Favorite Fights: George Nada Vs. Frank Armitage in "They Live"

Yesterday’s blog focused a lot on emotions and their importance in a fight. Today’s subject is instead about the raw energy of fighting, that primal tenacity that pours from the sweat and blood of two pugilists locked in a battle of strength, determination, and sunglasses.

John Carpenter’s “They Live” is perhaps the quintessential mindless fight sequence. There is no real choreography to speak of and it seems more in line with something you might see on a youtube channel devoted to filming homeless people fighting over a bottle of vodka. You know you’re in for a good time when the two characters engaged in combat are a pro wrestler and the smoothest talking black man to ever bless cinema.

What makes the fight from “They Live” so memorable is that it doesn’t hold its punches. This is a fight that feels real, like you are actually watching the characters thrash at each other in a painfully slow battle that mirrors the reality of hand to hand combat and all of its painful harmony and sloppy execution. The fighters, George Nada and Frank Armitage, aren’t just fighting one another; they are tip toeing along the path of murder.

What works best about this scene is just how long it lasts. Today we can expect most high budget wire-fu to treat us to a 2-3 minute barrage of insanity before the director chooses to get in touch with the script again. In this movie however the audience is subjected to a satisfyingly grueling 6 minutes, and just as it begins to lure you into the false sense of a climax one of the characters springs back for another round. You get to see all the dirty moves of fighting here too: choking, hitting below the belt, kicking a man when he’s down, and biting, basically if you wouldn’t expect to see a certain behavior or action sanctioned in any sort of professional arena you know it’s buried somewhere within this fight. This is true savagery to the nth degree and the audience gets so caught up in the horrifying image of two men trading blows that it begins to project itself back on to the viewer. Whenever a punch connects with a jaw or the impact of a knee to the groin delivers with an accompanying moan of agony, we start to feel the pain emerge from our very marrow as we sympathize with the epic beat down transpiring before us.

The actors deserve a lot of credit as well. As I mentioned before, both men are just perfect for this sort of thing and half of the joy comes from what they say to one another or how their body language translates the shear brutality on display.


This is honestly the manliest moment of cinematic history, and If you’ve never seen this scene before or for some reason you have and yet don’t understand why this is such an awesome confrontation, need I remind you that the notorious “Cripple Fight” from South Park was a shot for shot remake of this very battle? Yeah, it’s that good.