Neck Snap / Live-Action Films

• Happens twice in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension:
  • Lord John Whorfin performs a Neck Lift on an attendant, pins him against a wall, and snaps his neck.
  • During the infiltration of Yoyodyne, John Parker snaps the neck of a Red Lectroid.
• The president in Air Force One does a pretty realistic one, with considerable effort and a quiet little snap.
• In the made-for-video B-movie Airline Disaster, Agent Vitale snaps a female hijacker's neck. A rare example that suggests that a) it takes effort and b) it actually hurts the person being killed.
• Done realistically in The American. George Clooney's character runs a rival hitman off the road, then grabs his head as he leans out the window to shoot him, using his weight to break the man's neck over the car door.
• This happens in the 2014 revenge flick American Muscle when the villain's only female mook - a short, scrawny, inked-up punk called "Sassy Fanny", gets the drop on Jack as he tries to sneak into his brother's home. After a vicious beatdown on the veranda Jack pins her to the wall and strangles her before finally ripping her tongue out with one hand (payback for biting his neck in a prior fight) and breaking her neck with the other.
• Anaconda: Bizarrely, the Anaconda uses this on it first victim.
• The Annihilators from 1984 has a rather bad example, with the character simply grabbing an enemy soldier in a headlock and lightly squeezing and pushing his head to the side with his palm, with the soldier's head falling limp with a popping sound effect.
• Army of the Dead: Maria Cruz is killed with a particularly graphic one. An Alpha zombie comes out of the elevator behind her, grabs her head before she can even react, and twists a full 180 degrees with enough force to cause her spine to pop out.
• Assassins: After Bain is arrested and put in a police car, he disposes of a cop sitting in the driver's seat by kicking out the side window and breaking his neck from behind, using only one hand in a casual effortless way that suggests the cop's spine was made of cardboard.
• The Avengers (1998). Mrs. Peel's clone does it to a Prospero Project Lab staff member while breaking into the facility.
• The 1995 action film Ballistic has the villain's muscular henchwoman and lover Claudia (played by Cory Everson) beat a man nearly to death before snapping his neck with one hand. Later, Claudia finds herself on the receiving end of this when Jesse manages to reverse her chokehold and yank Claudia's head over her back, using her shoulder as leverage to break her neck.
• The Bell Witch Haunting has one of the possessed perform this on the priest one-handed.
• In Big Game, the vice president is killed by having his neck slammed against a bathroom sink, snapping it in the process. Helps to Make It Look Like an Accident.
• In Black Christmas, Black Mask kills Helena this way during the ritual in the frat house.
• BloodRayne: Rayne finishes Katarin this way.
• In Blue Jasmine, Jasmine's husband Hal committed suicide in prison by hanging himself. Jasmine's listeners think it must have been horrible to suffocate to death, but she enlightens them that hanging actually kills you by neck snap.
• In Bodyguards and Assassins the final assassin does this to a Mauve Shirt. Unusually enough he has to use a scarf for leverage and wastes a fair bit of time pulling it off.
• The Bourne Series:
  • The Bourne Ultimatum subverts this, with Nikki jumping on an assassin's back and trying to snap his neck, only to be flung back into the wall behind them.
  • Jason Bourne plays it straight, with Bourne doing this to the Asset.
• Bulletproof Monk: This is how Jade rounds out her Designated Girl Fight against the villain's sexy second-in-command, Nina Strucker. Right after breaking Nina's leg and delivering a vicious sucker punch that sends her careening headfirst into a wall, Jade pulls her haggard opponent into a chokehold before brutally snapping her neck. This is a somewhat poor example due to Jades awkward grip on her victim, but her violent twisting motion along with the signature "Crunch!" of a neck being broken leaves little room for confusion.
• Cadaver (2020): While Leonora is in a struggle with one of the actors, she puts her guest mask on his face. As a result, the large man in white who comes to them through the secret door behind the painting mistakes the actor for a guest and snaps his neck, killing him
• The TV movie Chameleon has Kam (played by Bobbie Philips) snapping a neck on a person.
• Subverted in Changeling. The child-murdering Serial Killer Northcott was supposed to die this way at the gallows, but ends up being strangled to death due to a rope malfunction.
• In Clear and Present Danger, the drug lord's right-hand man Felix kills his lover/informant Moira by breaking her neck while they're making out.
• Clownface: Clownface kills Jenna's father by snapping his neck.
• In Clownhouse, this is lunatic Cheezo's preferred method of killing people. In a Surprisingly Realistic Outcome, this is shown as being much harder to do than it is in most movies and Cheezo has to put serious effort into it.
• In Cold Mountain, Ruby does this to a rooster that won't shut up, then immediately prepares it for supper. Specifically, she wrings its neck, done by twirling the chicken by the head twice and then whipping the body forward (as we see in the film, this also tears off the head when done correctly).
• In Commando, John Matrix snaps the neck of one of Arius's henchmen while aboard a plane (differing slightly as the said henchman is knocked out first). This leads to the immortal line, "Do not disturb my friend, he is dead tired."
• In Cradle of Fear, The Man kills a nurse when breaking into the asylum by grabbing her head and twisting it around 180 degrees.
• Cryptz: This is how one of the female vampires ends up killed.
• In Cube 2: Hypercube, at the end Simon murders Sasha by breaking her neck.
• Bane's preferred method of making a point in The Dark Knight Rises. One case subverts the instant death effect that this trope usually has, as when Bane snaps the neck of Smug Snake/Corrupt Corporate Executive Daggett, Daggett can be heard screaming afterward.
• In Death Becomes Her, Madeline is pushed down a long flight of marble stairs and winds up in a heap with her head twisted around backwards. We do hear several bones break during the tumble.
• Pachenko in Death Race. In the movie, it's legal to kill other drivers during races, but for Jason Statham's character it's personal. So instead of simply running him over when he gets the chance, Jason gets out of his car in the middle of a race, just to snap Pachenko's neck.
• In Death Ring, Matt does this to one of the sentries when he sneaks back into Vachs' mansion to rescue Lauren.
• In The Descent, Juno does this to a Crawler.
• Tragically performed by a son against father in Desert Heat after being pushed too far by an abusive father.
• In the 1929 film version of The Desert Song, General Birabeau grabs Azuri by the neck.
• The Devil's Rejects: Tiny does this to Sheriff Wydell, who's trying to kill his sister Baby, and the Sheriff ends up with his head on backwards. Somewhat justified in that Tiny is seven feet tall.
• During John McClane's first brawl in Die Hard, he does this to a guy by putting him in a choke-hold and falling down the stairs with him. Missing the usual "walnut-snapping" sound effect.
• Hayabusa does this to a random mook while sneaking into the bad guy's lab in DOA: Dead or Alive The Movie.
• In Dogma, the angel Bartleby is accosted by a security guard, and says, in what is arguably the best use of a Shout-Out in movie history: "Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry." The security guard doesn't heed the warning, and a few seconds later is on the receiving end of a one-handed version of this trope.
• This method is also used in the Frank Langella version of Dracula (1979), when the Count kills Renfield. Later, he nearly does the same to Harker, but is stopped by Van Helsing.
• Borderline example in the Elektra film, where a ninja mook snaps his own neck, just by turning the head very fast.
• Ebola Syndrome have Kai, the Villain Protagonist killing at least 3 people by breaking their necks, the first being his ex-boss in the opening scene - caught sleeping with the boss' wife, he fights back and subsequently got his boss' head caught in the hinges of a folding table. Kai then proceeds to jump on the table and snap it shut, and the results aren't pretty. What's even worse is Kai jumping up and down on said table's top with the boss' head still twisted underneath.
• In Embrace of the Vampire, the vampire kills Daciana by swinging down from the ceiling, grabbing her head and twisting it sharply.
• In End of Days, Satan kills a guy by grabbing his head and twisting it 180 degrees.
• Enter the Dragon has a few neck snap scenes including one character (Jackie Chan in his cameo appearance) getting his neck snapped by Bruce Lee himself during a battle.
• Arnie is in love with this trope. In Eraser he does this by trapping a mook's head with a fridge door and twisting his torso.
• After he and Christmas defeat The Brit, Jet Lee's character finishes him off by snapping his neck using an axe kick in The Expendables.
• Varla snaps a man's neck during a fight in Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! At least that was during a knock-down, drag-out fight though. She uses her entire body, and it takes her several seconds to accomplish.
• At the end of Fear, Inc., when everyone is gathered at the diner for the 'wrap party', Ben has his neck snapped by one of the Fear, Inc. crew, as Joe discovers that it really isn't a game.
• Kenshiro kills Goliath in Fist of the North Star by twisting his neck around.
  Goliath: Who are you?
  Kenshiro: The Fist of the North Star. [snap]
• The Funhouse Massacre: Rocco the Clown kills the scare actor who's mask (and face) he stole by snapping his neck in front of the protagonists. Since it's set in a Haunted House Attraction, they assume it's All Part of the Show.
• In Future War The Master breaks a female lab assistant when she falls from an air duct.
• Future World: Ash kills a man in the Warlord's gang after he commands it this way.
• Kable kills Hackman this way in Gamer. He has to do it twice before Hackman finally dies.
• Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth and Sea have Genghis executing a traitor using this method, in front of his generals. Said traitor was actually a very close friend of Genghis, who's Forced into Evil and offers to let himself be killed in order to atone for his actions, where his last request is for a clean, honorable death, hence this trope. And Genghis is actually tearing up when twisting the neck.
• Ghost Rock: After a prolonged martial arts fight, Slaughter eventually kills the Barber by snapping his neck.
• The Golden Child: A mook villain converted to the side of the good guys breaks the neck of another, unconverted Mook to prevent him from skewering Chandler Jarrow with a crossbow bolt and allow the rescue of the title character.
• The Green Goblin's Last Stand, just like the comics, has Spider-Man do this accidentally when the whiplash from catching Gwen with his web snaps her neck.
• In The Grudge, this is how Kayako is murdered by her husband, thus starting the curse. In the sequel, this is also how Aubrey and Doctor Sullivan meet their ends.
• Michael Myers from the Halloween series is quite a fan of this trope. There's Grady's death in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, the hermit in Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers, and Mrs. Strode's death in the remake.
• Hanna has the title character (a child assassin played by Saoirse Ronan) snapping the neck of the Marissa Wiegler decoy.
• Hard to Kill: Mason Storm (played by Steven Seagal) snapping a neck on one of his assassins who tried to kill him years ago.
• Hayride: The killer murders one of the hayride volunteers with a neck snap.
• Haywire has a semi-realistic example where Mallory breaks a mook's neck using the edge of a table for leverage.
• Cato does this to one of the other tributes in The Hunger Games after Katniss succeeds in blowing up all the food the career tributes had hoarded. It's not terribly convincing, but they are minors acting and the lack of sound effect is due to Katniss (and in turn the audience's POV) being rendered temporarily deaf because of the explosion. (Out of universe adding a crunching sound effect would have pushed the films rating up from PG-13).
• The Hunt for Red October. Captain Ramius takes the easy route and just crushes Putin's windpipe.
• The infamous Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer has several neck snap scenes including the disturbing videotape scene of a mother and son getting their necks snapped.
• During The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Valentina breaks the neck of a chicken.
• James Bond
  • In From Russia with Love Bond tries this on Red Grant during their fight scene and fails.
  • In You Only Live Twice Bond breaks the neck of and kills the the assassin who killed Henderson.
  • In Thunderball Bond does this to Col. Bouvar in the teaser, with the assistance of a fireplace poker. He also does it to two SPECTRE frogmen during the underwater fight at the end.
  • In Goldfinger Oddjob breaks Tilly Masterson's neck by throwing his hat at her. At long range. In a forest. At night.
• Subverted in Jason X. Jason-fucking-Voorhees snaps someone's neck, not quickly, but slowly, and having to use all of both arms. Kane Hodder (Jason's actor) clarifies that script called for him to go for the quick snap, but decided that such a kill was So Last Season and instead convinced the director and writer to go with the slow kill instead.
• John Doe: Vigilante: Used by John Doe to murder his last victim after faking a suicide attempt in order to draw the victim in close enough to grab him.
• A Spinosaurus kills a Tyrannosaurus this way in their laughably bloodless battle in Jurassic Park III. Same sound effect even. One of the raptors also performs this trick on the last remaining mercenary.
• The Kentucky Fried Movie, "A Fistful of Yen" segment. Butkus does this to the three guard contestants in various ways in the The Dating Game parody.
• In Kiss of the Dragon Jet Li's character disposes of a pair of sadistic martial artists with a pair of neck snaps but with unorthodox methods. The first he catches in the middle of a flip and forces him head-first into the floor, and the second he finishes with a brutal roundhouse kick to the head while the guy is on his knees.
• In Kung Fu Hustle, the uber-martial-artist known as the Beast becomes annoyed at the prattling of the mob boss who's hired him and gives him an irritated backhand that causes his head to twist around at least 720 degrees. The Beast runs the mob from that point onward.
• The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. During the fight in Dorian Gray's mansion, Captain Nemo does this to one of the Fantom's mooks.
• Lethal Weapon:
  • In the first movie, Riggs kills a Torture Technician by snapping the guy's neck with his legs. He then throws the corpse at another mook to distract him then finishes him off by snapping his neck in the conventional way.
  • After returning from the dip in the water that was supposed to kill him in Lethal Weapon 2, a very pissed Riggs attacks a mook with a chain and twists his neck around. The other gets killed by Riggs using a car door.
  • In Lethal Weapon 4, Wah Sing Ku does this to a man simply by grabbing him by the throat (one-handed) and twisting it around purely by the strength of his wrist, complete with Sickening "Crunch!". The film gets away with this totally ridiculous example by virtue of Ku being played by Jet Li.
• Vampire Eli snaps the neck of a jogger in Let the Right One In after feeding to prevent him from turning.
  • Additionally, it is also performed by Abby in the remake Let Me In.
• In Life Blood, Brooke kills Rhea and Patricia by snapping their necks. Rhea gets better.
• In The Long Kiss Goodnight, amnesiac Samantha hits a stag and crashes her car. In the aftermath, she finds the deer bleeding to death and snaps its neck to put it out of its misery. Then she wonders How did I do that?
  • Later on the movie, she does the same to a mook sent to assassinate her.
• The Lord of the Rings:
  • Gimli does this to an orc in the movie version of The Two Towers. Gimli's version is exceptionally badass in that he does it with one hand while facing the orc and while trapped under a huge warg corpse.
  • Aragorn does too during the Battle of Pelennor Fields in The Return of the King.
• In Machete Kills, a man enters an S&M dungeon and lets himself get strapped down, thinking he's about to have a good time. Unfortunately for him, he gets Desdemona, who violently whips him a few times, then wraps the whip around his neck and pulls until it breaks.
• The eponymous villain in Madman tries to hang one of the characters, but the intended victim manages to get himself breathing again. So he grabs his foot and pulls him downward, and the guy breaks his neck.
• Man of Steel:
  • Faora does this to a few soldiers who get in her way.
  • After a drawn-out aerial battle with Zod, this is how Superman finally kills him, having no other choice as Zod is about to fry a human family with his Eye Beams. The shock of having to kill someone with his bare hands leaves him traumatized, not to mention having to kill the last of his people left this side of the Phantom Zone to save his adoptive world.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • Iron Man 2:
    • Ivan Vanko does this to a prison guard who tries to apprehend him.
    • Later, Black Widow appears to break a guard's neck with her legs, but this is inconclusive.
  • During the Battle of New York in The Avengers (2012), Captain America appears to break a Chitauri soldier's neck with one hand.
  • Thor in Thor: The Dark World does this to a Marauder by twisting his head with one hand.
  • In Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), Ronan does this to The Other, using a shockwave from his hammer to twist his head right around.
  • Avengers: Infinity War: Loki makes an attempt on Thanos's life, who anticipates it and grabs Loki by his throat and lifts him up, strangling him, and eventually increases the pressure until his neck breaks, killing him.
  • In Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Wanda breaks Professor X's neck while he's inside her mind which also breaks his neck in the real world.
• In The Matrix Revolutions, Morpheus sneaks up behind a Mook guarding an elevator outside the Merovingian's night club, wraps his arms around the mook's neck and breaks it.
• Chuck Norris's character, Colonel James Braddok, dispatches three or four Vietnamese soldiers this way in the third Missing in Action film. Somewhat unusually, it's used for stealth kills.
  • Before this, in Missing In Action 2: The Beginning, Braddok escapes the Vietnamese prison camp by faking his own suicide by hanging, then snapping the neck of the guard that came to inspect his seemingly dead body.
• A telekinetic does this to a cop in Momentum with a simple wave of the hand. Given that they are shown to be able to break open bank vaults with their minds, this is justified.
• In Mortal Kombat: The Movie, this is how Sonya Blade finishes her nemesis Kano. She used her legs to do it. Hey, he did ask her to give him a break...
  • One of the early scenes in the sequel has Shao Kahn snapping Johnny Cage's neck.
• In Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Smith assassinates a target in this way.
• Nazi Overlord: When Captain Rogers and his team are ambushed by Nazis at one point, one of the team kills one of the Nazis in this manner.
• Original Gangstas has one neck snap scene involving a teen.
• In Pagan Warrior, The Krampus kills Eirik by grabbing his head and rotating 180 degrees with a sickening snap.
• This occurs a number of times in the Paranormal Activity franchise. In the second film, Possessed-Katie snaps Dan's neck. In the third film, the Demon snaps both Dennis' neck and back. In the fourth film, Possessed-Katie snaps Ben's neck while he's sat at the computer, and in The Ghost Dimension, the now corporeal Toby strangles Emily before snapping her neck.
• In Penitentiary II, Mr. T kills Ernie Hudson this way,◊ albeit with a crush rather than a snap. As he says, "I'ma kill ya! I'ma kill ya slow!" And it is; no quick snap here, just a gradual Sickening "Crunch!" as Hudson slowly goes limp.
• Prince of Darkness. Susan (the radiologist) comes up from behind Lomax, grabs his head and twists it, breaking his neck and killing him.
• A rather interesting variation occurs in Prometheus, in which not only does [the Last Engineer use this on David but also decapitatees him. However, at the same time it's subverted, as being an android, David's head is still able to function, though he needs Shaw to carry him out of the ship.
• One of the primary methods used by the wrestlers in Pro Wrestlers vs. Zombies to kill the zombies, always from a sleeper hold. In particular, Shane Douglas does one after another to his zombified family, giving him a chance to whisper agonized goodbyes before snapping their necks.
• In The Raid, this is how Mad Dog finishes off Jaka.
• Used on the Asian man in [REC].
• In Resident Evil, Rain Ocampo does it to a zombie attacking her and Alice does it repeatedly to zombies with kicks (including multiple dogs) and one Murderous Thighs attack.
• RoboCop 2. When Cain (in his Robocop 2 robot body) meets Angie in the warehouse, he grabs her head and breaks her neck, then does a Neck Lift on her body.
• The Running Man
  • During the escape from prison at the beginning of the movie, Richard's friend Laughlin breaks the neck of a guard who was about to shoot Richards.
  • During the faked scene where Captain Freedom fights Amber, he performs a Neck Lift on her before breaking her neck.
• In Saw 3D, Hoffman does this to Palmer during his rampage through the police precinct.
• Scary Movie 4: Played for Laughs in Cindy's boxing scene with multiple broken necks from trips and falls.
• Scream Park has Roy dispatched this way after a Neck Lift.
• In the 1980 WWII film The Sea Wolves, Roger Moore's character dispatches a Nazi mook this way.
• Showdown in Little Tokyo:
  • A yakuza thug captured by the heroes snaps his own neck to avoid being interrogated.
  • Kenner also breaks a mook's neck during Minako's rescue at the boss's mansion.
• Sin City. When Marv sneaks onto Cardinal Roark's estate, he approaches a police officer on guard duty from behind and breaks his neck.
• In Star Trek: First Contact, Data (being an android with incredible strength) dispatches one of the Borg this way.
• Star Wars: Darth Vader appears to crush a Rebel ship captain's spine while strangling him in A New Hope, but that's not a typical example, as it wasn't exactly a surprise, and he has super-robot-strength arms. The Sickening "Crunch!" was accomplished by placing walnuts inside a grapefruit rind, then crushing them.
• Street Fighter has an unexpectedly realistic one. Cammy (played by diminutive Kylie Minogue) attempts one on a mook but he stays standing and it appears to not work as she has to flip him and punch him to actually take him out.
• At the beginning of Superman II, Non breaks a guard's neck as part of General Zod's plan to take over the planet Krypton.
• Tales from the Hood 2: After possessing John in "The Medium", Cliff uses his telekinetic powers to snap the neck of one of the gangbangers: twisting his almost 180 degrees.
• Happens at least three times in Tank Girl: Tank Girl to a Water and Power trooper after offering him an "oil change"; a Ripper to a W&P trooper during the attack that freed Tank Girl, and a Ripper to a W&P trooper during the attack on the W&P fortress.
• Theresa & Allison: Paisley instantly kills the sole vampire to object about her having a human be raped before she's killed this way.
• Arnie again: Douglas Quaid pulls off two sickening neck snaps in the original Total Recall when he is first ambushed by the Big Bad's goons after he leaves Rekall.
• This is how "The Frenchman" kills his first victim, a sniper, in The Tournament. He sneaks up on her using his Le Parkour skills, then grabs her head and twists it.
• In Top Gun, when Maverick’s and Goose’s plane ends up in a flat spin, they’re forced to Eject... Eject... Eject.... After jettisoning the canopy, Maverick succeeds in ejecting out of the falling aircraft, but Goose ends up launching into the canopy, bending his neck forward and killing him.
• In The Tripper, the killer murders the first redneck this way; running past him, grabbing his head and twisting it so his neck snaps, all without breaking stride.
• True Lies:
  • Arnie once more. Bonus points for being performed while hanging upside down using only his legs to hold onto a rope.
  • He also does this to the Torture Technician, having even warned him beforehand under Truth Serum.
• In Truth or Dare, Justin kills Gemma this way after she discovers that Felix is still alive.
• Unbreakable. David Dunn uses this technique during his climactic confrontation with the orange-clad janitor/serial killer/kidnapper. It's justified since David is explicitly superhuman and is implied to have well above average physical strength. Even so, he only pulls it off after putting the janitor in a chokehold for over thirty seconds straight and forcing the guy to tire himself out. In addition, it takes him multiple attempts to finally snap the neck cleanly, thus ending the fight. The scene in question can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-waJsBs0eBQ
• In Unknown, the assassin does this to his first onscreen kill, the hero's nurse at the hospital.
• Silk Spectre in Watchmen does this to a mugger.
• Mystique in X-Men: The Last Stand neck-snaps a guard with her feet since her hands are chained to the ceiling. In a deleted scene, Beast dispatches a mook this way.

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