There are A LOT of ‘last-minute saves’ in the movies and they tend to vary in degrees of how last-minute they really are since some are just that, the last-minute, while others are kind of a slow burn to the final moment that appears to happen just in the nick of time, such as the arrival of Gandalf and the calvary in Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, or the X-Wings at Maz Kanata’s fortress in The Force Awakens. These moments are great since they offer that sense of relief that is needed considering that otherwise, the day would be lost and the good guys would be ended in the next few moments or right that second. Sometimes these saves are made a little too obvious, but at other times they come off just the way they should since they’re done in such a way that shows that they fit perfectly with the story. But again, some of them are a little drawn out to be a real last-minute save, while others are the do or die moments that don’t allow for anything else since a person has to act in that single moment or everything is going to be lost and the audience will gasp in shock at what was allowed to happen.
Here are some of the best last-minute saves in movies.
5. Titan A.E.
It might not be held up as one of the greats, but this one moment kind of defined the whole purpose of the movie since the Titan was designed to build humanity a new home, and the Drej didn’t want that since they saw humans as a threat that needed to be eliminated. But the trick here is that somehow the human figured out to use the living energy of the Drej to fuel their machine, and Cale just happened to know how to reroute the system at the last second, on his own no less, to make it work. Plus, placing his father’s ring on the command node at the very last second, before the Drej wiped them all out with a pulse of energy, was about as close as it gets.
4. Jurassic Park
One might be asking how in the world no one notices a T.Rex entering the room since the impact tremors were already noticeable from a great distance much earlier in the movie. The argument could be made that the humans were too scared to notice and that the raptors were simply too intent on their prey. But seriously, when one is scared and alert they’re bound to notice just about anything that constitutes a threat, especially something this big. But still, it was a great save in the movie since the T.Rex couldn’t have been timed any better than the mid-jump grab that occurred, and of course, the other raptors would attack rather than run or go after their prey.
3. Waterworld
Some might want to think that the Mariner put a lot of faith in that length of rope and they’re not wrong, but seeing as how he was able to make his way down to the ruins of humanity so often it’s easy to just assume that he might have seen something like the bungee cord before. There is a lot to assume in this movie, but it’s the better choice if one wants to enjoy it since otherwise this movie can be ripped apart by facts and reality if one just barely tries. But tying off that quickly was pretty fortunate, though of course, one might need exceptional knot-tying skills when living on the water. Okay, I’ll stop there.
2. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2
Neville became something of a badass in the last Harry Potter movie, especially when considering that he was the bumbling, forgetful but courageous loser in the first few movies that turned into the gangly, uncertain botany student somewhere along the way. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time to help his friends since he not only kept Nagini from striking Ron and Hermione, but the snake’s death also helped Harry since Nagini was the final Horcrux and, as a result, the one thing that pushed the fight back into Harry’s favor as Voldemort’s power was gone and he was therefore little more than a shadow of his former self.
1. The Fifth Element
One thing about this is that Leeloo had studied as many words as she could all the way up to W before coming upon ‘war’ and finding out how horrible it was. But with the kind of speed she had when it came to reading and comprehending one might think that she might factor in the idea that a lot of people didn’t care for war, and that love, which comes before war in the dictionary, is a lot stronger and therefore easier to believe in. But since she hadn’t known love from anyone at that point it did make sense that she needed love to make certain that humanity was worth saving, which worked.
Sometimes that last moment is the most important of all of them.
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