A while back, we compiled a short list of some of the most ridiculous action movie moments. This may come as a shock, but there were so many more examples to choose from that it seemed only fitting to make a follow-up list of even more times action movies asked us to believe their steaming piles of implausibility.
Why action movies seem so hell-bent on betraying the laws of physics and probability to show us the most insane and least likely outcomes of any given situation is beyond me. While some action movies can strike the perfect balance between grounded action and visual thrills, many of them appear to exist in a plane of existence where heroes are immune to the same rules that normal human beings are doomed to comply with.
So here they are in all of their ridiculous glory: shining examples of the weird places that screenwriters will go to in pursuit of that one big, movie-defining set piece.
7. Outrunning A Falling Building – Volcano (1997)
The premise for 1997 action/disaster movie Volcano is pretty uninspiring action Hollywood fluff, even if it does have some basis in reality (the movie was inspired by the formation of the Parícutin volcano in 1943).
Tommy Lee Jones stars as Michael Roark, the head of L.A.’s Office of Emergency Management, and he’s tasked with protecting the city in the event of a disaster – say, like, maybe if a volcano were to form beneath the city. Roark must protect his city by diverting the lava flow using controlled explosions to make trenches to channel the flow of lava. Are you lost yet? Well, you’re about to be.
Roark decides that he must level a building to stop the lava (of course!), and he soon finds himself directly beneath it as it begins to topple – but don’t worry, because he’s able to rescue his daughter (who’s also in the building’s shadow, for some reason) and outrun the collapsing building with very little difficulty.
Apparently, it’s all in a day’s work for the OEM volcano department.