Best Movie Training Montages

Ten films that skipped the boring part of getting good, set to music.

Entries
10
Category
Film
Updated
  1. An old leather reclining chair with a cable dangling from its headrest, an old CRT monitor glowing plain green beside it.

    10. The Matrix

    The Wachowskis · 1999

    The shortest training montage ever filmed: a program loads into Neo's head and he announces he knows kung fu. Off camera, Yuen Woo-ping drilled the cast for months. The montage happened. It just happened before anyone rolled film.

  2. A stack of thick LSAT prep books on a pink fluffy bedspread, a pink pen, a coffee mug and a small dog bed at the foot.

    09. Legally Blonde

    Robert Luketic · 2001

    Elle Woods studies for the LSAT in a blur of pink and scores a 179, which with her 4.0 gets her into Harvard Law. Made for $18 million, grossed $142 million. Proof that the montage works on standardized tests, too.

  3. A thick wooden plank with a fist-sized hole punched through it, on a mountain temple step beside a bowl of rice and chopsticks.

    08. Kill Bill: Volume 2

    Quentin Tarantino · 2004

    The Bride trains under Pai Mei, played by Gordon Liu, who was also the Crazy 88 boss in Volume 1. She learns to punch through wood from three inches away, a skill that becomes relevant inside a coffin. His teaching method is contempt. It works.

  4. A pair of cowboy boots and a pair of sneakers side by side on a sunlit grass field, a portable cassette player between them.

    07. Footloose

    Herbert Ross · 1984

    The training is dancing: Ren teaches Chris Penn's Willard to move, set to Deniece Williams's Let's Hear It for the Boy, a No. 1 hit and an Oscar nominee. Kevin Bacon, for the record, had a dance double and two gymnastics doubles.

  5. An obstacle course on a tiny Greek island: a row of clay pots, a straw training dummy, and a whistle hanging from a broken column.

    06. Hercules

    Ron Clements and John Musker · 1997

    Danny DeVito's satyr trainer Phil sings One Last Hope, by Alan Menken and David Zippel, while drilling a teenage demigod. A year later Zippel wrote Mulan's training song too. One man was quietly running the montage industry.

  6. Two vintage cars gleaming in a sunny yard, a can of wax and two rags on the hood, a half-painted wooden fence behind them.

    05. The Karate Kid

    John G. Avildsen · 1984

    Training disguised as chores: wax the cars, sand the floor, paint the fence. Miyagi gets free labor, Pat Morita gets an Oscar nod. Avildsen made Rocky first, and the tournament song You're the Best was a Rocky III reject. Recycling.

  7. A dirt bike mid-wheelie on a narrow rowhouse street, a pair of boxing hand wraps hanging from its handlebar, golden afternoon light.

    04. Creed

    Ryan Coogler · 2015

    Adonis runs through North Philadelphia while real local dirt-bike and ATV riders pop wheelies around him, and Meek Mill gives way to the old Rocky horns. Grown adults cried. Stallone got an Oscar nomination for watching proudly.

  8. A tall wooden pole with an arrow stuck at the very top, two heavy bronze discs tied to ribbons lying at its base, mist on a training field.

    03. Mulan

    Tony Bancroft and Barry Cook · 1998

    I'll Make a Man Out of You, by Matthew Wilder and David Zippel, sung by Donny Osmond for Shang. To sound like he'd been hit in the stomach, Osmond punched himself in the stomach while recording. Method acting, but for a cartoon.

  9. A wooden sled loaded with logs in deep Siberian snow beside a rustic barn, a gleaming treadmill shown in a lit window across the valley.

    02. Rocky IV

    Sylvester Stallone · 1985

    Rocky trains in a Siberian cabin with snow and lumber; Drago trains in a lab with machines, doctors and steroids. John Cafferty and Vince DiCola supply the synths. The film won five Razzies and, judging by the montage, the Cold War.

  10. A long flight of stone museum steps at dawn, a gray sweatsuit hood and a pair of old sneakers left on the top step, the city skyline behind.

    01. Rocky

    John G. Avildsen · 1976

    Bill Conti's Gonna Fly Now hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 in 1977 as the soundtrack to a man running up the 72 steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Strangers still run them daily for photos. Every montage since is a cover version.

Honorable mentions

  • A tiny marionette-scale weight bench and barbell on a toy-size gym floor, puppet strings dangling from above.

    Team America: World Police

    Trey Parker · 2004

    Gary gets exactly one day of training, so the film stops for a song, written by Trey Parker, explaining that what you need is a montage. It runs about two minutes and is the most honest entry here.

Dishonorable mentions

  • A big-rig truck cab interior with an arm-wrestling trophy on the dashboard and a baseball cap backward on the seat.

    Over the Top

    Menahem Golan · 1987

    Stallone, reportedly paid $12 million, plays an arm-wrestling trucker. Sammy Hagar sings, Eddie Van Halen plays bass. It made $16 million on a $25 million budget, and David Mendenhall, as his son, won two Razzies. Nobody's arm was the problem.

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