Tony Scott 1944-2012

Posted by on August 19th, 2012   Filed under: News
Source: The Wrap

Tony Scott

Horrible news. According to The Wrap, Tony Scott, brother of Ridley Scott and director of modern action classics Top Gun, Days of Thunder, Crimson Tide, The Last Boyscout, and True Romance, has died from an apparent suicide. Scott’s body was recovered from the Los Angeles harbour after he apparently jumped from the Vincent Thomas Bridge bridge.

I’ll always have a massive soft spot for Tony Scott’s bombastic brand of high octane action cinema. Sorry to see him go.



  • woah…so sad…what could have pushed him to that? strange landscape the human mind

  • Kamen Liew

    Rest in peace Tony, thank you for bringing excellent cinema to us 80’s kids!

  • dan

    This is so sad :( Man on fire and true romance were two of my fave film’s.

    Please do A special podcast about his work

  • rjdelight

    Shitty news indeed.

  • milandob

    wtf, such a sad news… last boy scout was one ofnhis best…

  • dan day

    Horrible. At his best – TRUE ROMANCE, CRIMSON TIDE, MAN ON FIRE, he combined exciting, bombastic action with the intensly charismatic performances that he got from his actors. His movies were just a blast to watch.

    And he had two young kids. Hope they can get through this.

  • dan day

    Apparently he had terminal brain cancer. Poor guy.

  • patrik

    Gone before his time. It’s a shame. Top Gun, True Romance, Crimson Tide, Man on Fire, Domino etc.. Great movies. I only hope this makes Ridley cling to life even more and lives for some time yet.

  • Stinker

    Farewell Tony Scott. Your Movies will last forever.

  • kyri

    I can’t believe this…

    my soft spot got even bigger now..

  • What the hell man.. suicide? Why Tony? :(

    And to the comment above, where are you getting the info about brain cancer? It’s not in the article…

    Suicide seems a bit extreme even for terminal cancer tho. People have lived with ‘terminal’ cancer before and had prognosis’ of months last for years and years. It’s not unheard of to survive it.

    Such a shame. He was a talent who made many movies I enjoyed over the years. Wish he would’ve stuck around longer. :(

  • schizopolis

    Now all we’ll get are wannabe Tony Scott films by Michael Bay.

  • Steve Kasan

    so so sad. :( Such a big fan of Tony, I even am a champion for Domino.
    FilmJunk premium for Tony?

  • Plans are already being made for a Tony Scott tribute next week in place of a regular podcast.

  • may I suggest that the filmjunk crew do the tribute podcast as certain famous scenes from his films…

    the obvious ideas are for Jay, and his colon, to be on the toilet yelling to the mic like Dick Richie in True Romance

    of course Greg would be oiled up due his love of volleyball and that scene from Top Gun

    Sean can sit on one of his son’s toy trains for the whole show and Frank can alternate SanFran Giants and US Navy hats as Deniro and Hackman respectively

  • Maopheus

    The Scott brothers are undoubtedly the best brother directors who did not direct together.

  • Kasper

    It’s a sad, sad day. Tony Scott has always been right up my alley – and even though a lot of people didn’t like recent flicks like Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 and Unstoppable I still loved them, so that just makes it all the worse that I won’t get to see another movie from him.

  • Indianamcclain

    R.I.P Tony

  • 1138sw

    R.I.P Tony!

    Never thought he was as good as his bro, but I did enjoy some of his films especially Man On Fire which I thought was one of his best!

    Condolences to Ridley and the rest of the family.

    Suicide though? I still really can’t believe it.

  • Xidor

    I read an article with Tom Cruise about a sequel to Top Gun not too long ago. He also had a lot of projects in the works. It seems that he had a lot to look forward to career wise which makes suicide seem less likely, but who knows.

  • Kasper

    #11 Brain cancer can alter your personality and in general screw everything in your head up. If it’s not curable it’s not worth going through.

  • Tony Scott was the man! Suicide is always a shame, and this one hit me hard, because he’s one of my favorites. Guys like Michael Bay owe everything to Tony (too bad he used Tony’s style as a starting point then took it in a shitty direction). It’s hard to think of a Tony S. movie that I did not like. Ridley had higher and deeper peaks and valleys but Tony was consistently good in my mind. His films rachet up the tension and coolness. He always seemed easy to get along with and happy in the behind the scenes footage I saw too. Imagine the stars that will turn out at his funeral: Tom Cruise, Denzel Washington, James Gandolfini, Gene Hackman, DeNiro, Travolta, Bruckheimer, Tarantino… He touched a lot of lives. Rest in peace.

  • Paul Andrews

    That’s very fitting Sean. He left behind a great legacy.

  • I got to work on “Unstoppable” for a few days, mostly in smaller scenes (in a movie about a runaway train, I got to spend all my time in an OFFICE), and he seemed like a really awesome dude, very patient and funny and cool with answering questions, and it was so strange to see him directing scenes where people just talked on phones when he was such a big action guy. This one day, we were shooting in a high-rise that overlooked Pittsburgh the whole day, from like 6 in the morning until 6 at night in December, and I asked him what they’d do to compensate for it obviously being different times of day, because there were a lot of windows, and he replied with something like “Lots and lots of money. We will spend LOTS and lots of money”. Hey, at least he wasn’t a bullshitter.

  • @Kasper Fair enough. I can see where that sort of cancer or injury could mess with your mind and cause you to do something that you might not otherwise do, but I’m still not a big believer in suicide. Medicine isn’t an exact science and breakthroughs happen every day and all. But I suppose he had the means to know what was up as far as chances and possibilities and hopefully weighed all his options before doing it and it wasn’t because his brain wasn’t functioning properly….

    Nevermind. I’m not making much sense even to myself. I’m just sad to see the guy go. He made some great films. :(

  • 1138sw

    From what I’ve read his cancer recurred which probably meant he was dealing with this cancer for sometime. He might have felt he didn’t want to go through with treatments again which can sometimes be worse or just as worse as the disease itself.

    I lost my dad to cancer and he suffered with both the disease and treatment. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone…so I can sympathize with Ridley if his cancer did indeed recur..perhaps his suicide was the only way he thought he could be free of it.

  • Kasper

    @milath: Wasn’t implying that a change in personality made him do it, but more so that he didn’t want to reach such a state. That and as 1138sw mentions cancer treatment can be very painful. I’ve gone through cancer treatment myself and if it had been the case with me that I knew it would be terminal then I would probably have offed myself as well.

  • I’ll never forget my grandpa looking me in the eye, after they did radical surgery to remove his lung cancer, and saying, “they just killed me.” he died a few weeks later. sometimes the treatment is worse than the disease…

  • Matt

    I’m hearing now that he did not have inoperable brain cancer, and that was a false rumor. Apparently there is a suicide note, but the police won’t go into detail about what it said.

    In any case, it is very sad and shocking news.

  • @Matt Really? I thought the cancer thing was confirmed. Saw several entertainment news sites running with it anyway… :\

    Well, I hope they can set the record straight on this one way or the other. Sometimes it does help to know the reasons. Then again I guess it doesn’t really matter cause either way he’s gone and that sucks. :(

  • HFD

    Stopped by FJ to grab this week’s podcast and saw this thread. Such a shock! He and his always entertaining films will be missed.

  • devolutionary

    R.I.P. Mr. Scott! Looking forward to the Tony Scott tribute episode for sure. Should be interesting to see what you guys end up discussing.