by clicking HERE. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

Appearances can be deceptive, and never has this salient point been so spectacularly illustrated as it was in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

Who would suspect a humble white bunny rabbit of being a vicious bloodthirsty beast?

Alas, the Rabbit of Caerbannog (guard of the entrance to the Cave of Caerbannog, home of the Legendary Black Beast of Aaaaarrrrrggggghhhhh) is, as it turns out, an overwhelming deadly terror whose cute exterior belies its malevolent nature. The sequence where “manky Scotch git” Tim the Enchanter guides King Arthur and his fellow Grail-hunters to the killer critter’s lair ranks amongst the top moments of the legendary comedy troupe’s twisted 1975 retelling of the Arthurian legend.

Spurred on by “a vicious streak a mile wide”, the murderous mammal goes for the jugular and gives us a great bit of lo-fi gore as it hilariously terrifies the questing travellers who fail to heed Tim the Enchanter’s warnings. In the subsequent violent set-piece that follows, it’s clear that Hell hath no fury like this diminutive beast, surely the most inspired and awesome monster never to have been the eponymous star of its own feature-length film (come on: you know you want to see that).

Even though the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch obliterates the rabid animal, putting any possibility of such a project ever happening, it’s an unforgettable little bastard that serves as another striking example of the Pythons’ gift of imagination and ability in creating sublime, surrealistic physical comedy that endures.

To see all our great movie scenes, simply click on the “Greatest Scenes” button on menu, or click here. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.

James has now taken over the Greatest Scenes feature, in a hope that it can get back to being a weekly feature. It will probably run every Sunday again but to get us back in the groove, I thought I would put this up today…

To purely remember Peter Lorre as a sinister-looking supporting actor - an unsavoury opposite to Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon, or as the comic bumbler in the ‘Triumvirate of Terror’ alongside Vincent Price and Boris Karloff - would be doing the man a great disservice. Far from being a one-dimensional pudgy thug, Lorre was an immensely expressive actor who could convey not only scintillating creepiness but considerable character depth as well.

Take his role, perhaps his greatest, in M where plays a whistling child murderer. In this scene, Lorre’s Hans Beckert finds himself caight in a warehouse cellar, pleading his case before the vengeful mob that’s baying for his blood…

Are we creeped out or sympaphetic towards Lorre?

Can we really feel empathy for someone who was so unnervingly introduced as a twisted loner preying on innocent youngsters? As the on-trial Beckert mournfully tries to explain his compulsive psychological illness and the assembled vigilante court expose their own hypocrisy and reactionary fervour which are reflective to us on our own thoughts on morality, crime and punishment. All of this is achieved by Lorre’s outstanding acting and Fritz Lang’s fantastic direction and sublime editing sensibilities.

It’s amazing to think that such a bold film could come out of the 1930s, especially in light of the unstable political climate of Germany at the time (which eventually, with the rise of the Nazis, would see Lang and Lorre flee to America). Thought-provoking and unforgettable, the trial sequence towards the end of M resonates as the most potent part of this influential Expressionist movie.

Such an uncomfortable scene from No Country for Old Men the best film I saw in 2007, superbly acted from Academy Award winner Javier Bardem and Gene Jones - a memorable cameo from the latter who has a scarce filmography of roles but even if he had supporting parts in a 100 movies he would be lucky to find material as good as this.

I love how Bardem’s Chigurh wasn’t going to harm the gas station proprietor but he said something that ticked him off and he suddenly changes into the scariest son of a bitch on the planet. I love how this scene just builds and builds whilst Chigurh decides to himself want he wants to do with him whilst the gas station guy slowly comes to the realisation he could be screwed.

He comes up with the first think he could think of to get out of trouble by saying he is closing up and watch Chigurh’s quick look at the lock as he tests the gas station guy to see if he lies and gives the wrong time.

Great writing, awesome dialogue. I have no idea how much of it is Cormac McCarthy’s writings or the Coens - I’m sure someone can correct me if they feel so inclined but I have to say the stuff about how far the coin toss has travelled to get this far was genius stuff. My favourite line from the film.

To see all our great movie scenes, simply click on the “Greatest Scenes” button on menu, or click here. If you find any broken links or wish to request a scene (make sure you leave a paragraph saying why you recommend it), Contact Me and let me know.