Movie Body Counts

June 25, 2009 1:53 PM

"Movie Body Counts tallies the actual, visible 'on screen kills/deaths/bodies' of your favorite action, sci/fi, and war films."

Films with the highest body counts; characters who have killed the most people in a single film.

posted by Prospero (42 comments total)

300: 600
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 1:58 PM on June 25, 2009

There is no way only 307 people get shot in Hard Boiled. A friend and I tried to make that count one afternoon and gave up during the warehouse scene...if memory serves we were already well north of 200.

* disclaimer: we were drunk
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:59 PM on June 25, 2009

Where Hard Boiled is concerned, the stat I'd really like to see is "number of windows broken" - remember that hospital scene? Tequila seemed pathologically driven to jump backwards through as many windows and partitions as possible. You got the feeling he'd be diving through glass even if there wasn't a shoot-out going on.
posted by EatTheWeak at 2:04 PM on June 25, 2009 [3 favorites]

Sure, it's easy to look at their Charts category and assume that bigger body count is better, but if you go down a ways, you'll find movies like The Outlaw Josey Wales at 44 which might not be the biggest violent movie, but each and every kill was a lovingly crafted unique snowflake of bloody retibution.

The big leagues are fun, but a smaller, more personal bloodbath is sometimes just what a viewer needs.
posted by quin at 2:10 PM on June 25, 2009

Without getting into spoilers, Beneath The Planet of the Apes is way ahead of any of these.
posted by Joe Beese at 2:15 PM on June 25, 2009

Anakin Skywalker is a wimp.
posted by ooga_booga at 2:15 PM on June 25, 2009

Major diss to Commando.
posted by Artw at 2:17 PM on June 25, 2009 [2 favorites]

I tried doing this with a friend of mine when watching Rambo 2. We ran afoul once Rambo started blowing up huts with explosive arrows and we had to make estimates on the number of military staff one might have in a (surprisingly flammable) hut. I think we were at around 56 (confirmed) before we gave up. Apparently the total is 67, but I swear those huts had people in 'em.

I'd also argue that John Woo movies are should get a special bonus as his protagonists have a bad awesome habit of emptying two (or more) full magazines into a single person. That's gotta count for more than one kill, really.

This a fun resource. Thanks!
posted by slimepuppy at 2:18 PM on June 25, 2009

I watched The Wild Bunch this past weekend, and was wondering about the body count. Now I know--145. Thanks, MetaFilter!
posted by MrMoonPie at 2:20 PM on June 25, 2009

Ok, so I count four females on the Top Characters List. I could be missing some with androgynous or foreign names from movies I haven't seen. Anyone want to check me?

It makes me a little proud of The Bride.
posted by threeturtles at 2:21 PM on June 25, 2009

Including war movies seem like cheating. Sure, the body counts are high, but they seem less violent* than movies like, say, Kill Bill, where every death is shown in loving detail.

There's got to be a better metric than just the number. One possibility is screen-time per death, but then you get into some issues involving torture scenes (or movies like Hard Candy where the entire length of the thing is just one drawn-out death scene) where you have to make some decisions about what time range is included in the actual death part.

Alternatively, you could go with a measure based on amount of screen-space per death - the battle of elves and men in front of Mordor during LOTR: many deaths, but not much visual real-estate is allotted to each individual death.

Ideally, there would be a weighted measure, where both screen-time and screen-space per death are used to calculate the final metric for ranking movies. Possibly also gallons of blood spilled per death.

*Granted, the name of the web site isn't "violence of movies estimated by body count", but if you're going to put in the time counting bodies, you might as well introduce some sophistication into the process.
posted by logicpunk at 2:25 PM on June 25, 2009 [1 favorite]

There is no way only 307 people get shot in Hard Boiled

Yeah, it seems extra wrong that Hard Boiled is tied with Titanic.
posted by gurple at 2:27 PM on June 25, 2009

Without getting into spoilers, Beneath The Planet of the Apes is way ahead of any of these.

You'd think so, but they seem to be lamely excluding visible on-screen deaths where the victims are too small to make out individually.

Otherwise, I think Star Wars would have to win for the visible on-screen killing of everybody on Alderaan, and then the killing of what must have been hundreds of thousands to millions of people on the Death Star.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 2:31 PM on June 25, 2009

Yeah, it seems extra wrong that Hard Boiled is tied with Titanic.

Unless you think of Tequila as a friggin ice berg, mf!
posted by asfuller at 2:32 PM on June 25, 2009

What?? No Death Wish II - V? That's where the majority of Charles Bronson's kill count comes in!
posted by pravit at 2:34 PM on June 25, 2009

logicpunk: There's got to be a better metric than just the number.

Yeah, the reason I came across this site is because after watching Rambo (the fourth film, not the second one), I wanted to confirm my suspicion that it was the most violent film ever to receive an R rating. But it only ranks #13 on this list.

Deaths divided by minutes of running time (excluding closing credits) might work.
posted by Prospero at 2:42 PM on June 25, 2009

CGI deaths, do they really count?
posted by Artw at 2:43 PM on June 25, 2009

tallies the actual, visible 'on screen kills/deaths/bodies'

Actual?
posted by ODiV at 2:43 PM on June 25, 2009

Interesting idea, but the interface sucks for finding the information and the text is (maybe borderline) inaccessible due to poor contrast between the text colors and background colors. The interface is good for pushing ads, though.

Clint Eastwood is badass in Where Eagles Dare, though.
posted by kirkaracha at 2:45 PM on June 25, 2009

How many billions died on Vulcan in the new Star Trek?
posted by MikeKD at 3:10 PM on June 25, 2009 [1 favorite]

I'm amazed that Joe Bob Briggs didn't do this first. :)

Does anyone else miss MonsterVision?
posted by zarq at 3:13 PM on June 25, 2009

300: 600

yeah, I saw that too... I'm guessing he saw the movie twice...
posted by HuronBob at 3:15 PM on June 25, 2009

How many billions died on Vulcan in the new Star Trek?

They wouldn't count for the purposes of this site (from the FAQ):

Q. Why are planets, planes, explosions...not listed on the site?

A. We count only physically visible, "on screen" kills/bodies in a film. Nothing that is hypothetical or off-screen is counted in the final tallies.

But to answer your question, I don't remember the number, but I'm almost positive they say it in the movie.
posted by quin at 3:39 PM on June 25, 2009

Hey! Zombies don't count!
posted by jabberjaw at 3:53 PM on June 25, 2009

In 300 they were probably counting onscreen deaths of Persians as well. I'm surprised it didn't beat ROTK.
posted by Ber at 4:11 PM on June 25, 2009

"Millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced" but don't count here? Bah.
posted by wendell at 4:23 PM on June 25, 2009

Hokey religions and vague feelings are no substitute for visual confirmation.
posted by ODiV at 4:25 PM on June 25, 2009

I tried doing this with a friend of mine when watching Rambo 2. We ran afoul once Rambo started blowing up huts with explosive arrows and we had to make estimates on the number of military staff one might have in a (surprisingly flammable) hut. I think we were at around 56 (confirmed) before we gave up. Apparently the total is 67, but I swear those huts had people in 'em.

I find it odd they do not list the first Rambo movie, First Blood, which has a body count of... one.

"First Blood" (1982)
Total Body Count: 1
Kill Count Per Minute: 0.01
Torture Scenes: 2
Time of First Death In Film: 29min 31sec
Good Guys Killed: 0
Bad Guys Killed By Rambo: 0
Bad Guys Killed By Supporting Characters: 0
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:45 PM on June 25, 2009

They claimed 6 billion were on Vulcan in the new Star Trek.
posted by nonreflectiveobject at 5:02 PM on June 25, 2009

Also, the movie with the greatest number of kills is PG13. I think the rating system is broken.
posted by nonreflectiveobject at 5:03 PM on June 25, 2009 [1 favorite]

I'm surprised Zatoichi's not in there.
posted by redteam at 5:07 PM on June 25, 2009

Hah! Someone completed my plan from 10 years ago. In the earlier days of the internet, I was trying to figure my angle. I had a great name for the site: Bodycounter. I had even made an animated GIF for link exchanges! But that was it.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:06 PM on June 25, 2009

Any site omitting an entry on Cobra is obviously doing something wrong.
posted by skammer at 7:09 PM on June 25, 2009

"Otherwise, I think Star Wars would have to win for the visible on-screen killing of everybody on Alderaan, and then the killing of what must have been hundreds of thousands to millions of people on the Death Star."

I'm not sure what the population of our home planet was at the time of Dr Strangelove (Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)'s detonation of the Doomsday Machine, or several years later when the Vogon Constructor Fleet arrived to make the hyper-space bypass smack through our orbit at the beginning of A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but the utter destruction of Earth took place in both cases.

Oh... SPOILER. (Sorry about that.)
posted by Mike D at 7:27 PM on June 25, 2009

Junkie-a-thon Trainspotting - Deaths = 2
'The Feel Good Movie Of The Decade' Slumdog Millionaire - Deaths = 8 (2 imagined)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:19 AM on June 26, 2009

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 - 95
Kill Bill: Vol. 2 - 3

That's why part 2 sucks
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:23 AM on June 26, 2009

Thousands of Mongols are buried alive by the titular character in Mulan. It's the highest body count by far for a Disney film.
posted by Scoo at 4:38 AM on June 26, 2009

I'm always amazed that Disney managed to make a G-rated war movie (Mulan). A good example of a movie that essentially has zero on-screen deaths (assuming the avalanche scene doesn't really count), no dead bodies, and yet manages to imply a whole lot of violence. Also, one of the few (only?) Disney movies where the bag guys are never even a little bit goofy or funny. Just mean warriors who want to kill some people. Yes, I like this film.
/derail
posted by dellsolace at 6:58 AM on June 26, 2009 [1 favorite]

"Hey! Zombies don't count!"

That depends on whether they died before the movie started, or after.
posted by Eideteker at 10:43 AM on June 26, 2009

'The Feel Good Movie Of The Decade' Slumdog Millionaire - Deaths = 8 (2 imagined)

I do not understand how anyone can call Slumdog Millionaire a "feel-good movie." These people were not watching the same movie I was watching.

Also: Kill Bill: Vol. 1 - 95
Kill Bill: Vol. 2 - 3

That's why part 2 sucks

No. That's why part 2 is AWESOME.
posted by threeturtles at 11:02 AM on June 26, 2009

I do not understand how anyone can call Slumdog Millionaire a "feel-good movie." These people were not watching the same movie I was watching.

That's how it was mainly marketed in the UK... I can't help feeling that some viewers will be have been somewhat disappointed.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 11:12 AM on June 26, 2009

Hot Shots part deux! actually featured an on-screen body count. It's a good thing to see Topper Harley on fourth place in the per character ranking, beating Rambo which it obviously spoofed.
posted by mbn at 4:48 PM on June 26, 2009