10 Ways To Destroy New York

[Forkboy]

New York, New York: A city so nice they keep destroying it. In science fiction films, that is.

The Big Apple is arguably the city most likely to be devastated by a giant monster or natural disaster in movies, in part because it has such lovely landmarks to devastate.

It wasn't always so, at least not in recent memory. James Sanders, author of Celluloid Skyline, said that the filmed destruction of New York became taboo after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

But as sensitivities lessened, New York again became fair game, culminating with this year's Cloverfield.

With a new Escape From New York remake planned, viewers can expect more apocalyptic destruction for this most recognizable of American cities. "What's the point of showing a demolished suburban street?" Sanders said. "You take the most familiar, iconic symbol of civic society in the world, a big city, like New York, and that's where disaster is going to be the most powerful."

Following is a countdown of the top 10 movies in which New York gets the big smackdown. (The list doesn't include films in which the city is already decimated, such as I Am Legend and the Italian Mad Max wannabe 2019: After the Fall of New York: This list includes only movies in which we actually see the city getting blowed up real good.)

10. Ghostbusters (1984). The giant Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man invades the Upper West Side in the climax of this classic comedy caper. Dan Aykroyd spent the whole first day of shooting driving around the city in his customized Ectomobile. The Ghostbuster headquarters was Firehouse Number 8 in Tribeca; all of the college scenes were filmed at Columbia University. Director Ivan Reitman wanted to film the marshmallow man next to the Statue of Liberty but scrapped the idea when it proved too difficult. Five years later, in the sequel Ghostbusters II, he got his wish: The Statue of Liberty got her own supporting role.

9. Godzilla (1998). Say what you will about Roland Emmerich's odd reboot of the famed Japanese giant-lizard franchise, the city of New York nevertheless plays a major role. Not only does the big iguana get tangled up in the Brooklyn Bridge, it also lays eggs in Madison Square Garden. The Twin Towers are shown in the skyline, and the Fulton Fish Market gets smashed when the creature first pops out of the East River.

8. The Day After Tomorrow (2004). In director Roland Emmerich's love letter to New York, apocalyptic climate change floods and then freezes the city, along with most of the Northern Hemisphere. Jake Gyllenhaal and his pals hole up in the New York Public Library and survive by burning the books inside. The movie's poster depicts the Statue of Liberty's torch poking out of a sheet of ice.

7. Meteor (1979). An asteroid named Orpheus heads to Earth, and the Americans (led by Sean Connery) try to convince the Russians (led by Natalie Wood) to combine their nuclear warheads to destroy it or blow it off course. Henry Fonda, Karl Malden and Martin Landau are the famous people who have to deal with New York's getting obliterated by a piece of the rogue meteor, starting with a big rock that lands in Central Park.

6. Armageddon (1998). The World Trade Center and Grand Central Station get smashed by a meteor, the harbinger of the world-destroying asteroid on a collision course with Earth. Flaming pieces of debris also shear off the deco tip of the Chrysler Building, which plummets onto 42nd Street.

5. Independence Day (1996). Unfriendly aliens wipe out a lot of familiar cities before unleashing their full fury on Manhattan on the 2nd of July. It's ominous enough when huge flying saucers hover over the skyscrapers, but when the lasers begin shooting, it's simply chilling. Disaster-meister Emmerich again seems to take great joy in destroying the city, though he inaccurately puts the Empire State Building in the middle of a block, rather than on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 34th Street. Favorite bit: Harvey Fierstein stuck in traffic as a wall of flame approaches: "Oh crap!"

4. When Worlds Collide (1951). This movie won an Academy Award for its special effects, which include the thorough destruction of New York. A wave of water hits the island and washes over the buildings as screaming Gothamites flee. But New Yorkers are the survivors who head into space to repopulate the human race. Imagine.

3. Cloverfield (2008). Nothing says "I Heart NY" better than bowling the head of the Statue of Liberty down a Manhattan street. Filmed in Blair Witch Project-like cinema verite, producer J.J. Abrams' post-modern monster movie features the pulverization of the Woolworth Building and the filleting of Brooklyn Bridge pedestrians like so much sushi.

2. Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953). A prehistoric reptile, awakened by nuclear radiation, beaches itself on Coney Island and snacks on sunbathers. In the climax, the creature attacks the Cyclone roller coaster for one last ride.

1. King Kong (1933), (1976) and (2005). All three incarnations of the classic giant-monkey movie feature large-scale destruction in Manhattan, culminating in Kong's climb atop a prominent skyscraper.

Merian C. Cooper and Ernie Shoedsack's 1933 black-and-white original featured Kong tossing aside an elevated subway train and scaling the Empire State Building. True New Yorkers know that Kong heads up the building on the southern face, with the Chrysler Building in the background, but falls on the western side.

In John Guillerman's now-camp classic 1976 remake, the climactic moment was moved to the then-brand-new World Trade Center. Employees of the Empire State Building objected to the change, and everyone on the 102nd floor wore a gorilla suit in protest.

In Peter Jackson's 2005 remake, the film goes back to the 1930s and the climax again takes place atop the Empire State Building. Jackson's movie made much more use of its New York setting, with some 90,000 buildings created in a computer or on a backlot set to re-create 1933 Manhattan, including Times Square and Central Park, site of the questionable ice-sliding scene. More trivia: the pilot who shoots down the great ape in the final scene is played by special-effects master Rick Baker, who played Kong in a costume in the 1976 version. --Mike Szymanski

http://www.scifi.com/sfw/news/sfw_news_20080908.html

[salvorhardin]

1. Hmm...

I'd think that, counting Japanese monster movies and anime, that Tokyo would be the most oft destroyed city on film.

[Forkboy]

2. I can guarantee that.

I think I have the proof sitting on my DVD rack. :)

[Orrex]

3. Yeah, but to most American viewers...

"Tokyo" is just a generic Asian city with lots of pagodas and Mt. Fuji in the background. New York, on the other hand, is The Big Apple.

:sarcasm:

[salvorhardin]

4. Hmm... I'd like to think that's not the case

I mean, Tokyo is a major world city with 12-14 million people in it, 8.5 million in the 23 special wards that make up its core. New York City on the other hand has about 8.25 million people. NYC is only the 12th most populous city in the world behind Tokyo, Jakarta, Mexico City, Shanghai, Seoul, Moscow, Sao Paul, Delhi, Istanbul, Karachi and Mumbai.

But you're probably right. NYC is in a special class of city and to Americans it is *the* city. Still, I can't help but think the author did his readers a disservice.

[Orrex]

5. Oh, you're 100% correct--the author dropped the ball

But, sadly, I'd be willing to bet that a goodly fraction of Americans, if asked to place Tokyo, would put it either in "somewhere in China" or else "in Hong Kong."