The Best Martyrs in Disaster Movies

1972’s The Poseidon Adventure was the second release, following 1970’s Airport, in the Golden Age of disaster films. These movies drew in some of Hollywood’s most famous stars, finding themselves in earthquakes (Earthquake), burning buildings (The Towering Inferno), and more. The Poseidon Adventure found some of the 1970s most famous names aboard the ill-fated SS Poseidon, overturned by a tsunami en route to Athens: Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Shelley Winters, Gene Hackman, and Pamela Sue Martin, among others. The story finds a small group of survivors climbing to the top of the ship, formerly the bottom, to seek help. As they make their way, a few of the survivors perish, but one death, in particular, is indicative of the genre’s need for a martyr character: Gene Hackman’s Rev. Frank Scott, who leaps across a pool of flaming oil to turn off a valve that is preventing the group from going any further. He saves the day and dies while doing so, literally a few feet away from the engine room where rescue awaits. Scott isn’t the first martyr of disaster films, nor is he the last, but he was one of the best. Below are more heroes that made the ultimate sacrifice:

RELATED: From ‘Independence Day’ to ‘2012’: Why Do We Like Disaster Movies?

Russell Casse in ‘Independence Day’ (1996)

In Roland Emmerich‘s Indpendence Day, a former Vietnam War fighter pilot and most recently a crop duster pilot, Russell Casse (Randy Quaid) claimed that in 1986 he had been abducted by aliens and tested upon. His claims were largely derided, but Casse held firm in the belief that aliens planned to wipe out humanity. Let this be a lesson – don’t be so quick to dismiss the tinfoil hat folk. Proven right, Casse volunteers to join President Whitmore’s (Bill Pullman) counterattack on the aliens as a fighter pilot. But when his missile gets jammed – the last missile in the attack fleet left – Casse tells ground control to tell his children “I love them very much” before flying his fighter jet directly into the alien Destroyer’s weapon port. The mighty ship goes down, Casse having sacrificed his life to successfully save millions. His famous last words? “Hello, boys! I’m baaaack!”

Mr. Thornton in ‘Twister’ (1996)

It’s June 1969, and an incoming, powerful tornado is sweeping through Oklahoma. The patriarch of the Thornton family (Richard Lineback) leads his young clan into their storm shelter where they take refuge. The tornado is particularly strong, however, and threatens to rip the storm cellar door off. Mr. Thornton tries to hold the door down, but the tornado tragically rips the door off with him still holding on, killing him. The horrifying event leads to his daughter Jo’s (Helen Hunt) obsession with the study of tornadoes and a way to increase warning times.

Ruth in ‘Dante’s Peak’ (1997)

Ruth (Elizabeth Hoffman) not only becomes a martyr in Dante’s Peak but an excellent example of another trope of the genre: the stubborn dumbass that won’t leave their home. When the volcano erupts, Harry Dalton (Pierce Brosnan) and Mayor Rachel Wando (Linda Hamilton) race to Wando’s home to grab her two children and flee the area. Only they aren’t there. They’ve gone to try and convince Ruth to leave. So what should have been a no-brainer instead becomes a rescue mission as the two drive through volcanic hell to reach Ruth’s home. Reunited, the five evacuate the lava-engulfed home by crossing the lake in a motorboat. Perfect if the lake is full of water, not so much if that water has turned to sulfuric acid. The acid eats away at the boat and destroys the motor, stranding the group mere meters away from shore. This prompts Ruth to jump out of the boat and walk it to shore, suffering fatal chemical burns in the process, but saving the others, who are able to escape in a nearby truck. Oh, and they save Ruth’s dog Roughy on the way, which in itself is another genre trope: the dog lives.

Harry S. Stamper in ‘Armageddon’ (1998)

An asteroid the size of Texas is heading toward Earth, estimated to make contact in 18 days and wipe out all life. NASA has a plan, though: bring a team of oil drillers to the asteroid via space shuttle, drill a deep hole in said asteroid, drop in a nuclear bomb, get away, detonate, ba-da-boom, ba-da-bing, Bob’s your uncle. They recruit oil driller Harry Stamper (Bruce Willis) and his team to perform the task, and after twelve days of astronaut training, they’re off. After a number of setbacks, the hole is finally completed. It should be mentioned that one of those setbacks is the irreparable damage to the remote detonator. The team draws straws to see who will stay behind to detonate the device, and A.J. (Ben Affleck) is the loser. Or would be, but Stamper disconnects A.J.’s air hose and takes the detonator, choosing to take the place of his future son-in-law. Stamper sets the bomb off once the others are gone, successfully completing the mission, but setting off the true disaster in the film: Aerosmith‘s “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing”.

Frank Harris in ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ (2004)

A severe drop in the temperature of the Atlantic Ocean spawns extreme weather events and three gigantic, hurricane-like superstorms. The superstorms take in frozen air from the atmosphere into their center, flash-freezing anything in their path with temperatures below -150 degrees Fahrenheit, creating a new ice age when they stop, as paleoclimatologist Jack Hall (Dennis Quaid) predicted. Jack makes contact with his son Sam (Jake Gyllenhaal) and instructs him to stay inside the New York Public Library, start a fire, and keep it going, promising he’s on his way to rescue him. With transportation out of the question, Jack and two colleagues, Frank (Jay O. Sanders) and Jason (Dash Mihok), bundle up and begin the walk from Washington, D.C. to New York (don’t ask, just don’t), attached to each other by cable so as not to get separated. In Pennsylvania, Frank falls through the glass ceiling of a mall, held aloft by the cable. But as the other two start losing the struggle to pull Frank up, Frank cuts the cable, falling to his death but saving the lives of his friends.

Leveque, Brazzelton, and Zimsky in ‘The Core’ (2003)

Increasingly catastrophic incidents involving the Earth’s magnetic field can only mean one thing: the Earth’s molten core has stopped rotating. Obviously. But with the U.S. Government’s help, a multi-compartment vessel is built that can drill to the core and release nuclear weapons to kickstart the rotation again. The mission is ultimately a success, of course, with the crisis averted, but at the cost of not one, not two, but three martyrs: Dr. Leveque (Tcheky Karyo), who rescues the detonation timers and launch codes from the last compartment before it implodes; Dr. Brazzelton (Delroy Lindo), who sacrifices himself to work the compartment detachment from the outside; and Zimsky (Stanley Tucci), who figures out their plan will only succeed if the vessel’s plutonium fuel core increases the blast power of the final bomb before he cakes it. Because sometimes, a regular nuclear bomb just doesn’t give you enough.

Marcus in ‘The Last Days of Pompeii’ (1935)

Marcus (Preston Foster) adopts young Flavius (David Holt), the orphaned son of a man Marcus killed in the gladiator arena. When an injury forces Marcus’ professional gladiator career to end, he turns to trading. After raiding the Ammonites, Marcus finds Flavius on the ground near death, having been thrown from his horse. He takes Flavius to a healer and begs for his help. The healer is none other than Jesus Christ himself, who saves the boy’s life. Years later, a grown Flavius (John Wood) is arrested and sentenced to death for helping slaves escape, but as he’s led into the arena, Mount Vesuvius erupts. Marcus wanders the streets amid the chaos, and when he finds the jailer who took Flavius trying to rescue his own son, his anger turns to mercy when he remembers begging Jesus for help. The change of heart inspires Marcus to help as many as he can escape by ship. He sees that Flavius is aboard the ship and is about to join when he notices that the prefect and his men are coming to take the ship for their own (politicians, right?) Marcus closes and holds the gate shut to give the ship time to get away, sacrificing his life to save the innocent.

Jack in ‘Titanic’ (1997)

Let’s start the debate again, shall we? We all know the story – the unsinkable Titanic is on its maiden voyage, hits an iceberg, starts to sink, dude pings it off a propellor, with a love story between Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Rose (Kate Winslet) woven in. As Rose lies upon a floating door, Jack is still in the freezing ocean, holding on to the door but refusing to get on it, convinced it will lead to the death of them both. Soon, they say their goodbyes as Jack lets go and sinks into the depths, taking his own life so Rose will survive. Yes, they both could have been on the door without it sinking, so “martyr” may not quite be right, but a sacrifice nonetheless.

Dale Heath in ‘The Crowded Sky’ (1960)

Two planes are on a direct collision course: a U.S. Navy Lockheed TV-2 jet piloted by Commander Dale Heath (Efrem Zimbalist Jr.) with one passenger, and a full Douglas DC-7 airliner piloted by Dick Barnett (Dana Andrews). With air-traffic control unable to prevent the collision – Heath’s radio and navigation systems are down, and Barnett is just a dumbass – the two collide. Heath, however, dives his plane before it can fatally damage the larger craft, leading to the death of himself and his passenger but saving the lives of those aboard the airliner.

General Thaddeus Slater in ‘The Swarm’ (1978)

Just because a film is considered one of the worst of all time doesn’t mean it can’t stick to the script. The Swarm sees a ginormous swarm of killer bees destroying everything and everyone as they make their way to Houston. General Slater (Richard Widmark), aided by Dr. Bradford Crane (Michael Caine) and Helena Anderson (Katharine Ross), oversees efforts to stop the bees and arrange mass evacuations, with the bees thwarting all attempts. Crane and Slater come to the conclusion that the alarm system at the nearby nuclear power plant attracts the bees, but before they can enact a plan to use that information, the bees invade. To save Crane and Anderson, Slater uses a flame thrower to give the pair time to escape, losing his life but allowing Crane to lead the bees out to sea where they set the swarm ablaze.