Cycles of Revenge in Live-Action Films.
- In American History X, this trope is played tragically straight, with a gang of black bullies shooting Danny dead in retaliation for him pulling a Bully Hunter on them the day before.
- Bad Black: In The Stinger, Hirigi's wife tries to exact revenge on Black for carrying out revenge on Hirigi, which will inevitably lead to Black getting revenge on her [[Sequel Hook in the future].
- Blue Ruin: Dwight wants vengeance on the man who killed his parents. He eventually learns that his parents' murderer was himself inspired by revenge, and Dwight's own act of vengeance just kicks off yet another cycle in the man's family.
- Captain America: Civil War has this for all the major events throughout the film and drives the plot forward. Black Panther wants revenge on the Winter Soldier for apparently murdering his father and spends a majority of the film chasing him. Zemo wants revenge on the Avengers because he blames them for the death of his family during the Sokovia incident, caused by Ultron. Ultron was itself a ramification of Scarlet Witch's Mind Rape of Tony in vengeance for her parents being killed by Stark weapons. Zemo's plans for revenge include murdering Black Panther's father and framing Winter Soldier for it and later showing Iron Man evidence that Winter Soldier killed his parents, all in an effort to have the Avengers kill themselves for him. Once Iron Man sees the footage of Bucky killing his parents, he goes into a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against him and he and Cap engage in a brutal beatdown that essentially ends their friendship. Black Panther, who discovered that Zemo was his father's true killer, decides to break the cycle after he has seen what revenge has done. He proves he's learned his lesson in his solo movie where he strives to prevent the villain, Erik Killmonger, from taking revenge for his father and mistreated Africans all over the world by starting a world war, despite agreeing with his point about Wakanda needing to do more to help. He builds Wakandan outreach centers instead.
- Casper Meets Wendy: Desmond Spellman wanted to kill Wendy to prevent her from becoming more powerful than him as predicted by a prophecy and, to make sure nobody would try to avenge her, he intended to kill her family.
- This is the entire basis of the film Changing Lanes: When each man refuses to budge and try to see things from the other person's shoes, they get stuck in a cycle of increasingly undiplomatic responses and revenge. Throughout the film, it is shown where each gets opportunities to end it by doing the right thing... opportunities that are, for the most part, promptly ignored* .
- In City of God, the gang war is touched off by revenge against Lil Ze for raping Knockout Ned's girlfriend and killing his brother and uncle. However, in a year, no one knows how it started, as everyone joins sides for revenge on the other side.
- With the notable exception of the kid who kills Ned. He had joined Ned's side, telling them he wants to get revenge for his father's death. Turns out he was the son of the security guard that Ned killed near the beginning of the war.
- In Death Sentence, Nick (Kevin Bacon's character) having his son killed in a gang initiation, which leads to Nick killing the guy who killed his son, which leads to the killers coming after him, which leads to Nick killing one of the killers, which leads to the killers killing Nick's wife, which leads to Nick killing the rest of the killers.
- The Emperor and the Assassin. Ying Zheng crushes the nation of Zhao that once held him hostage as a child. Aware of this trope from his own story, and seeing the hateful expressions on the Zhao children, he has them all buried alive so they won't grow up and rebel against his reign.
- The second act of the kung-fu film, Fearless (2006), runs on this: the hero, Huo Yuanjia, intending to avenge his students' honour, challenged a rival martial artist, Qin, to a massive duel that culminates with Huo accidentally landing a fatal punch into Qin. The very next day, Qin's godson seeks revenge... by killing Huo's mother and daughter, before killing himself when Huo tries confronting him.
- The object lesson of the Bruce Lee film Fist of Fury.
- Referenced in For Your Eyes Only when James Bond tries to convince Melina Havelock not to let her desire for revenge against her parents' killer destroy her. He quotes the sentiment attributed to Confucius (see Real Life below):"The Chinese have a saying: 'Before setting off on revenge, you first dig two graves.'"
- Heatwave (2022): Lane turns out to be the son of the slumlord who Claire nearly killed in revenge for letting her family die in a fire. He works with Eve to get revenge on Claire in return. Claire ends up killing him in self-defense.
- The Danish film, In a Better World, is extensively about this. In his Establishing Character Moment, Christian, after being pushed down by the local schoolyard bully, assaults the bully the next day, and beats him viciously with a bicycle pump before threatening him with a knife to the throat. In this case, the bully, being rather understandably scared out his wits, promises to never ever to start anything with him again, and actually keeps true to his word.Claus: If you hit him, then he hits you, and then it never ends!
Christian: (coldly) Not if you hit hard enough the first time.- Of course, Christian's worldview does come back to bite him hard, when he accidentally injures his best friend during another payback mission.
- The Joshuu Sasori films develop a series of these across the first 4 entries. The protagonist's desire for revenge against the detective by whom she was seduced and betrayed fuels her repeated escape attempts. Thus, the guards hate her. This results in harsh punishments for all the prison inmates, which means they all hate her too, and they hate the guards almost as much. The warden hates her personally for causing all the trouble, and for the pain and embarrassment she's caused to happen to him personally. In the 2nd film, savage new inmate Oba sees her as a threat to her dominance among the prisoners, causing more betrayal down the line, and a new vendetta for Matsu. The 3rd film replaces the guards with detective Kondo, who takes her escape understandably personally. There's also the jealous woman downstairs from her, and old enemy Katsu to deal with. By the 4th film, every policeman and member of prison staff hates her passionately.
- This is the entirety of the plot of Karaoke Terror, a Japanese Exploitation Film. It starts with a teen hooligan killing a lady (just because) from a group of karaoke-lovers, and the victim's fellow karaoke-mates then stalks down the teen and kills him in retaliation. Then the teen's friends decide to stalk the women back, and so on and forth.
- In Kill Bill, The Bride gets revenge on Vernita Green for having a hand in the massacre of her wedding party. But after killing her, The Bride realizes that Vernita's daughter, Nikki, had witnessed the whole thing and so The Bride says to Nikki, "When you grow up, if you still feel raw about it, I'll be waiting." Tarantino has said that he's interested in making a Kill Bill Vol. 3 in the future, where a grown-up Nikki Green hunts down The Bride, and a fourth film that elevates into this with B.B. (Bill & The Bride's daughter) hunting down Nikki for killing her mother.
- Implied at the end of The Kingdom (2007). After killing the Big Bad, Adam asks Fleury what he whispered in Janet's ear before going to Saudi Arabia. At the same time, an aunt asks her grandson what his grandfather whispered in his ear as he died. The answer to both? "We'll kill them all."
- Kung Fu Hustle combines this with Lensman Arms Race:
- The Crocodile Gang attacks a police station, beating the cops for making the mistake of arresting the mob boss’ girlfriend for spitting on the side walk.
- The Crocodile Gang leave the station, to be dispatched by the Axe Gang.
- Petty thugs Sing and Bone, initially presented as bad-asses and who seem to be from the Axe Gang, appear at a slum tenement, the Pig Sty, to conduct a shakedown, but are driven off by Landlady.
- The real Axe Gang shows up and beats the people of Pig Sty.
- Until three heroes reveal themselves as seemingly ordinary tenement residents, and defeat the Axe Gang.
- So the Axe Gang recruits two deadly harpists, who go to Pig Sty and kill the three heroes.
- So Landlord and Landlady reveal themselves as even greater masters, and defeat the harpists.
- So the Axe Gang recruits the most dangerous master of all, the dumpy-looking but powerfully frog-like Beast, who defeats Landlord and Landlady.
- But when Beast goes to Pig Sty, he discovers that Sing has transformed into a true master of the Buddhist Palm. Sing, now a redeemed man, defeats Beast, but in an enlightened manner that brings Beast to heel and ends the cycle of escalation.
- This trope is blamed for the war that destroyed civilization in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, and attempting to prevent it is the reason for the existence of the titular Thunderdome. As the master of ceremonies character explained it: "Fighting leads to killing, and killing leads to warring, and that was damned near the end of us all. Now look at us! All busted up, and everyone talking about hard rain. But we've learned! From the dust of 'em all, Bartertown's learned. Now when men get to fighting, it happens here, and it -finishes- here! Two men enter, one man leaves!"
- Manila in the Claws of Light: Ah-Tek kills Julio's girlfriend Ligaya. In turn, Julio kills him... in broad daylight, causing an angry mob to form and go after him.
- In Steven Spielberg's Munich, the main protagonist, Avner, fears that he is treading down this path.
- The Northman is all about the main character, Amleth, seeking to kill his uncle for killing his father. It turns out his uncle was himself acting out of a sense of vengeance for what he perceived as his brother's misdeeds. What's worse, once Amleth starts slaughtering his uncle's men, his uncle becomes hellbent on killing Amleth even after Amleth starts to consider giving up on his quest to live a peaceful life.
- In Now You See Me, The Reveal involves a very basic motive of revenge. In the sequel, the son of one of the victims in the first film tries to take down the Four Horsemen for what was done to his father.
- Similarly, in Oldboy (2003), Oh Dae-su wants to find the mysterious 'Evergreen' and make him pay for imprisoning him for fifteen years. It turns out that Evergreen is Lee Woo-jin, who was getting him back for carelessly outing an incestuous relationship he was having with his sister while they were back in high school, which drove his sister to suicide. What's more, Lee's revenge was just beginning.
- Only God Forgives is based around a chain of revenge killings and beatings, with family members stepping up to avenge their debts against the ones who wronged the victims. One of the major themes is breaking the revenge cycle and finding peace against the pressures from others to continue the violence. Probably.
- The Prestige is about two stagehands-turned-magicians becoming bitter rivals; After one accidentally causes the other's wife's death (performing a drowning trick), the other one threatens him with a gun and maims him, upon which the other sabotages his show, ruining his contract, upon which the other steals his act, upon which the other breaks his leg and corrupts his staff, upon which the other steals his plans and kidnaps his assistant... Eventually, it all culminates in one magician framing the other for his death.
- In The Proposition, Mr. Fletcher explains how to avoid one of these:"There's a little something called the law of reciprocity. You kill one of theirs, and they kill one of ours. Here's a piece of general advice: if you're going to kill one, make sure you bloody well kill them all."
- Shotgun Stories is about two feuding sets of half-brothers. The older set were born when their shared father was an abusive alcoholic. They crash his funeral and denounce him as an evil man, which enrages the newer family he made after reforming. The second set of brothers antagonize the first set in vengeance, triggering a cycle of revenge.
- Star Wars: The whole Skywalker Saga can be summed up as the Sith nearly get wiped out by the Jedi, then the Sith get their revenge by taking advantage of the Jedi becoming complacent by the time of Phantom Menace by ordering the Clones to execute Order 66 after Grievous is defeated by Obi-Wan and the Jedi note try to overthrow Palpatine. Then, the Republic gets replaced by the Empire, a more perfect government, which prompts Bail Organa and Mon Mothma to start the Rebel Alliance, which manages to overthrow Palpatine via Anakin/Darth Vader redeeming himself to save his son Luke. Then, the Rebel Alliance becomes the New Republic, a illegal and illegitimate government, and starts stamping out what remains of the Empire after the Battle of Jakku while being corrupt as the Old Republic, note the most diehard Imperial loyalists led by Brendol Hux and Grand Admiral Rae Solane start the First Order, which begins rebuilding its strength in the Unknown Regions against the terms of the Galactic Concordance, before Supreme Leader Snoke and Kylo Ren/Ben Solo become the new leaders of the Order while Brendol's son Armitage and Phasma take over the military leadership and avenge the Empire by destroying the New Republic with Starkiller Base. note Despite the Resistance fleeing for their lives while Rey is trained by Luke, they are decimated at the Battle of Crait, though Luke and Rey manage to get the remnants of the Resistance away from the First Order, now led by Kylo who killed Snoke. THEN, it's revealed the First Order is a way for Palpatine to get revenge on the New Republic that destroyed his perfect Empire, while it's also revealed Snoke was a creation of his and that he was just getting started, since he has a fleet of Star Destroyers with Death Star lasers. note Things get more dark when it's also revealed Rey was Palpatine's granddaughter and a Sith assassin Ochi, was tasked by the Sith Eternal to bring her back "home" to Exegol, but Sheev's son Dathan Palpatine and his wife Mirmiar trick Ochi by claiming she's not on Jakku by wearing beads from Pasaana, which convinces the assassin to look for her there after he kills them against the advice of Bosvarga and Cerensco, leading to his death. Despite a few setbacks during the movie, such as Chewbacca getting captured by the Knights of Ren, the only other Sith wayfinder getting destroyed by Kylo/Ben and Ben himself being redeemed at the cost of Leia's life while Rey exiles herself to Ahch-To, she eventually comes "back home" to Exegol. Later, Palpatine orders a Xyston-class Star Destroyer to destroy Kijimi note , which lures the Resistance to Exegol. Then, when Rey confronts her grandad, Palpatine wants her to kill him so he could escape the decaying body fate he was dealt with after Anakin killed him on board the Death Star II. However, Rey fakes it while Ben fights his former Knights of Ren friends with the Skywalker lightsaber and Rey fights the Sovereign Protectors. When going up against the Emperor, however, he decides it's better to drain their life force which restores his body to perfection and proceeds to throw Ben in a chasm as payback to what his grandfather Anakin did to him all these years ago. When the Resistance is aided by the Citizen's Fleet to prevent the fleet from leaving Exegol, Palpatine unleashes a Force Lightning storm that nearly destroys the entire fleet. However, due to the spirits of the Jedi, Rey prepares to fight her grandfather, who uses the same old Force Lightning trick, which gets deflected by both the Skywalker family lightsaber and Leia's lightsaber, causing him to die, thus preventing the First/Final Order from fully reviving the Empire and any and all remaining First Order forces get overthrown by people everywhere, but achieves one goal: the death of the Skywalker/Solo bloodlines, though it's downplayed when Rey inherits the Skywalker bloodline as her own.
- Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. After Ryu is cheated by organ donors, he is forced into a disastrous kidnapping plot, triggering one long Cycle of Revenge.
- In Taken, Bryan slaughters the members of a human trafficking ring, including one named Marko, to rescue his daughter. In Taken 2, the villains' families, led by Marko's father Murad, attempt to avenge them and attack Bryan and his family. Bryan eventually discusses this with Murad, particularly when he learns that Murad has two more sons who will surely attempt to avenge him as well. Or Murad could go home and be with his remaining family, ending the cycle; those who who have died so far is simply the price paid of their "business", echoing the lives and families destroyed by their actions. Murad tries to kill him and Bryan kills him. While there is a Taken 3, Murad's sons do not appear. Maybe they decided not to continue it?
- In the final tale of Tales from the Hood, a gangster shoots another dude for killing a friend. In his later rehabilitation, he is confronted by shades of people he killed, many as parts of other cycles, including some guys who hadn't even done the killing he killed them for. In the end, he is gunned down by three other men in revenge for that last killing, who happened to be the three protagonists of the movie's framing device. In the end, it turns out that they too were slain for killing the guy in the last tale, and are currently in Hell.
- Discussed in Troy. Hector kills Patroclus in battle, so Achilles kills Hector, so Paris plans to kill Achilles. Briseis asks Achilles where it all ends, and he replies "It never ends".
