10 Best Opening Movie Scenes Of All Time (According To Reddit)

4. Raiders Of The Lost Ark

Raiders Of The Lost Ark
Paramount Pictures

Spielberg strikes again! All of the Indiana Jones movies have fantastic openings (yes, even the fourth), but Raiders Of The Lost Ark is the one that Reddit likes the most.

Following Indy as he dodges booby-traps in a Peruvian temple, retrieves a golden idol, then escapes said temple while an enormous boulder chases him down, it's an adrenaline-pumping sequence that really does have it all - from a pinch of humour, to a dash of horror, to a few skilfully-staged action beats.

It's almost a mini-movie in its own right, with Indy's superb, whip-cracking reveal, a major plot twist (the betrayal of Satipo, played by a young Alfred Molina), and a third-act gut-punch in the form of villain René Belloq's arrival on the scene.

It's a testament to Spielberg's GOAT status that there are 10 or 12 iconic moments in this one sequence alone, and bonus points must also be given to composer John Williams, who uses this opening to debut one of the best movie themes of all time.

You're humming it right now, aren't you? Of course you are.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!