75 Best Action Movies of All Time, Ranked

It's hard to pin down when the action genre was created. Movies before 1954 certainly didn't lack action, but it was rare to get a movie that centered on constant physical conflict (or the threat of it) throughout, and similarly rare to see an extended action sequence that lasted more than a couple of minutes. There's an argument to be made that Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai was the film that changed all that.

It's a 3+ hour epic revolving around a village whose inhabitants are being targeted by bandits, and so they enlist samurai (seven of them!) to help in defending themselves. Its structure of forming a team, training, and then doing battle—each of the three taking up one act—has influenced countless other action movies, and the way it displays the combat is more visceral and believable than anything else from its era. Filmed action has become more bombastic since 1954, sure, but the majority of action movies owe something to Seven Samurai for paving the way for the genre as a whole. For that reason, it's the greatest action movie of all time.

The original Die Hard is essentially a textbook example of how to make a great modern action/thriller movie. It pits a vulnerable, underdog hero against a powerful and charismatic villain, keeps its straightforward storyline moving forward ceaselessly, has some great side characters, a memorable setting, and just the right amount of action generously spread throughout the whole runtime.

In short, it's just difficult to try and find many flaws with Die Hard. Its sequels are uneven, sure, but the original is a classic for a reason, and it's the rare kind of movie that everyone—regardless of how much they love action movies—is likely to find exciting and engaging.

There was certainly a degree of anticipation for Mad Max: Fury Road ahead of its 2015 release. However, few were expecting the fourth film in the Mad Max series to be as good as it ended up being, with this non-stop, large-scale, and truly explosive car chase/action movie being one of the best of the 2010s, action movie or otherwise.

The other films are very good (especially 1981's Mad Max 2), but ultimately can't match the intensity and constant forward momentum offered in Fury Road. It's stunning to look at, gets the heart racing from beginning to end, and despite being a relatively recent release, it's likely to endure as one of the great all-time action films as the years go on.

Just as James Cameron injected more action into The Terminator's sequel, so too did he redefine the Alien series with his 1986 movie Aliens. He didn't direct the first, which was a sci-fi/horror movie more concerned with survival than combat, but took over with the acclaimed sequel, making things considerably more action-heavy.

Some may prefer the atmosphere and overall approach of the original, but it's hard to deny that Aliens works fantastically well as an action movie. Aliens builds well and has perfect pacing, starting off steadily with things getting considerably bigger and more harrowing as the film approaches its fiery climax. It's great, satisfying stuff through and through, and arguably a high point for the franchise as a whole.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was a groundbreaking martial arts movie, given it focused as much on romance and fantastical drama/adventure as it did on action. Its story surrounding heartbreak and redemption resonated with audiences on a global scale, making it a surprise hit and an Oscar winner.

After watching the movie, it's easy to see why. Few martial arts movies capture their action scenes in quite the same way as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, making it a sometimes gentle, yet sometimes heartbreaking movie that's filled with great characters and one beautifully shot sequence after another.

The Rambo series has become synonymous with excessive, over-the-top action, but its beginnings were surprisingly humble. First Blood is the first film to feature John Rambo, and it's easily the best, with a down-to-earth story focusing on a veteran living with PTSD and sent on the run because of a villainous Sheriff.

It's fairly serious stuff, especially considering the direction the series went in, but it also functions well as an action/thriller movie. The body count is low, and the story is personal and grounded, but that keeps it easier to get invested in, and also ensures the action is genuinely impactful when it does come around. Those who want more action might be better off checking out the sequels, but those wanting to see a compelling blend of action and drama that ranks as a highlight within Sylvester Stallone's body of work ought to give this one a shot.

Steven Spielberg is a filmmaker who can seemingly master any genre, with Raiders of the Lost Ark being the clearest indicator of how well he can do action/adventure movies. It's the first film to feature Indiana Jones in what's become a long-running series, and it's one instance where the original is still the best. Similarly, it's one of the greatest things Spielberg's ever made as a director, and could also arguably be his most entertaining film to date.

It helped make Harrison Ford even more of a star than he'd already become thanks to Star Wars, and its old-fashioned thrills and pulpy, action-packed storyline still ensure it's a hugely enjoyable movie. Globe-trotting action/adventure movies don't get much better than Raiders of the Lost Ark, and it's hard to imagine another similar film ever topping it.

By paying homage to old martial arts movies, samurai films, and Westerns, Quentin Tarantino made one of the best revenge movies of all time with the two-part Kill Bill. However, when it comes to action, Vol. 1 stands as the best of the two, given that that's where most of the large-scale fight sequences occur, and the second leans heavier into the Western side of things.

The climax of Vol. 1 sees Uma Thurman's character taking on a small army of gangsters inside a Tokyo restaurant, with the result being one of the bloodiest and most spectacular fight sequences of all time. It might be the single most violent scene in any Tarantino movie, and that's certainly saying something. And, if watched in conjunction with Vol. 2, Kill Bill could well be an all-time great revenge epic.

Seven years after the original film, James Cameron returned to the Terminator series with a movie that blew what came before out of the water. And that's no easy task, considering 1984's The Terminator was a low-budget classic... yet 1991's Terminator 2: Judgment Day upped the stakes and the scale considerably.

You can see where all the money in Terminator 2: Judgment Day's increased budget went, and all the big action sequences are still stunning enough to hold up to this day. At its core, it's also a surprisingly heartwarming story about the bond that forms between a machine and a young boy who just so happens to be instrumental in the coming war between the human race and the all-powerful Skynet.

Movies that combine action and science fiction rarely get more iconic than the first Matrix film from 1999. It plunges its protagonist—and the audience—into a battle for humanity, as much of the population has been enslaved in something of a virtual reality by machines, with only a select few people knowing the truth, and fighting to break everyone free.

The look of the film and its characters—as well as the iconic slow-motion action scenes—have all been referenced and parodied to death, but that wouldn't have happened if The Matrix wasn't great to begin with. Its sequels proved to be more divisive, but few can argue against the original being one of the best action movies of the last few decades.

The Dark Knight is the middle chapter in Christopher Nolan's acclaimed Dark Knight trilogy. It's easily the best of the three, delivering the most consistently thrilling action and the best story of the lot, with a tense crime/thriller narrative pairing perfectly well with the grand-scale superhero action.

And it does all this while having the main villain be one of Batman's least physically imposing villains: The Joker, here played by the late and legendary Heath Ledger. The psychological torment and chaos he causes keep things moving at a non-stop pace, with unpredictable turns in the narrative making The Dark Knight both a great crime saga and a fantastic action/thriller, as well as what could well be the very best superhero movie of all time.

Alongside the John Wick series, the Mission: Impossible franchise has also done a great job at continuing to get better with pretty much every new release. Anticipation is high for what comes next, but the high point of the series at this stage is arguably the sixth film in the Tom Cruise-led franchise: 2018's Mission: Impossible - Fallout.

It doesn't offer much new narratively, with the kind of twisty spy story fans of the series are likely familiar with, but benefits from having great action and awe-inspiring stunts. And it's hard not to be impressed by how Cruise does increasingly wild things in each new movie—he may be getting older, but you sure can't tell from watching him in something like Fallout.

As far as modern-day action franchises go, few do it better than the John Wick series does. The films may have some flaws, but they shine brighter than the vast majority of modern-day action movies, with increasingly creative fight-and-chase sequences throughout, and excellent stunt work that's often presented with minimal editing or close-up shots designed to hide imperfections.

And it's hard not to admire a series that continually gets better and more exciting with its action set pieces, culminating with the remarkable (and epic-length) John Wick: Chapter 4. If it's the last viewers see of Wick and his adventures, it's a great note to end on, with the final hour of the movie, in particular, delivering one thrilling and off-the-wall action sequence after another.

Bruce Lee's tragically early death meant that he only got to be the lead in a handful of films in his brief yet impactful career as a martial arts actor. Those films still manage to deliver plenty of action paired with Lee's natural charisma, with the best of all his movies being his final completed film: Enter the Dragon.

It was released one month after he passed away, and though scenes Lee shot for Game of Death ended up in that 1978 film, it didn't feel complete or as satisfying overall as Enter the Dragon. Martial arts movies don't get much better than this, with a plot about a martial arts tournament that expands into something more. Enter the Dragon serves as a perfect showcase for what made the late Bruce Lee so great.

While Face/Off might well be John Woo's best American film, he also made numerous films in Hong Kong that are just as good, or arguably even better as action movies. The Killer (1989) might have the best and most emotional story of all his Hong Kong movies, but it's 1992's Hard Boiled that delivers the best and most explosive action. It honestly has numerous scenes that need to be seen to be believed; the action is that gloriously over-the-top.

Its simple plot about two cops taking on a large criminal gang gives plenty of excuses for huge action sequences to occur, with the largest of all taking up much of the final act. Plenty of slow motion, thousands of bullets fired, and a body count in the hundreds all make Hard Boiled one of the biggest and most exciting shoot-em-up action movies of all time.

Make no mistake: The Raid (2011) was a fantastic and brutal martial arts movie. It largely took place inside a single apartment complex, following a SWAT team getting trapped inside and forced to fight their way out or risk certain death. Its 2014 sequel, however, escalated things to a whole other level, and was somehow even better.

The Raid 2 had a larger scale and a more complex story revolving around a gang war, but made sure to keep the action frequent and consistently exciting. Like the first, sequences in it prove absolutely brutal to watch, meaning it's likely not an action movie for all... but those who can handle some fairly grisly on-screen violence should make checking out both films a priority.

Winning Best Picture at the Academy Awards, Gladiator was a huge commercial and critical success, and a high point in the careers of its star, Russell Crowe, and its director, Ridley Scott. Its revenge-focused story is a tale as old as time, but it's the execution and visceral gladiator sequences that make it shine.

It's all incredibly well-made and easy to get invested in, and also helped kick off a short-lived trend of big-budget historical action epics (like Troy, Kingdom of Heaven, and arguably even 300). Few were anywhere near as good as Gladiator, though, and as a throwback to the Hollywood epics of old, it works amazingly well. Whether you want to assess it alongside Ridley Scott's other historical films, or rank it among his movies in general, Gladiator emerges as one of his very best either way.

Few action scenes are as consistently reliable as the good old-fashioned car chase, and few action movies deliver car chases like Bullitt does. It's one of the best-known Steve McQueen movies, and focuses on his character—a San Francisco cop—trying to find the person who killed a witness who was in his protection.

Truth be told, it's relatively light on action until its climax, but the way it ends is more than enough to make it an all-timer within the genre. Its lengthy car chase in the final act is legendary for how well edited, paced, and shot it is, memorably using the unique layout of San Francisco to its advantage, and is a go-to example of how to make a chase scene exciting. Even if you only watch Bullitt for one scene, that single sequence makes it all worthwhile.

Truth be told, many Jackie Chan movies could be considered among the best in the action genre. Few martial arts stars have committed themselves with such dedication to their craft and the stunts they do on-screen, with Chan's earlier movies, in particular, having awe-inspiring (and painful-looking) stunts and fight scenes constantly.

Few offer quite as much as the original Police Story, though. It's less comedic than most of Chan's other Hong Kong action movies, but makes up for it with incredible action sequences, with the climactic fight in a shopping mall being a particularly staggering scene that needs to be seen to be believed. It's a movie that kicks off almost straight away and then never lets up, making Police Story a blast to watch from start to finish.

Face/Off is a gloriously wild movie, and easily one of the best action films of the 1990s. Who could resist a movie that sees John Travolta and Nicolas Cage as adversaries who end up swapping faces and getting wrapped up in the other's life, all the while continuing their violent rivalry that only one can emerge from alive?

It's also easily the best movie John Woo's made while directing in Hollywood, with its ridiculous plot that never lets up, entertaining and funny lead performances, and action that's as silly as it is spectacular. It takes a crazy premise and actually makes it work, becoming a classic of the action genre in the process. With its rather ludicrous plot, Face/Off also functions as a genuinely great piece of science fiction cinema, too, even if it's most concerned with delivering action-packed thrills.

The James Bond series is one of the longest-running in cinema history, and it's a vitally important one within the action genre as a whole. For as great as the campier, escapism-heavy entries could be, however, there's a case to be made that 2006's Casino Royale is the best of the lot.

It took some inspiration from the aforementioned Bourne movies, with a darker tone and slightly more grounded action. It's a tough, lean, brutally effective take on James Bond, and ushered Daniel Craig into the titular role in immense style, cementing him as a star and one of the best on-screen Bonds so far. Purists might still want to stick to Sean Connery, but Craig established himself as a 007 to be reckoned with in this dynamite film; one of the very best in the entire long-running movie series.

Beginning with The Bourne Identity in 2002, the series about Jason Bourne—a CIA assassin struggling to recollect his past—proved hugely influential for the action genre. The first three movies were particularly great, and helped usher in a fresh style of action movies, focusing on grittier, more realistic fights, fast-paced editing, and often shaky camerawork. When it came to the last of those, such a stylistic choice did become less aggressive and in-your-face as the series went on.

It's a style that certainly doesn't always get imitated well, but the first three Bourne movies pulled it off. The best of them is likely 2007's The Bourne Ultimatum, which wraps up many of the trilogy's mysteries satisfyingly and makes for a great ending (especially considering 2012's The Bourne Legacy and 2016's Jason Bourne weren't so good).

The impact of Avengers: Endgame is only truly felt when one's seen the majority of the MCU movies that came before it. It was technically the second-last Phase 3 film, but still served as a climax for the first three phases of the MCU as a whole, given it centered on fighting back against Thanos and reversing the damage he caused to the universe at the end of 2018's Infinity War.

Through a time-travel narrative, it manages to revisit previous films in the series and view them from different perspectives, all before things culminate in the largest superhero battle depicted in the MCU so far. It's a great finale, earning its huge runtime and setting a high bar that subsequent MCU movies have (so far) failed to match. Grand superhero crossover movies haven't gotten much better than this, and it remains to be seen whether it'll ever be equaled or topped in the future.

In a year when some people began to express a certain amount of superhero fatigue, RRR stepped up to the plate and showed the world how modern action blockbusters should work. It fictionalizes the exploits of two Indian revolutionaries (who never actually met in real life), essentially turning the pair into superheroes while showing them teaming up to take on the Crown rule in India during the early 1900s.

RRR has a lengthy three-hour runtime that nevertheless flies by thanks to good pacing, fantastic action, and a straightforward yet emotionally satisfying story filled with likable heroes and immensely hateable villains. It's explosive and over-the-top in the best way possible, with RRR deserving worldwide success in 2022.

The Fast and Furious series has turned into a behemoth franchise at this point in time. It began in 2001 and had a 10th entry released in May 2023, with the series focusing on illegal street races near the beginning, and then transitioning to more spy/espionage-focused stories in later entries.

Fast Five was the point where the series made that dramatic transition, with far more explosive and over-the-top action, and less street racing than had been seen before. It was instrumental in transforming the series into one of the 21st century's biggest action-heavy movie franchises so far, and holds up as a series high point, ultimately being worthy of squeezing into a list of the best action movies of all time.

There's a wonderful simplicity and silliness to Speed's premise that makes it instantly hook the viewer in. The characters are stuck on a bus that is set to explode if the bus drops below a certain speed, and so things are always moving forward and feeling tense, given that the danger inherent from such a premise; danger that never fully goes away.

It helps make Speed one of the best movies of 1994, with its cast—including Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, and Dennis Hopper—enhancing things further. Speed is a constantly thrilling action movie, and it delivers something that's consistently fast-paced and never boring, making it easy to recommend for fans of cinematic excitement.

Heat might not have as frequent action scenes as most action movies, but here, it's all about the quality, rather than the quantity. Its legacy as a great piece of action cinema is cemented by its bank robbery/shootout sequence alone, which is a perfectly executed—and ferociously intense—scene that's lost none of its power in the years since Heat was first released.

Also helping Heat is the fact that it has a fantastic cast led by Robert De Niro and Al Pacino, and a solidly told story that unfolds steadily over an almost three-hour-long runtime. It earns that length and feels suitably epic, making it among the best action movies of its decade. It's also a film that could well rank as the greatest achievement within Michael Mann's career, which is certainly saying something, considering how many high-quality movies he's made.

A John Woo movie that was clearly influential on the action movies that followed in its wake, The Killer is an overall excellent and action-packed film. It follows a remorseful assassin who wants to atone for a hit that went wrong with unintended consequences, only for his personal quest to land him in even deeper trouble.

It's both a tragedy and an explosive, gunfight-heavy spectacle, and the way it balances its somber story with very over-the-top action is something of a filmmaking miracle. Later John Woo movies might deliver even more wild action set pieces, but few action movies hit as hard as The Killer does when it comes to the emotional content of the stories they tell. For that main reason, it's pretty much an action movie masterpiece.

Even if Predator isn't the very best Arnold Schwarzenegger movie out there, it has to be a contender. Predator is a fantastic blend of action, sci-fi, and even a little horror, given it pits a fearsome team of commandos up against a rarely-seen alien enemy who hunts them for sport, and with ruthless efficiency, deep in a Central American jungle.

It's at its best in the final act, when Schwarzenegger's character is essentially alone against the titular monster/alien, with the extended one-on-one battle of wits playing out with minimal dialogue, and plenty of suspense. It's a well-polished movie that's far less schlocky than its reputation might have one believe, and deservedly stands as a 1980s action classic, with the film perfectly combining action and sci-fi to stunning effect.

The original Top Gun is a solid enough movie, but not one that holds up particularly well. It's probably liked for nostalgic reasons, rather than for being a genuinely great movie, but thankfully, Top Gun: Maverick was able to build upon it and spin the familiar into something great, in turn feeling like one of the very best movies released during the 2020s so far. It's also no secret at this stage that it's one of the highest-grossing in recent memory, too.

It was far better as a movie than just about anyone was expecting, and arguably stands as one of the greatest sequels of all time, given how much of an improvement it is on the first. Tom Cruise's dedication to the role makes it shine, and all the scenes of aerial training and combat are genuinely thrilling to watch.

It’s impossible to talk about great action movies without bringing up the legendary Jackie Chan, who’s been in so much (and many of those titles get underrated/overlooked). One of his earlier starring roles was in Drunken Master, and while that film was a more than a solid piece of martial arts entertainment, its eventual sequel, 1994’s Drunken Master II (sometimes known as Legend of the Drunken Master) was a significant improvement in almost every regard.

This 1994 flick is funnier and far more bombastic when it comes to action, delivering some huge sequences where Chan’s character and an ally take on dozens of foes, as well as a climactic fight where Jackie Chan fights another skilled martial artist in a scene that feels like it never ends, all the while continually escalating. Those who aren’t familiar with martial arts outside American cinema ought to make watching the martial arts classic Drunken Master II a priority, because it does undoubtedly represent this genre at its best.

For a movie that’s got a title as simple as Hero, this 2002 martial arts epic does have a surprisingly complex and intricate structure, even if the plot itself isn’t too convoluted, at the end of the day. Things revolve around one hugely talented warrior detailing how he took down three assassins in rapid succession, each playing out through a series of gorgeously filmed and quite stunning flashbacks.

Once the stories are over, other things transpire that aren’t worth spoiling, but the overall structure and slow-burn narrative building in the film’s present does somewhat mimic the storytelling found in Masaki Kobayashi’s Harakiri. Hero is a good deal more action-centered than that iconic samurai drama movie, though, and is worth a watch for just how visually beautiful it is alone (that the action is also very good honestly just feels like icing on the cake).

When it comes to the filmography of the legendary William Friedkin, you can’t really go wrong with much of what’s there. And sure, his best efforts were probably from the 1970s (looking at you, The French Connection and The Exorcist), but beyond that decade, his best single film might well be that of To Live and Die in L.A., which is a gritty blend of crime/action/thriller genres that feels of its time, yet also somehow timeless.

Like a great many action movies, the plot here never gets too complex, more or less being focused on one man’s quest for revenge against an elusive criminal after his Secret Service agent partner is killed in cold blood. To Live and Die in L.A. is relentless, violent, and unpredictable, and delivers some seriously impressive action within its runtime, including an all-time great car chase sequence.

Like the aforementioned Touch of Zen, The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter is another absolutely essential martial arts movie classic that's lost none of its impact in the decades since its original release. The plot is minimal, all things considered, with The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter's narrative essentially boiling down to an elongated and bloody quest for revenge on the part of one inexperienced martial artist (who soon becomes very experienced) after a violent and bloody betrayal.

It might be a little unclear what all the hype is about surrounding The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter at first, but viewers should stick with this one for the long haul. The final 15 to 20 minutes delivers some of the best and most brutal action sequences in the history of the action genre, and it's all a sight to behold (so long as one isn't looking away from the screen, owing to all the surprisingly gruesome violence that still feels a little hard to watch to this day).

The Dune duology has two distinct halves, with 2021’s Dune being mostly focused on world-building and set-up before having a more action-heavy final act. Dune: Part Two isn’t necessarily constant action and fighting, but it has noticeably more compared to the first film. Characters are established, the stakes have been set, and the climactic action here is even bigger and more spectacular than comparable scenes found in the first movie.

Denis Villeneuve uses Dune: Part Two to further demonstrate his mastery of the science fiction genre, with both Dune movies standing together to be an immense and amazing epic blending adventure, sci-fi, drama, and action to stunning effect. Dune: Part Two isn’t just an action movie by any means, but that side of it impresses more than enough for it to be considered a great action film alongside being an excellent sci-fi flick.

A Touch of Zen could well be defined as a fantasy movie, as it gets pretty mystical in parts and has an overall strange and otherworldly atmosphere. While it does eventually reveal itself to be a rather fantastic martial arts movie, it's a patient film that takes some time to get to the action, so to speak. For the first hour or so of the fantasy-action movie's mammoth three-hour runtime, there's little to no action to be found.

Instead, A Touch of Zen is all about atmosphere and is dedicated to being a slow-burn, though once the action does start, it's spellbinding to watch. The plot is fairly straightforward overall, being about a woman on the run and how she joins forces with a group of monks to eventually stand up to those pursuing her, but it's the execution that makes the film special, and an undeniably essential watch for any and all martial arts fans.

Though it feels, in hindsight, a bit like a feature-length warm-up for a certain 2015 film within the same series, Mad Max 2 is still an excellent action/sci-fi movie in its own right. Sometimes called The Road Warrior, Mad Max 2 takes the character and world of the first movie and does something radical with them, as while the original from 1979 was more of a revenge thriller that was surprisingly light on action, Mad Max 2 goes for broke and feels a great deal bigger.

And sure, the Mad Max series as a whole would wage into even more grand territory further down the road, but Mad Max 2 was pretty unreal for its time. The titular character clashes in a post-apocalyptic landscape with a foe known as Lord Humungus, who lives up to his name and becomes a great source of conflict, leading to a ton of action crammed into a runtime that’s only a little over an hour and a half long.

Anyone who’s a fan of both action cinema and the classic Western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly owes it to themselves to stop whatever they’re doing and watch The Good, The Bad, The Weird. It’s a Korean film that takes a similar premise to Sergio Leone’s legendary 1966 film and injects it with broader comedy and more over-the-top action, making for a relentless and dizzying viewing experience.

The characters of The Good, The Bad, The Weird inhabit a cruel world and are similarly hard-edged for survival’s sake, all the while scheming and competing to get to a hidden stash of treasure before anyone else. It’s a film that shows how you don’t, by any means, need to come up with a brand-new plot for a movie to have a reason to exist, as the presentation, emphasis on action, and style of The Good, the Bad, the Weird prove to be more than enough to make it feel fresh and unique.

While it’s not the only Indiana Jones movie worth bringing up when discussing great action movies, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is usually considered a series highlight, and likely to be either the second-favorite or favorite for most people. It retreads some familiar territory during this third time around for the titular roguish hero, but The Last Crusade does have an ace up its sleeve in the form of Sean Connery.

He's paired expertly here with Harrison Ford’s protagonist, portraying Indy’s father, Dr. Henry Jones Sr., with their dynamic injecting a healthy dose of comedy into the proceedings and making this action/adventure film also feel like a buddy movie. That, coupled with typically great action sensibilities from the ever-versatile Steven Spielberg, ensures The Last Crusade is a great time, and one movie that manages to blend action with suitable amounts of humor and heart very well.

Any discussion about great on-screen action is inevitably going to involve name-dropping John Woo a bunch of times. Few directors have delivered explosive shootouts quite as well as he has, but less well-celebrated are his efforts within the martial arts genre, and it’s one of his earliest movies – Last Hurrah for Chivalry – that shows his surprising knack for staging elaborate combat sequences that don’t contain firearms.

Last Hurrah for Chivalry is one of the most underrated action movies of its era, and an essential martial arts film for those who like this brand of action. Its plot can be convoluted, throwing together a group of skilled fighters and giving them all intense reasons to dislike each other and clash, but it never loses the plot entirely, and even if it did, most wouldn’t mind when the fight scenes are as good as they happen to be here.

Not to be mixed up with the similarly named Chuck Norris film Lone Wolf McQuade, Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril is instead an installment in the legendary Lone Wolf and Cub samurai movie series. This is the fourth film that was made within that series, and somehow came out the same year that the first three did: 1972. It’s remarkable how quickly they were all churned out, considering how good they are.

Baby Cart in Peril continues the adventures of the revenge-seeking former executioner Ogami Itto and his young son, who are assigned to kill a notorious assassin while clashing with a feared clan of fighters. The plot isn’t always super necessary, with this Lone Wolf and Cub movie—like most of them—being most concerned with delivering bloody, over-the-top action and taking no prisoners in the process. In that sense, it’s a rousing success and a blast to watch.

When a movie has a simple title, it can be a relatively safe sign that it will also have a simple premise, and that’s definitely the case for Revenge, which is about revenge. Specifically, the individual seeking vengeance is a young woman who’s horrifically mistreated and then left to die in the desert by a trio of men. When she miraculously (and perhaps even supernaturally) survives, she goes about getting back at them in an exciting, cathartic, and sometimes stomach-churning fashion.

Revenge gets extremely brutal at times, and even those who are okay with 99% of violent/gory scenes may find a couple of points in this film to be too much (the self-surgery scenes look way too convincing; that’s all that needs to be said). Still, by committing to this simple premise and tackling it in such a visceral and stylish way, Revenge is a hard movie to forget or shake, and it instantly established its director, Coralie Fargeat, as someone to keep an eye on going forward (especially considering this was only her feature film debut).

Michelle Yeoh is best known for starring in movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Everything Everywhere All At Once (winning a well-deserved Oscar for the latter), but her filmography goes back surprisingly far. Something like Magnificent Warriors isn’t as well-known as those aforementioned later films she starred in, but it is amazing and underrated nonetheless, and certainly deserving of more love.

It delivers so much action within a relatively short runtime, and is one of those excellently paced movies belonging to this genre that somehow keeps on one-upping itself with every big scene. It takes place during a time of war, but focuses more on explosive action and entertaining spectacle than being a traditional war movie. There are also key places in Magnificent Warriors where one can see other films that may have influenced it, but that’s okay when such influences are remixed and reimagined the way they are during this entertaining ride of a film.

Speaking of violent, dark, and fairly wild movies, Dangerous Encounters of the First Kind is genuinely unlike anything else out there, and serves as one of the most uncompromising and cynical action/crime/thriller movies of all time. The lead characters comprise a trio of social outcasts who one day begin setting off explosives in public places, seemingly for a laugh, which catches the attention of a much more violent and ruthless young woman who wants to use them for her own violent means.

Dangerous Encounters of the First Kind (not to be mixed up with a certain Steven Spielberg movie) looks at social isolation, the tedium of life in the 20th century, terrorism, misanthropy, and the cruel nature of fate. It’s the sort of thing that’s unpredictable from scene to scene, and it moves at a good pace, all the while having brief bursts of uneasy violence and tense action. It’s not for everyone, but it deserves credit for how out there it’s willing to get.

Yakuza movies tend to get pretty violent, but at the same time, few can hold up to the level of carnage and bloodshed on display in the over-the-top Why Don’t You Play in Hell? (a movie that also might have one of the best titles in recent memory). It’s about a film crew going to great lengths to capture authenticity in the movie they’re making, which leads to them finding themselves in the middle of a genuine yakuza gang war.

It's not the most serious of looks at the infamous Japanese criminal organization, but the yakuza movie is certainly one of the most entertaining and darkly funny. Balancing the bloody violence and comedy with some occasional drama and simple but compelling characters, Why Don’t You Play in Hell? is a winner overall, so long as you’re not too squeamish a viewer.

It’s not the easiest thing in the world to label one of the Mission: Impossible movies as the best, as they all have different things to offer while having generally consistent action and sequences of impressive stunt work. The ever-committed Tom Cruise sought to outdo what had been done in previous installments with 2023’s Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, and the results were largely successful and genuinely thrilling.

Like any Mission: Impossible movie, the plot of Dead Reckoning Part One is a bit all over the shop and not too important, ultimately benefiting from an interesting AI villain and using what it has narratively to showcase some truly impressive sequences. It’s a movie that’s worth watching for the final act on board a train alone, but everything up until that point is also great, ensuring Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is a top-tier action/adventure/thriller movie.

Though he made many great movies throughout his time, few Alfred Hitchcock films can strictly be labeled as action movies. Most of the time, Hitchcock was focused on suspense, favoring the build-up to an explosion more than showing the explosion itself, for example. But then came North by Northwest, which was one of his most action-packed efforts and showed the filmmaker was more than capable of tackling that broadest and most wide-appealing of genres.

North by Northwest is also a thriller, an adventure movie, something of a comedy, and a film that doesn’t skimp on romance, with Cary Grant being paired excellently with the always delightful Eva Marie Saint. Both shine in scenes both comedic and action-focused in nature, and to this day, North by Northwest is simply a relentlessly fun ride about a desperate chase playing out in the wake of an ordinary man getting accused of being a spy.

Though it feels like the James Bond movies have been around forever, back in 1964, the film series was relatively new. In fact, Goldfinger was only the third of the bunch, but to this date, it’s still usually considered up there as one of the greatest movies featuring 007, and includes perhaps Sean Connery’s greatest single performance in the lead role out of all of them.

Narratively, Goldfinger is typical spy/adventure/action stuff, with the main villain having an ambitious plan that involves a heist at Fort Knox, the consequences of which are intended to disrupt the entire world economy. Of course, Bond is the only person up to the task of stopping such a thing from happening, and he does this while traveling to exotic locales, charming beautiful women, and kicking/punching/shooting various adversaries for good measure. You know, classic 007 stuff.

It's always hard to top a film that’s already seen as a classic when it comes to doing a reboot/remake, and William Friedkin therefore had a difficult task ahead of him when it came to making Sorcerer. This 1977 film is a reimagining of The Wages of Fear, which is one of the best movies of the 1950s. Both films are white-knuckle thriller/adventure films, following individuals tasked with transporting highly explosive material across rough terrain.

It's hard to say which is better between The Wages of Fear and Sorcerer, and it is safe to say that both are worth checking out for fans of the thriller/action genres. But Sorcerer is a little shorter and snappier, and it was made more recently (comparatively speaking), so its more surprising scenes hit harder and feel more visceral. It’s an intense and unnerving experience in all the best ways.

Few actors or actresses have ever been quite as cool as Pam Grier, especially when she was at the height of her popularity in the 1970s (though she had a great comeback in the 1990s, partly thanks to Jackie Brown). Of her early films, Coffy and Foxy Brown are likely Grier's most iconic, with the former being the slightly stronger one overall, particularly for those after a satisfying crime/action movie.

Coffy sees a nurse taking matters into her own hands when the drugs and crime that surround her life overwhelm her, and she enacts vengeance against the various nefarious individuals responsible for such wrongdoing and hardships. It’s a no-nonsense approach to being a vigilante movie, but it all works exceedingly well, and Grier is more than up to the task of considerably elevating the already solid material found elsewhere in the film.

Masaki Kobayashi made plenty of films that dealt with violent conflict, though his movies, classifiable as action films, are a good deal more patient and sparing with their action sequences than most. Samurai Rebellion is an example of this, as it’s mostly a drama with some brief spurts of intense action here and there, though the build-up to physical conflict taking part proves to be supremely tense in its own way.

The story takes a critical look at feudalism and the samurai way of life, with a conflict surrounding a kidnapping of sorts that pulls many characters into events that have dramatic and deadly consequences. Samurai Rebellion is a slow-burn, but in no way a boring or disappointing one, taking its time and ensuring that the scenes of swordplay eventually have the maximum impact possible.

Some might say Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is a tad too recent to be called one of the all-time greatest action movies, but the spectacle and creativity on offer is just too immense to resist. It serves as a prequel to 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, and does contain more of an emphasis on story, character, and world-building, all the while having similarly entertaining bursts of action.

Though Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is long and not as consistently action-packed, the runtime does still allow for plenty of action, and it’s wild, explosive, and bold in all the right ways. Time will likely be kind to the film, and revisits will probably prove to be rewarding, given there’s so much going on and the maximalist style of it all is a lot to take in on one’s first viewing.

A classic action/crime film that pushed boundaries for its time, Shaft is well-recognized as a distinctive 1970s classic, not to mention an influential one that also happened to have a pair of follow-ups in the 21st century, not to mention two direct sequels in the years following its release. The plot’s pretty simple, following the title character (first name John) as he undertakes a mission to retrieve the kidnapped daughter of a powerful criminal.

The story might not be anything too out-there, or worth writing home about, but it’s the style, music, and undeniable cool factor of the main character that makes Shaft stand out. It can be included as a title within the Blaxploitation movement, and is one of the most timeless of such films, still proving entertaining and exciting to this day.

House of Flying Daggers is more than just an action/martial arts movie, as there are strong drama/romance elements spread throughout, but it’s all very well-balanced in the end. The film’s story takes place more than 1000 years ago, and involves several people who are wrapped up in an extended conflict between corrupt government forces and an army of rebel warriors.

Coming out at a time when martial arts cinema seemed to be having a brief resurgence in popularity, House of Flying Daggers really stands out thanks to how beautiful it is visually, and it helps that the narrative—while slow at times—is ultimately emotionally impactful. Those wanting non-stop action might not quite get that here, but there’s definitely enough by way of creatively staged fight sequences for House of Flying Daggers to nevertheless satisfy as an action movie.

Without a doubt, Kathryn Bigelow knows how to craft great action/thriller movies, with Point Break exemplifying this well. It’s also a noteworthy film for Keanu Reeves, given it was one of his first opportunities to show off his capabilities as an action movie star, with such abilities being further realized through The Matrix and John Wick films later in his career.

Patrick Swayze also gives one of his most iconic performances here, playing the leader of a gang of bank robbers, with Reeves playing an undercover agent who infiltrates their gang, but finds himself drawn to their way of life. It’s the sort of premise that’s familiar, but Point Break executes it all perfectly well, and delivers some impressive stunts and exciting action/chase sequences along the way.

Exploring the filmography of Buster Keaton shows that he was ahead of his time in many ways, including being ahead of the curve when it came to the entire action genre. The General might not have entirely invented the idea of basing a movie around action and/or adventure, but it was debatably as good as such movies got at the time, and probably wasn’t topped as an action movie until 1954, with the release of a little movie about samurai; seven of them, in fact.

In The General, there is a young man who loves a young woman and his prized locomotive, so he goes to great lengths to recover both when they're kidnapped/stolen. It’s a quintessential chase movie, with the action heading in one direction before heading back in the opposite direction, the whole journey being jam-packed with stunts, physical comedy, and various inventive set pieces.

The 36th Chamber of Shaolin is about as essential as kung fu movies from the 1970s get. It follows one young man who begins an arduous training process mainly so he can become strong enough to efficiently seek revenge as a one-man army, but is overall unprepared for just how strange and vigorous physically and mentally that training will prove to be.

It’s undoubtedly familiar ground for a martial arts movie to cover, but The 36th Chamber of Shaolin just covers it all so well that it’s hard to get too angry about possibly feeling a sense of déjà vu. Indeed, some of that déjà vu might well be in reverse (and thereby not exactly fair), seeing as The 36th Chamber of Shaolin has certainly been an influence on some other martial arts movies that have been released in its wake.

Sure, Hot Fuzz is generally a parody of action movies featuring cops, but that doesn’t mean it fails to satisfy when it comes to action and a genuinely intriguing murder mystery narrative. It works as both parody and something more straightforward simultaneously, pulling off this minor miracle of a balancing act in much the same way Shaun of the Dead did three years earlier (which was a great zombie movie and a great parody of the zombie genre).

Edgar Wright was the director behind both, as were stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, and the two films are excellent for different reasons. Hot Fuzz name-drops various classic action movies while also parodying and/or referencing several, all the while doing its own thing tonally and narratively. Not much out there that wasn’t directed by Wright can be compared to it, really.

Putting a bit of an arthouse spin on the action genre, Léon: The Professional is a movie with some unusual stylistic and thematic choices, but a thunderously direct and emotionally satisfying story at its core. It’s about a young girl, Mathilda, whose family is murdered, and her quest for revenge that ends up involving a lonely hit man named Léon.

It’s a movie with a bombastic Gary Oldman performance, too, as he plays a terrifying DEA agent who’s responsible for the murder of Mathilda’s family. It’s easy to get behind the revenge narrative of Léon: The Professional, and the action scenes—though not too frequent and relatively confined in scope—do generally satisfy. It’s pretty easy to recommend, especially the shorter theatrical cut rather than the sometimes questionable longer version, which adds about 25 minutes to the runtime.

Those who are fond of extreme action movies ought to prioritize watching The Raid, if any have somehow gone the last 10+ years without bearing witness to it. This is really as good as modern-day martial arts movies get, or at least as straightforward/satisfying as they can maybe ever be. It’s a film that’s all about the action, and the fight scenes are so good that that’s all it has to be.

The premise, simple as it is, confines the lead character to a building he has to spend most of the movie’s runtime fighting his way out of. Some gunfights early on give way to more frequent hand-to-hand combat (sometimes involving various brutal weapons), and there’s a frenzied nature to such set pieces that helped make The Raid an instant action movie classic.

There are lots of good 007 movies that themselves can count as good action films, since even though you’d call them spy movies, action scenes naturally play a big part in just about every single one of them. GoldenEye might not quite be the best of the best, but it is a very good James Bond film, having everyone’s favorite secret agent deal with the usual sorts of world-ending stakes.

Things get a bit spicier in GoldenEye because the main villain (who’s played by Sean Bean) was once Agent 006, so there’s that whole friends-to-rivals thing at play, which always makes for good drama. Elsewhere, GoldenEye is explosive and pretty over-the-top, though there’s just enough here by way of grit and intensity to keep it from falling into full-on camp (not that the campier 007 films don’t have their fans, though).

Redline shows that a movie doesn’t have to be in live-action to have great action. This is a top-tier anime film that revolves around an interplanetary car race that takes place in the distant future. An already intense and sometimes dangerous sport is just made even more intense, dangerous, and high-stakes, thanks to the vehicles people drive when taking part in this futuristic race.

Speed is the name of the game with Redline. It wants you to feel like you’re racing through the entire thing, and the amount of adrenaline provided, thanks to the immense animation and expert use of sound, is undeniable. Few animated movies come even close to being as exciting as Redline, and even if you’re the sort of action movie fan who doesn’t usually like anime, this one’s a must-watch.

Well, okay, Kung Fu Hustle is a unique martial arts comedy, but by no means is it the only great martial arts comedy, since Everything Everywhere All at Once also exists. Though, to be fair, this Best Picture winner is more than just a comedic martial arts movie, with it also functioning as a family drama, an adventure film, and a sometimes complex piece of science fiction, too.

Everything Everywhere All at Once explores the idea of the multiverse—and eventually saving it—in a thrillingly unique and unpredictable way. There’s too much going on here to break down in the space of a few short sentences, but if you come away from Everything Everywhere All at Once not having felt some kind of unexpected emotion, then that would be genuinely surprising.

Functioning as both a live-action cartoon and a martial arts movie, Kung Fu Hustle attempts to do a lot within a fairly short runtime, and it honestly succeeds across the board. It’s somewhat inspiring that such a wild film can come together this well, and the film’s narrative itself is oddly inspiring, in that it’s about one unlikely person achieving greatness and standing up to immense adversity.

Of course, Kung Fu Hustle does this in a way that’s far from straightforward, and parts of it are more than willing to parody martial arts movie conventions more than play them straight. It feels like every cartoon and kung fu film you’ve ever seen thrown into a blender, and spiked with additional sugar for more energy. It’s a glorious and strangely beautiful mess, and unlike much else out there.

It’s honestly pretty easy to summarize Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as “the dark one” and leave it at that, because it is noticeably bleaker than the other two acclaimed Indiana Jones films of the 1980s. It sometimes feels like the forgotten middle child of the series, but as an action movie, it does really satisfy… it’s just that, for better or worse, the action/adventure stuff has to share the screen with some really dark and gross things.

Steven Spielberg was at least going for something different here, and the content of Temple of Doom did also help bring about the PG-13 rating, given how this film, though intended for a wide audience, did have some pretty chunky (almost) R-rated violence. It’s a mean-spirited, strange, weirdly bloody, and honestly admirable romp, and it more than works as an action movie.

Functioning as both a great epic movie and an over-the-top action flick, Sholay runs for well over three hours yet stays entertaining for pretty much every minute of its runtime. Broadly, it’s about one man seeking revenge against a notorious criminal for the murder of his family, and the way he seeks the help of two slightly less notorious outlaws to carry out his plan.

Also, if that doesn’t sound like enough, Sholay is also a musical, sort of a Western, and it balances its dramatic moments with the more buddy comedy-style moments surprisingly well. It’s a maximalist film that, on the surface, might look like it’s overstuffed, but everything just comes together somehow, and it ends up being a blast. If you're not too familiar with Indian cinema and want to get acquainted with it, so to speak, then this is honestly a pretty good starting point.

Even if The Dirty Dozen disappointed when it came to its action scenes, it would still be worth checking out for how ridiculously great its cast was. This World War II action/adventure movie stars the likes of Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, John Cassavetes, Telly Savalas, and Donald Sutherland, and has a super enticing and well-executed premise, too.

Essentially, The Dirty Dozen is about assembling a group of military prisoners and training them for a hugely dangerous mission, one in which their survival (though unlikely) will be rewarded by their crimes being pardoned. It’s got a very straightforward three-act structure, but it’s also very satisfying to watch play out nonetheless, with the performances and the memorable characters also going a long way toward making The Dirty Dozen a classic.

The premise of Battle Royale is instantly horrifying and successfully stomach-churning, given that it’s about a class of teenage students being sent to an island and told they have to kill each other. It’s established early on that the people behind this are not messing around in the slightest, and that it really will be a “last person standing” sort of competition, with only one student allowed to live, once all others are dead.

It's heavy stuff, but Battle Royale is also quite exciting and has a ton of action alongside all the depressing drama. It’s the sort of thing that could’ve really gone wrong, but it’s pulled off well here. It’s also a must-watch for anyone who was intrigued by the premise of The Hunger Games but wanted to see it executed in a rawer and (mostly) more realistic way.

Braveheart is probably more definable as a historical epic (albeit one that’s more set in historical times rather than going for historical accuracy) than an action movie, but there’s still quite a lot of action. It’s about William Wallace (Mel Gibson) seeking revenge for the murder of the woman he loved, but then this act of revenge snowballs into a full-on rebellion against English rule in Scotland.

It's a little like Spartacus in terms of its premise and structure, but it feels bloodier and more brutal than that film and the other epics of old. Braveheart scarcely holds back and might well be a little too over-the-top at times, but it’s also easy to get swept up in the film, even with it being as broad, bombastic, unsubtle, and historically shaky as it is. There’s a good story here bolstered by compelling battle sequences, and that ends up being more than enough.

The first of a handful of John Woo movies worth talking about for present purposes, A Better Tomorrow was one of his earliest films to attain a certain level of popularity and acclaim, putting him further on track to be one of the all-time great action movie directors. His name’s going to pop up a further four times below this (spoilers?), which should say a lot about how great he is at making this kind of movie.

A Better Tomorrow was his earliest borderline perfect heroic bloodshed movie, with its plot pitting two brothers against each other in a complicated test of loyalty, as one is an ex-gangster who wants to break free of that sort of life, and the other is a police officer. It’s more of a melodrama for a good chunk of its runtime (not that there’s anything wrong with that), saving its best action sequences for the final act, but when they hit, they hit uncompromisingly hard.

A recent film that achieved remarkable critical success (less so box office-wise, though it could’ve been worse), One Battle After Another saw Paul Thomas Anderson helming an action movie for the first time in his filmmaking career. Other films of his had been tense and exciting in other ways, but this one had a bigger budget and more set pieces, even if it was also concerned with being more than “just” an action movie.

Leonardo DiCaprio, as Bob, is kind of the lead here, but Sean Penn’s villainous turn often steals the show, and much of the film is spent shifting the focus to Bob’s daughter, Willa (Chase Infiniti), who emerges as the real protagonist. There are tons of great performances here, a surprising amount of offbeat humor, and then some chase sequences that really feel alive and demonstrate that Anderson, as it turns out, probably has it in him to make blockbusters if he wanted to continue doing so.

It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is an old-school epic in terms of production, cast, and scope, but it’s also exceptionally silly and broadly comedic, keeping that energy up for about three hours. It’s exhausting, but also a ton of fun, and the premise is also rather simple, since it involves a dying man telling a group of strangers about a buried fortune many miles away.

A race then ensues, with countless selfish individuals wanting to beat everyone else to the destination, causing havoc all the while, and then Spencer Tracy is also there, following the chaos a little like Tommy Lee Jones’s character in (the tonally very different) No Country for Old Men. It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is a bit, bit, bit, bit much at times, but the excess is also funny, and it’s up there among the best gun-free action movies of all time, too.

There are hundreds of beavers in Hundreds of Beavers, but not straight away. Much of this film plays out like a survival movie, albeit one without dialogue and a lot more comedy than you might see in other films with wilderness settings, like Jeremiah Johnson and The Revenant. One man (Ryland Brickson Cole Tews) battles the elements and then realizes he can make money by hunting beavers and selling their fur.

This ends up building in ridiculous ways, with constant slapstick comedy and ridiculous costumes used to bring the beavers and other animals to life (so all the deaths played for laughs don’t feel too morbid). There is a bizarre energy here that’s hard to put into words, but Hundreds of Beavers is both one of the funniest movies in recent memory and one of the more exciting, so it’s absolutely worth one’s time, particularly if one is looking for something more than a little different.

Perhaps the best movie out there that features giant robots and giant monsters (at least of the ones where none of the giant robots are called Mechagodzilla), Pacific Rim is a strangely inspiring movie about a world-ending threat. Just about everyone on Earth teams up to combat invading alien monsters, and the amount of teamwork between nations might well be even more fantastical than the sci-fi/fantasy-related stuff.

Still, Guillermo del Toro knows how to make a movie like this work, and he nails the tone here, ensuring Pacific Rim is silly, endearing, exciting, and a bit laughable, all at once, and always in the right ways. It’s a movie that had a sizable budget and actually put it to good use, since there’s an amazing world built here, and the biggest/most action-packed sequences still hold up immensely well on a technical front.

Yes, there have been many superhero/comic book movies that have come out in the last few decades, but before things got a bit oversaturated, there was The Crow, and it was great. This one’s dark and focused enough on the supernatural to almost/occasionally feel like a horror movie, with the plot involving a murdered man (Brandon Lee) being brought back to life as an unstoppable being of vengeance.

He and his fiancée were murdered, and so his quest is one that’s mostly about revenge, though he does also try to help those who are still living and suffering in the world he thought he’d left behind. Even without taking into account what happened with Lee during the production of the film, The Crow is a deeply sad and heavy watch, but it’s powerful and also undeniably stylish in ways you don’t often get to see in superhero/comic book movies nowadays.