4. The Restaurant Battle - The Protector
The Protector is a cracking Tony Jaa-starring martial arts flick that absolutely demands your attention, especially the four-minute steadicam sequence that sees Jaa's protagonist fighting his way through a restaurant, ascending several flights of stairs as he dispatches countless goons. This is a scene that really exemplifies Jaa's physical prowess, for he has virtually no time to rest and has to be "on" for the entire four minutes, hitting the right cues and making the entire enterprise look as authentic as possible. And does he pull it off or what? Like a video game come to life, Jaa kicks ass, takes names, and is respectfully out of breath by the time he reaches the top. Who needs fancy filmmaking tricks when you can just film a guy punching and kicking people while running up some stairs?
How It Changed Cinema: Martial arts sequences don't need epileptic, ADD-addled cuts and shaky camerawork to be entertaining and exhilarating. With its slick, steadicam movement, Tony Jaa is no less an indefatigable martial arts master.