10 Of The Best Survival Movies To Test Your Limits

Alive tells the truly brutal and harrowing story of an Uruguayan rugby team who were forced to do the unthinkable after their plane crashed in the Andes in 1972. The film stars Ethan Hawke and Vincent Spano as two of the rugby players who went to extreme lengths in order to survive the 72 days of being stuck in the Andes.

The team, along with members of their families, were on their way to a rugby match in Chile when the plane hit a mountain, taking off both wings and tail and crashing into a mountain slope. Six passengers are killed immediately in the crash, six others die shortly after. Faced with no food, others dying from injuries, and even more deaths from an avalanche, the remaining survivors make the horrific call to eat the dead to survive. One of the more gruesome survival movies, but one that shows the lengths people will go to.

When all was said and done, and rescuers found the group, 29 had perished, leaving 16 survivors.

Into the Wild tells the true story of Chris McCandless, a young man who decided to live off the grid in Alaska. While it is one of the best survival movies, it also shows just how some survival movies don’t have that happy Hollywood ending. Emile Hirsch stars as McCandless, a young man who, in the early ‘90s, disillusioned by his life and lifestyle, decided to head into the wild to experience life off the grid and live off the land.

McCandless found himself in Alaska, living in an abandoned bus (The Magic Bus) in the wilds near Healy, Alaska. He is thrilled and content with the isolation, living off the land (trying to), hunting with a .22 rifle, and entertaining himself with books and the journal he writes in. Soon, though, McCandless discovers that living off the land is not as romantic as it sounds. He makes the fatal mistake of eating a poisonous plant, spending the remaining days of his life in his Magic Bus, where hunters eventually find his body.

The Way Back tells the survival story of one man and his trek across Siberia after his escape from a Siberian Gulag. Jim Sturgess stars as Polish officer Janusz Wieszczek who, during World War II, the Soviets capture and try to force him into admitting he is a spy. Unable to do so, they instead force his wife into making a statement against him, resulting in the officer receiving 20 years in the gulag.

The gulag, though, is not where he plans to stay, and instead plans an escape with a number of other prisoners. They decide to head out during a snowstorm, which is great at hiding their tracks but ultimately a fatal mistake for some. As bodies drop around him, Wieszczek continues to endure, making his arduous journey even more compelling. This survival movie is based on a true story.

Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin star in this survival movie that pits man against man as well as men against beast. The “beast,” in this instance, is a dangerous Kodiak bear who is hunting down the men in question.

In The Edge, Hopkins is billionaire Charles Morse, and Baldwin is photographer Bob Green, two men, along with Bob’s assistant Stephen (Harold Perrineau), who are forced to survive in the Alaskan wilderness after a small plane they were in crashes into a lake. Barely able to make it to the shore, the three eventually attempt to hike out, but instead encounter a very hungry bear.

Survival from the bear is on their mind as well as survival from themselves as Bob has intention on Charles’ wife and plans on killing Charles. Playing cat and mouse with a bear is certainly no fun, especially while playing cat and mouse with each other at the same time.

When comparing elements in which to survive, most would probably choose to give it a shot in the wilderness than on the ocean. In All is Lost, Robert Redford gives it his best while fighting off the ravages of the Indian Ocean in a one-man survival movie. The film begins with Redford on his ship, waking to find it taking on water. Seems his boat hit a shipping container, and it now has a large hole in it.

All is Lost is the ultimate tale of survival, and Redford gives a bravura performance in a film where he has only 51 spoken words. For the entirety of the survival movie, it is him against every ocean element imaginable, including his sinking boat, a life raft on fire, sharks, and of course, the ocean.

It is once again man against beast in The Grey, one of the best survival movies that star Liam Neeson, Frank Grillo, and Dermot Mulroney. Neeson is John Ottway, a sharpshooter working for an oil company in Alaska whose job it is to protect the oil workers from wolves. Ottway is readying for his two weeks off when the plane he is on hits major turbulence and crashes.

Not many on the plane survive. When Ottway sees a flight attendant moving, he goes to rescue her but finds out that her movement is being caused by a wolf eating her. The remaining survivors now know that they are being hunted. The Grey tells a harrowing story about the plane crash survivors and how they try to stay alive in the freezing wilderness while being hunted down by hungry wolves.

This is a true story of the ultimate survival. James Franco plays Aron Ralston, the real-life mountain climber who found himself in such a precarious situation that he had to take extreme measures just to survive. 127 Hours is a survival movie that shows the human spirit and what they can endure to stay alive.

Ralston is climbing in Utah’s Bluejohn Canyon when a boulder he is on comes loose, causing him and the rock to fall. When they land, Ralston finds his arm trapped, unable to get it out. He tries everything imaginable as his rations begin to dwindle. After six days, Ralston has no other choice than to make a major sacrifice. He makes a tourniquet, wraps it around his arm, then breaks his arm, and uses his knife to slowly cut his arm off.

Somehow living through that, Ralston’s survival story is not yet complete. He still has to find a way to climb out of the mountains with one arm.

If there is a feeling of dread being lost out on the ocean, imagine what it would be like to be lost in outer space. That is exactly what Sandra Bullock and George Clooney have to contend with in this great survival movie, Gravity. This Academy Award-winning film (it won 7) was written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón and tells the story of two astronauts who are trying to find their way back to Earth after the space shuttle they are on is destroyed by space debris.

It’s a survival tale that puts man (and woman) in the precarious confines of space as they search for ways to rescue themselves before the space debris makes its way back to them. The film is about survival and sacrifice, with survival not guaranteed in the least.

Here is one more plane crash film that has the lone survivor facing nature after he washes ashore on a deserted island. Tom Hanks and “Wilson” find themselves fighting for survival after the plane that Hanks was on hits a massive storm that takes it into the ocean. Somehow Hanks manages to survive while the remaining crew perishes.

Hanks is Chuck Noland, a FedEx executive who travels the globe to fix problems the company has with productivity. On his way to an office in Malaysia, the plane goes down. What makes this survival movie even more impressive as far as Hanks is concerned is that the actor gained 50 pounds for the film, which was shot in chronological order, so he could show the weight loss of his character. There were large gaps in production as Hanks could lose the weight and grow out his hair and beard to show he was stranded for four years.

In The Revenant, it is man against beast against nature against man in this harrowing tale that stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy. The film, set in the 1820s, tells the true story of Hugh Glass (DiCaprio), a fur trader who is on an expedition with his hunting team when he is mauled by a bear and left for dead by his team.

The survival movie features a bear attack scene that is graphic but sets up just how much Glass had to endure just to survive it. But not only does Glass have to survive the attack, but he must also survive the elements as well as members of his team that decide it is best to leave him for dead, burying him in a shallow grave.