411's Top 100 Guy Movies: #20 - #11

Posted by Chad Webb on 09.08.2010

From Pulp Fiction and Sin City to The Big Lebowski and Raiders of the Lost Ark, the 411 Movie Zone's look at the Top 100 Guy Movies of All-Time continues with #20 down to #11! Check out the full article to see which guy flicks made this part of the list!

The List So Far...

100. Mad Max
99. Stripes
98. Saving Private Ryan
97. Death Wish
96. Old Boy
95. Top Gun
94. The Evil Dead 2
93. Fast Times at Ridgemont High
92. Bachelor Party
91. Shaft
90. The Searchers
89. The Rock
88. Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
87. Shoot ‘Em Up
86. Patton
85. Training Day
84. Braveheart
83. The Killer
82. Big Trouble in Little China
81. Beverly Hills Cop
80. The Untouchables
79. Shaun of the Dead
78. Crank
77. Hot Fuzz
76. The Shawshank Redemption
75. Grind House
74. The French Connection
73. Dr. No
72. Ocean's Eleven
71. The Matrix
70. Kill Bill
69. Aliens
68. The Deer Hunter
67. Army of Darkness
66. Glengarry Glen Ross
65. Swingers
64. This is Spinal Tap
63. Commando
62. The Crow
61. Face/Off
60. Goldfinger
59. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
58. The Wrestler
57. Office Space
56. Blade Runner
55. Easy Rider
54. Ghostbusters
53. 48 Hours
52. Hard Boiled
51. Unforgiven
50. The Wild Bunch
49. Casino Royale
48. Heat
47. Road House
46. Porky's
45. Escape from New York
44. Seven Samurai
43. Clerks
42. The Departed
41. Apocalypse Now
40. Rambo
39. Taxi Driver
38. The Dirty Dozen
37. Tombstone
36. The Longest Yard
35. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
34. The Road Warrior
33. Slap Shot
32. Blazing Saddles
31. Blues Brothers
30. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
29. The Terminator
28. Platoon
27. Enter the Dragon
26. 300
25. Caddyshack
24. The Dark Knight
23. First Blood
22. Cool Hand Luke
21. Predator

From #100-#91
From #90-#81
From #80-#71
From #70-#61
From #60-#51
From #50-#41
From #40-#31
From #30-#21

#20
Robocop

Starring: Peter Weller, Nancy Allen, and Kurtwood Smith

Directed By: Paul Verhoeven

Release Date: July 17, 1987

Summary: In a dystopic & crime ridden Detroit, a terminally wounded cop returns to the force as a powerful cyborg with submerged memories haunting him.

Memorable Quote: DAVE THE TV GUY: I'll buy THAT for a dollar! HAAAA HAHAHAHAHA!!!

Blurb Written By: George Sirois

Few films have the sort of visceral impact that rivals Robocop, one of the most absolutely violent entries in possibly the most violent decade in movie history. During that time, we were given one Chuck Norris actioner after another, Stallone turning John Rambo into an indestructible icon and the Governor of California cutting his enemies in half with a chainsaw (see The Running Man). Who would have thought Peter Weller – whose most memorable moment on the big screen was in a Woody Allen movie – would trump them all by becoming the murdered police officer Alex Murphy, who would then be brought back to life as Robocop?

Director Paul Verhoeven was the perfect choice to helm this production, and he brought with him such raw and bloody mayhem that the original cut of the film was Rated X for violence! That's when you know you have a winner on your hands. But it's not just the violence that makes this such a great film for guys. There are also the memorable characters like Clarence Boddicker and his gang, Murphy's partner Ann Lewis – the only truly feminine element of the movie, despite her butch haircut – and the co-anchors of MediaBreak Casey Wong and Jess Perkins keeping the pace moving along.

Everything in this film works, and every bit of it is designed to appeal to the guy's eye. After a hell of a car chase, our hero gets his hand blown to shit, then takes round after round of shotgun blasts that – in the X-rated version – blows his whole arm off before taking the fatal shot in the head. And that's only 20 minutes into the film, PLUS Murphy's death had to compete with Mr. Kinney getting filled with holes by the malfunctioning ED-209 ten minutes earlier. Your endurance for the most visceral violence is tested early and often, and by the end, you're watching one guy drive into a vat of toxic chemicals and another getting stabbed in the neck. Now THAT's entertainment!!!

Oh, and apparently the Old Detroit Metro West station has co-ed showers too.

Manliest Moment: RoboCop shoots through a woman's dress to hit the armed guy holding her hostage.

#19
Sin City

Starring: Bruce Willis, Clive Owen, and Mickey Rourke

Directed By: Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller

Release Date: April 1, 2005

Summary: A film that explores the dark and miserable town Basin City and tells the story of three different people, all caught up in the violent corruption of the city.

Memorable Quote: Marv: "The night's as hot as hell. It's a lousy room in a lousy part of a lousy town - I'm staring at a goddess. She's telling me she wants me. I'm not going to waste one more minute wondering how I've gotten this lucky. She smells like angels ought to smell, the perfect woman... the Goddess. Goldie. She says her name is Goldie."

Blurb Written By: Chad Webb

With many book adaptations, a common line from writers is "The pages were literally brought to life." With the arrival of Sin City from author/co-director Frank Miller and co-director Robert Rodriguez, that statement could not be more suitable and truthful. The images and dialogue from three of those popular graphic novels translated onto the big screen in ways nobody thought possible. The tactics employed, and the resulting concoction, remains matchless to this day.

The gorgeous black & white, altered only by a couple important colors, inject a well-defined appearance, and allowed the filmmakers better opportunities to astound the audience, and they take full advantage of that. Miller and Rodriguez understood that simply slapping three stories together would not be sufficient. The duo, along with a spectacular contribution from Quentin Tarantino, laid out this universe in a magnificent fashion. Even if the connection from one tale to the next is not obvious, deep down we appreciate that all the events take place within the confines of the same violent city. And if that was not enough, the bookend scenes with Josh Hartnett were terrific.

The all-star cast slid wonderfully into their roles. The central characters are three heroes, all seemingly indestructible. They are Dwight, Hartigan, and Marv, depicted gloriously by Clive Owen, Bruce Willis, and Mickey Rourke. Sin City represents first-rate acting from each of these actors, and should be considered the real resurrection of Mickey Rourke. Backing them up is an outstanding supporting cast such as Rosario Dawson, Jessica Alba, Nick Stahl, Elijah Wood, and even Powers Booth. The chemistry between the directors and the actors made it possible for the best possible interpretations of these unique characters.

Counting and describing the reasons why guys love this movie would take pages of explanation. It boils down to the fact that they are provided with equal amounts of style and substance. The technique, atmosphere, and portrayal of the characters make Sin City a clear exercise in film noir, and if judged solely on that, it is still a triumph. But taken as an action-adventure blockbuster, or a comic book adaptation, it is evident that Sin City is a dazzling effort in any genre, for almost any type of audience.

Manliest Moment: Dwight uses Jackie Boy's head in exchange for Gail, and then activates a grenade inside of the head, which explodes so it cannot be taken as evidence. Prostitutes then open fire on mercenaries. The manliness never stops.

#18
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Starring: Clint Eastwood, Eli Wallach, and Lee Van Cleef

Directed By: Sergio Leone

Release Date: December 29, 1967

Summary: A bounty hunting scam joins two men in an uneasy alliance against a third in a race to find a fortune in gold buried in a remote cemetery.

Memorable Quote: Blondie: "You see, in this world there's two kinds of people, my friend: Those with loaded guns and those who dig. You dig."

Blurb Written By: Chad Webb

When describing a guy movie, one could take almost the entire western genre and use it as an example. No director exemplifies a male's appeal of this genre better than Sergio Leone. John Ford made some films that were revered by all, but Leone helped give us the Spaghetti western, and within that section, lays its crown jewel, The Good the Bad and the Ugly. Not only is it rather lengthy at 3 hours, but the amount of memorable qualities is what makes watching this movie such a fulfilling experience.

Much of the Leone cannon possess obvious influences from Akira Kurosawa. Some of them are even direct remakes of films from the Japanese director. The Good the Bad and the Ugly is separate from the previous two installments of "The Man with No Name" trilogy because it is distinctly Leone. This was and is the most beautiful example of his strengths as a filmmaker. He is responsible for numerous above-average efforts, but none more lasting and thrilling than this. Every aspect of the production was handled with the utmost precision and care, but in a manner that accentuates Leone's style.

The "good" of the title is Blondie, who does indeed have a name, and is played masterfully by Clint Eastwood. In his successful career as a director himself, he will never be able shake the lone gunfighter image from our heads. He is the hero of the story, but Blondie is not a stereotypical cowboy. He possesses amoral qualities. He is quiet, restrained, and intense as well. The absence of those customary attributes for a western hero make Eastwood's portrayal of Blondie so arresting. The "bad" is Angel Eyes, depicted with piercing fervor by Lee Van Cleef, who wastes no time in demonstrating just how "bad" he really is. The "ugly" is Tuco, Blondie's partner and a Mexican bandit. His ugliness is conveyed not in a literal sense, but through all facets of his persona. As the humor of the picture, Eli Wallach's Tuco is sensational.

Observing these three men pursue a chest of gold results in some truly breathtaking instances. The performances and the direction help The Good the Bad and the Ugly, but it is that unforgettable score from Ennio Morricone that puts the flick over that hill dividing good films from great ones. "The Ecstasy of Gold" will remain in your head forever and is such an identifiable sound that Metallica opens with it for every concert. Leone took his grand old time developing a simple story because he had specific intentions in mind. The Good the Bad and the Ugly, despite unraveling at such a measured pace, is suspenseful in the purest sense of the word, is endlessly fascinating, and cemented as an undeniable classic.

Manliest Moment: Come on, the entire film is one giant ball of manliness, but how about using an incoming train to cut handcuffs, or interrupting a Civil War battle by blowing up a bridge. Hell yeah.

#17
Raging Bull

Starring: Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Cathy Moriarti

Directed By: Martin Scorsese

Release Date: December 19, 1980

Summary: The true story of Jake La Motta, a legendary Bronx born boxer who thought he had it all, and seemingly moments later, lost it all thanks to a Thelma Schoonmaker jump cut. The man fights so that he can feel pain and desires pain so that he may experience forgiveness. Arguably Martin Scorsese's best work, and one of the best films of the 1980s.

Memorable Quote: "Did you fuck my wife?"

Blurb Written By: Erik Luers

In a way, Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull is a guy's movie for women. Hear me out. The film depicts brothers, Jake and Joey La Motta, as foul mouthed, violent, uncaring behemoths that are more animalistic than human, and female viewers must nod their heads in agreement. "Well, of course they are," they may be saying, as their boyfriends ask the opposing "are we really like that?" Jake has few redeeming qualities and yet we care about him and his future. We want him to gain success even though he won't know what to do with it, and that's what makes the screenplay by Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin so heartbreaking. Here is an abusive man that doesn't stop to think about the consequences of his fury until it's too late; he is not a role model but a model example for people with internal (and sometimes external) explosive behavior.

Another important factor in the characterization of Jake is his underlying jealousy amid an array of incontrollable hormones. The ever voyeuristic male gaze is present several times throughout the picture, as his eyes zoom in on his next female prey. He loves women but doesn't know what to do with them. He uses them as sex objects and baby suppliers; once they get old and whiny, they get beaten into submission. In one scene, Jake's second wife, Vickie, implies that she had an affair with his brother, Joey, infuriating him to no end. He breaks down the bathroom door, smacks her in the face, beats her down the street, walks to his brother's house, and beats Joey down as his wife and kids watch. Jake's wife runs back in and gets the wind knocked out of her by her husband. This isn't macho masculinity but macho sadism, albeit in it's most vile form.

There's so much that Jakes does wrong in the film and yet, I don't know, I still didn't want to see him fail completely. He's so misguided that you want to see him get help. Scorsese excels with these tragic types (see Travis Bickle, Max Cady, or Henry Hill for other examples), and knows that in order for them to be redeemed, they must first go through hell. Perhaps that's the Catholic altar boy in him speaking. Raging Bull is a guy's movie because it involves men in their rawest form, dangerous and free, but it's not necessarily something to be proud of. Jake is an interesting case thanks to Robert De Niro's remarkable performance, and Scorsese's complete understanding of the character (Jake is never glorified, but depicted realistically as a struggling, confused fighter).

This is also the first of three films that depicts a Joe Pesci versus Frank Vincent character feud. In Raging Bull, Pesci's character wins the first round, but watch Goodfellas and Casino to see who gets the upper hand in the other legendary cinematic showdowns.

Manliest Moment: The whole film really, but.......umm, the scene where he walks down the street and beats up his brother, Joey. It's sad to watch.

#16
Full Metal Jacket

Starring: Matthew Modine, Adam Baldwin, and R. Lee Ermey

Directed By: Stanley Kubrick

Release Date: June 26, 1987

Summary: Stanley Kubrick's epic Vietnam flick, told on an intimate and artsy scale. The training, the planning, the warfare, it's all here in vivid detail. While the film is a little uneven (try caring as much about the second half as you did for the first), it is still quite powerful and is still being rightly analyzed over twenty-two years later.

Memorable Quote: "You had best unfuc* yourself or I will unscrew your head and shit down your neck."

Blurb Written By: Erik Luers

It has been quite a while since I've last seen Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, at least a good two years. And yet, it's always a film I think about revisiting, even if it's not one of his films I truly love. It's a very cold and distant, stand offish kind of film that demands to be respected from afar. It's a tough one to love and embrace, but a much easier one to admire and dutifully appreciate. Focusing on the elusive movie heroes known as the strict military, this is a strict, militant made movie. Kubrick seemed to work that way on all of his projects (one easily thinks back to the stories of the director making Shelley Duvall redo a scene from The Shining over seventy times until it was perfect), so maybe that's neither here nor there. Still, Kubrick's use of the camera and reliance on editing dissolves/scene transitions makes the viewer feel a constant sense of alienation, and maybe that's the point.

Sgt. Hartman's verbal beatdowns would be considered damaging to anyone's self esteem, and yet these men learn to desensitize themselves from it; Kubrick almost desensitizes the viewer from the entire picture. We know something tragic will happen with Pvt. Pyle (played by Vincent D'Onofrio), but we're not sure what or when. When it comes, we're shocked but not surprised — hopefully one can distinguish between these two distinct levels of emotion. What does surprise us is how early the climax occurs. Our=2 0lead characters (or at least who we had assumed we're going to be our lead characters) are killed off quite early on in the film's running time. Who do we side with now? I suppose audiences were faced with this same question back in 1960 when they viewed Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho for the very first time.

But the second half of this film doesn't really work, at least not in a structurally sound narrative sense. The scenes with the mysterious sniper are particular well framed and staged, but what purpose do they serve to the film's overall story? War is hell, of course, but since when did a recent war take place in England (where Kubrick chose to shoot this film)? There are some good scenes in the second half in desperate need of an efficient storyteller; Kubrick lets these scenes slip away because he was slowly becoming the demanding, obsessed Sgt. Hartman, controlling his set with the crack of a whip. The final scene involving a suffering Vietnamese girl doesn't work as well as it should because she is metaphorically faceless to us, just as she is to the soldiers. It's an awkward ending to an awkwardly paced, but still occasionally brilliant movie.

And what better way to end this guy movie's review than with the legendary female critic, Pauline Kael's take on the film. Kael wrote on the film (in a condensed capsule review), "The first three-quarters of an hour is basic training in the Marines stripped down to a cartoonish horrorshow; it's military S&M, and the pounding compulsiveness can easily be taken for the work of a master director. After that, the movie becomes dispersed, and you can't get an emotional reading on it. Kubrick probably believes he's numbing us by the power of his vision, but he's actually numbing us by its emptiness."

Manliest Moment: Every scene involving one of Sgt. Hartman's profane motivational speeches. R. Lee Ermey, in one of his first film roles, is hilarious, scary and strangely poetic in his vulgar ode to the troops. This is not a man you'd want to encounter on a bad day (or hell, even a good one).

#15
The Big Lebowski

Starring: Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, and Steve Buscemi

Directed By: Joel and Ethan Coen

Release Date: March 6, 1998

Summary: It starts off as a movie about a lazy guy trying to get a new rug for his apartment after a burglar urinates on it. It ends up being a movie about much, much more than that. It's also a movie about bowling.

Memorable Quote: "Shut the fuck up, Donny."

Blurb Written By: Bryan Kristopowitz

Much like "Caddyshack," "The Big Lebowski" is one of those movies that people, guys especially, love to endlessly quote because that's what the movie seems to be designed for. The plot is basically irrelevant. I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that they like the movie because of its crackerjack plot. It's all about the characters and what those characters say.

There's the Dude, real name Jeffrey Lebowski (Jeff Bridges). But no one calls him that. Everyone calls him the Dude. There's Walter Sobchak (John Goodman), an ex-Nam vet that's the Dude's best friend and bowling teammate. Walter's also a bit wacky. There's Donny (Steve Buscemi), the third member of the Dude's team. He doesn't do much besides not have any idea what the hell either the Dude or Walter are talking about. There's the rich Jeffrey Lebowski, also known as the Big Lebowski (David Huddleston) and his butler/personal secretary Brandt (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), the people who contact the Dude when the Big Lebowski's young wife Bunny (Tara Reid) is kidnapped by someone (potentially the gang of Nihilists, led by Peter Stormare's Uli) and ask him to get her back. That's about the entire plot right there. Again, the bulk of the movie is those characters and others (like Julianne Moore's weird beard artist Maude Lebowski and John Turturro's Jesus) interacting.

Now, there are what you could call twists and turns sprinkled throughout (porno king Jackie Treehorn and whatever it he has to do with the plot, a severed toe in a box, weird beard art, flying coffee cups, a private detective in a Volkswagen, and a stolen car and a dumb ass kid with a father in an iron lung, among others), but they're really just excuses for more character interactions. And great lines.

The movie is also about bowling. Not really, but a whole bunch of it takes inside a bowling alley. And we never see the main character, the Dude, ever bowl a frame. We never even really see him pick up a bowling ball (I think he touches a bowling ball twice, maybe three times, and that's it. Walter bowls a bit but we never see his ball go down the lane. We get to see Donny bowl, though, and he usually gets a strike. Usually). I don't know what the significance of that is. Maybe it's just a way for the Cohen Brothers, the masterminds behind this flick, to fling their nose at convention. The Dude is a bowler you never see bowl. And in the end it doesn't matter. It doesn't bother you.

Well, maybe the best thing to do is to think about the opening narration by Sam Elliott's Stranger character. It eventually just trails off at the end as the Stranger forgets what the heck he's talking about. That about sums up the movie, doesn't it? It goes nowhere, and it sure is a fun trip.

"Fuck it, Dude. Let's go bowling."

"The Dude abides."

Manliest Moment: Walter Sobchek (John Goodman), enraged by rival bowler Smokey fouling during a game and saying that it didn't happen, pulls out a gun and demands that Smokey's frame be marked a "zero." It is, after all, tournament play.

#14
Gladiator

Starring: Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, and Connie Nielsen

Directed By: Ridley Scott

Release Date: May 5, 2000

Summary: When a Roman general is betrayed and his family murdered by a corrupt prince, he comes to Rome as a gladiator to seek revenge.

Memorable Quote: Maximus: "At my signal, unleash hell."

Blurb Written By: Chad Webb

Period epics chronicling the adventures and battles of heroic warriors have become prevalent in cinema, but Ridley Scott's Gladiator is one of the best because of many key elements clicking into place. The success and aging of this Roman Empire picture is not limited to one actor or a sole crew member. Every single person involved brought their A-game to the table, and the result was a classic.

Gladiator, when stripped bare, is a tale of revenge, which is always money with viewers. But simply having a character set out of a quest of vengeance is not enough for a passing grade. The audience must believe in the victim, and want him to wreak havoc on all those who wronged him. Maximus opened up the world's eyes to Russell Crowe (even after The Insider). His gripping and intense portrayal of an honored General, anticipating retirement in the country with his family is poignant and powerful on its own level. But what hero could thrive without an equally as mesmerizing enemy? Gladiator also gave took Joaquin Phoenix into a whole new playing field. He is the epitome of all that is evil, but not as a caricature. He also perfectly exemplifies how zany Roman emperors tended to be.

Ridley Scott is a filmmaker with many brilliant offerings under his belt, but his aim for Gladiator was a lot braver than he is given credit for. He knew enough to not focus on historical accuracy. Scott's goal was to craft an entertaining film…period. His amazing sense of timing and vigor produced superb shots and a fascinatingly detailed depiction of ancient Rome. These qualities, and the irreplaceable score, put Gladiator right at the front of the pack of its genre.

Observing a nice character transform into a blood thirsty man on a mission ignites a fire within us. Maximus is reduced to a slave, but we urge him on, and pray that he survives the deadly face-offs with opponents, and somehow give his villains their just desserts. The amount of memorable images and quotable lines are too numerous to mention. For a film that covers incest, a public obsessed with violence, slavery, and power hungry leaders, it is just plain awesome.

Manliest Moment: The opening battle sequence is as bad a$$ as it gets.

#13
Raiders of the Lost Ark

Starring: Harrison Ford and Karen Allen

Directed By: Steven Spielberg

Release Date: June 12, 1981

Summary: Archeologist and adventurer Indiana Jones is hired by the US government to find the Ark of the Covenant before the Nazis.

Memorable Quote: "I don't know, I'm making this up as I go."
-Indiana Jones

Blurb Written By: Steve Gustafson

It all started as homage to the adventure serials from the early days of cinema but no other movie has captured the spirit of action and the excitement that this movie has. It ushered in a new era and redefined the adventure genre as we know it. From its famous opening scene in South America to its gruesome Ark-opening ceremony, Raiders of the Lost Ark is nearly non-stop, and as soon as Indiana Jones slips his way out of one situation, he finds himself jumping right into the next.

Raiders of the Lost Ark is filled with classic scenes that sum up the fun that movie serials brought. Indiana is looking for damsel in distress Marian Ravenwood, who had been kidnapped in a basket, and Indy fights off four knife-wielding assassins. Chasing after her he faces more and more of these fighters, all dressed in the same white tunics. He races through the sandy corridors of the city and into the market square, tipping over straw basket after straw basket, as all these villagers in their white and khaki robes shake their fists in objection. Indy's cracks his whip and lets his fists fly. Suddenly, the crowd parts and a massive guy in a black tunic appears. Much bigger than the others. Much more intimidating. He has a ridiculously large curved sword that he carries with a deep, confident laugh at the bullwhip-armed Indiana Jones; he starts to twirl the sword in a complicated pattern around his body, demonstrating just how quickly he will dispatch our hero. Indy looks at him, tired, and then he nonchalantly pulls out his revolver, and shoots the guy in the chest. Simple as that. This scene is rumored to be built around Harrison Ford's stomach virus that he had that day. True or not, it demonstrated the charm that was Indiana Jones. Sometimes you just have to shoot your wait out of a situation.

Manliest Moment: The infamous scene in which Indy shoots the cocky swordsman stands out as mucho macho because it was quick and to the point. Boom. Manly man, Harrison Ford was supposed to use his whip to get the swords out of his attacker's hands, but after several unsuccessful tries, someone made the off-handed remark, "Why doesn't he just shoot him and get it done and over with?" Steven Spielberg immediately took up the idea and the scene was filmed, providing us with the way a real man would handle things.

#12
Pulp Fiction

Starring: Uma Thurman, John Travolta, and Samuel L. Jackson

Directed By: Quentin Tarantino

Release Date: October 14, 1992

Summary: The lives of two mob hit men, a boxer, a gangster's wife, and a pair of diner bandits intertwine in four tales of violence and redemption.

Memorable Quote: "Aww man…I shot Marvin in the face."

Blurb Written By: Joseph Lee

Tarantino has made a career on making movies strictly for men. Maybe there are times when they're for men with foot fetishes (could it be any more obvious in Death Proof?) but they're for men just the same. Many can argue which is his best, but you would certainly have to throw Pulp Fiction in there. This was the movie that single-handedly made John Travolta a star again. This movie also made Quentin Tarantino a name to be revered within the film industry. While Reservoir Dogs was the beginning, this cemented him as a top director in Hollywood.

Pulp Fiction features several different tales all interconnecting and it takes pieces of each one in order for the entire picture to make sense. Whether we follow the team of Travolta and Samuel L Jackson (in possibly his best role ever), the washed-up boxer played by Bruce Willis or the wife of notable gangster Marcellus (played by Uma Thurman), it doesn't matter. All of the stories are equally entertaining and while it runs long, it never feels like it.

Most movies on this list that are for guys rely on a lot of action. Pulp Fiction has it's fare share, but this is an entirely different kind of guy movie. Like most Tarantino films, this is a dialogue-driven film. What makes it a movie for guys is how cool the entire movie feels. The everyday conversations about things like foot massages or how they say "Quarter Pounder with Cheese" in France are a lot better when guys like Jules and Vincent are talking about them. They are hitmen, but they have a charisma which makes them incredibly relatable and likable guys.

This movie features a lot of comedy, some of it is overt but a lot of it is subtle. It's all really dark. If you need an example, look at the quote above. It's not what is said, it's how it is said. Vincent laments shooting Marvin like anyone else would be upset they knocked over their drink. It's moments like that that have us laughing, even though we probably shouldn't be. It's completely intentional, dark humor and Tarantino really throws a lot of it in there. Don't even get me started on The Gimp.

Manliest Moment: The finale.

#11
Reservoir Dogs

Starring: Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, and Michael Madsen

Directed By: Quentin Tarantino

Release Date: October 23, 1992

Summary: After a simple jewelry heist goes terribly wrong, the surviving criminals begin to suspect that one of them is a police informant.

Memorable Quote: "Are you gonna bark all day, little doggy, or are you gonna bite?"

Blurb Written By: Joseph Lee

Speaking of great Tarantino films, Reservoir Dogs is, in my opinion, his very best. This was also, for all intents and purposes, his debut as a filmmaker. He manages to get an incredible cast featuring guys like Michael Madsen, Steve Buscemi, Tim Roth, Chris Penn and Harvey Keitel and throw them all together in one movie. It's a somewhat complicated story, yet the majority of the film is told either in the warehouse that all of the men were supposed to meet, or through flashbacks.

This movie gives us glimpses into why Tarantino would be so great, and why he would make movies that guys can love. The dialogue at the beginning, while some would say is too talky, is just the sort of conversation I can imagine having with my group of friends. The people are real, they're guys just like you or me. It just so happens that they are about to rob a jewelry store. How about a guy not wanting to be named Mr. Pink? That makes perfect sense to me.

The star of the show, and the best character is Mr. Blonde, played by Michael Madsen. The boss trusts him, the boss's son trusts him, but what they don't realize is that he's a little crazy. Okay, that's wrong. He's a lot crazy. He cuts a cop's ear off just for fun, and then talks into it. While he's doing it, he has classic oldies playing on the radio and he's dancing. Madsen chews up the scenery and plays a memorable character.

As a guy movie, this has plenty of the proper elements: a score of guys who are known for being tougher guys (and Steve Buscemi), lots of blood, violence, guns and even comedy. It has great lines that you can quote all day and memorable characters (not just Mr. Blonde, as I find Mr. White to be pretty awesome as well, in a fatherly sort of way). Reservoir Dogs just isn't a great movie for guys, it's a great movie period. It's one of my favorites and if you have yet to see this classic, I highly recommend it.

Manliest Moment: Mr. Blonde cuts off a cop's ear and talks into it.

Thanks for reading and make sure to check back for the final 10 next week!