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I couldn't watch Kevin Bacon for awhile after Sleepers - he is that good in it!

I know it got terrible reviews, but I really liked Law Abiding Citizen. If your gonna get revenge might as well try and take down the whole system.

Another props for Commando. I've always loved that movie

OldBoy is, if nothing else, a terrific (and terrifying) revenge story.

Lucky Number Slevin is a batshit insane pile of hogwash strapped to a confused, off-kilter, wild-eyed horse. And I fucking love it every single time it's on.

Also, full disclosure: I've yet to see Commando. I figure this makes me a fairly rare specimen, especially for an 80's kid.

No mention of The Shawshank Redemption? You have to admit Andy got a very good revenge against Warden Norton & Chief Hadley. He not only got then in trouble, but he escaped from their prison and could have done so much earlier than he did, took all their ill-gotten loot scott free AND he let them know it was he that did them in. His final message to Norton was the most poetic "fuck you" in cinema. I'd say that's a pretty smooth comeuppance.

They even went so far as to mention Count of Monte Cristo.

As much as I disliked the first half, the 2nd half of the "Hills Have Eyes" remake was incredibly cathartic. The payback visited on the sadistic hillfolk is almost worth the price of admission.

So is there going to be a recap for 2011 of the top eloquent quotes and # of comments per person? Usually that is posted in December but I don't think I've seen one this year.

I agree with Matt. Oldboy, while brilliant, isn't as satisfying a revenge story as I Saw the Devil, because, in boy, the protagonist essentially has the revenge turned around on him.

I just watched the bluray version of The Crow I almost forgot how good that movie was.

What, no Revenge of the Nerds? This list is meaningless.

To the last, I will grapple with thee...from Hell's heart, I stab at thee!

Haven't seen Visitor Q. The thing about VGvFG that really creeped me out was the wrist-cutters club. I couldn't watch it and I had to turn away. That so rarely happens. That and the Ganguro(?) girls.

No Jaws 4: The Revenge? It has "revenge" right there in the title.

KKKHHHHAAAAAAAAAANNNNN!!!!!!!

In regards to Oldboy. That was the point.

SPOILERS.

Oldboy is the story of Woo Jin Lee's revenge as told from the point of view of Oh Dae Su. That is the real twist. Oh Dae Su ruined Woo Jin's life. At least that is how he feels. So he gets his revenge.

I Saw The Devil is brilliantly paced and had top notch directing but had a very weak script. Nothing but coincidences and cool and clever scenes driving it. No emotion. No character study. Just a nonstop action flick in thriller form. Great entertaining movie. Just nowhere near the league of Oldboy. Or any other top notch thriller/revenge flick.

Oh and Visitor Q. Opening scene is dad soliciting sex from his daughter. Most mild thing in that movie.

I think this list is missing Stephen Seagal...(half-serious)

The Crow is a horrible terrible movie, I have no idea why is it so revered other than for its camp value.
I'm starting to believe the reason for this praise is solely the refusal to accept that someone died in the making of such utter cr*p.
It's boring, repetitive, with very little to no (totally predictable) plot and boasts catastrophically bad acting from everyone involved.

Just to clarify - those were additional suggestions, not replacement suggestions.

What about Porky's Revenge?

The "Wrath of Khan" font implies a cameo by She-Ra.

Dogville.

What a gloriously fucked-up ending.

Hard Candy is one of those movies that I enjoyed immensely but will probably never watch again. I get squirmy when it gets intense.

Happy to see "Man On Fire" included, but I prefer the original from 1987. Scott Glenn is much more believable as a badass bent on getting back at the bad guys than Denzel anyday.

Man on Fire, Khan, Unforgiven and Gladiator, while all accurately described as revenge films are more notable for sharing the distinction of being hugely overrated.

You sadly overlooked Black Death--thank you REDBOX. That movie has one of the ballsiest, best-written endings I've seen in many, many years. Perhaps better described as the best 'dark' revenge movie, at least in recent history.

Oh, and on your list of revenge movies, you somehow forgot Revenge.

About 95% of South Indian flicks revolve around avenging somebody or just getting revenge for the masses. Romance, comedy, and drama are all plot devices used to further the justification for the wholesale crates of whoop-ass opened up on the bad guys. Unfortunately, all of the men have black mustaches that are regularly twirled, so you can't rely on that to separate the good guys from the Big Bads.

Sleepers: Justice and atonement in Hell’s Kitchen with a side of Kevin Bacon.

...and sodomy. Kevin Bacon child sodomy.

No Oldboy? really?

What about "Straw Dogs"? Isn't that a revenge movie? And it's certifiably awesome. I mean, Dustin Hoffman kills a guy with a bear-trap. That's like top-10 kills of all-time.

Speaking of Hard Candy, I am glad you touched on the guy's penis, hehe. But seriously, does Page's character not just play a video of a castration? Where do i get one? That's all I need. I have the ice, leather straps, surgical tools, a VCR and a spank-happy roommate in need of a rude awakening.

Excellent list. The Crow is beyond criticism.

Oldboy however is not a revenge film - at least not in the classic sense of 'justified revenge' - otherwise we can call any old tragedy where the bad guy beats the good guy for 'messing with him' a revenge flick. Also, it's awful. You don't have to recognise that, but I'm right.

Tombstone and The Odessa File.

After 3 years of trying unsuccesfully to get pregnant and giving up, I actually got pregnant while watching Wrath of Khan; that's how awesome it is!

What about Harry Brown?

Ohh, I totally forgot about Harry Brown. It totally should have been on that list. Along with I Saw The Devil. Substitute them for Gladiator and Sleepers, because they suck.

Of the many, many, many, many awesome scenes in Commando, I have to say that my favorite is when Arnold's character places C4 around the enemy base. We see him setting it around all the buildings and, when he detonates, of course everything explodes; including the top of a guard tower! THE TOP!

And thanks for reminding me of how much I liked Payback.

Count of Monte Cristo is good as well.

A couple glaring omissions, IMO:

Conan the Barbarian
Mad Max (at least the last half would qualify as a revenge flick)
Jaws (at least Quint's involvement)

And I'd like to address a couple of other people's suggestions. While totally awesome, I wouldn't classify Taken as a revenge flick. It's more of a rescue flick. Yes, he kicks some major ass along the way, but that is only to get what he needs - his daughter back. And I don't think Departed was either. Yes, someone gets revenge in the end (won't spoil it for anybody here) but that was just at the very end. It wasn't the main plot of the movie, just a satisfying conclusion tacked on at the end.

I think revenge has to be the main motivation for a character and one of the main plot points of a movie for it to qualify as a revenge flick.

It's like you are purposely ignoring I purposely ignored the "he was a ghost all along" twist, and instead talked about how the entire movie was about, well I've been over this. Twice.

I'm a bit confused here, because to me this makes it sound like we've had a conversation about The Sixth Sense before and I don't remember. It's also possible my reading comprehension skills are a bit low this morning.

If you don't like my The Sixth Sense comparison, fine. It was just the first and most obvious example of a movie with a twist ending. I guess the main point I was trying to make is that the ending wouldn't be such a shock if that's what the movie was mainly about and if it had spent its previous time building up to it. To me, the significance of the twist is the tragedy that all his efforts to put his life back together and reconnect with his wife were doomed from the start. Well, that and the "Holy shit! I didn't see that coming" aspect of it.

I can appreciate your alternative view on Oldboy, or maybe I'm the alternative one. It's not like I talk about this movie a ton, so I wouldn't know what the general consensus is. I think it's a good illustration about how any sequence of events can have more than one story drawn from it. There is a story there to be told about Woo Jin Lee, but that's not where the focus of most of the movie is. Oh Dae Sun is the protagonist. The story is told from his perspective. The audience sees the events that happen to him, and is meant to identify with him. That's why I say the movie is about him and felt the twist was about Sun's extremely disturbing humiliation more than Lee extracting revenge.

I think you were talking to someone else with the first pragraph, but I'll agree. It's definitely a revenge movie, regardless of who the main character is. BOTH Sun and Lee are trying to get their revenge. But since I identified Sun as the main character, it's pretty hard to call it "satisfying" which is what this list is.

No love for the original I Spit on Your Grave?

Since Commando is about rescuing a family member, and Lucky Number Slevin is terrible, this is not a very good list. Maybe if anything from Vengeance Trilogy, Point Blank, Dogville or I Saw the Devil was on here, this would be decent. There are so many great revenge movies listed in these comments, that you don't really have to re-imagine Man on Fire as a revenge movie. After all wasn't it more about a Bodyguard just doing his job than any actual revenge?

Hi there, nice post. Thanks a lot.