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If an action movie impresses when it comes to the action side of things, then what you’ve very likely got on your hands is a more than pretty good action movie. Not really all that hard to see why that might be the case. People fight, it’s exciting, and the stakes are probably fairly high, too. If you’re invested in the characters in some kind of genuinely dramatic and emotional way, too, then all the better.
As for the following films, they do indeed all belong to the action genre, and they’re highlighted here for being especially packed with things to be wowed by. They’re all worthy of being considered among the most impressive action movies ever made, and there’ll also be a combination here of classics that have stood the test of time, and more modern releases that feel like they’ll be considered true classics one day.
10
‘Gladiator’ (2000)
Gladiator does just about everything right, as an epic movie, and then it also functions as a pretty great action film, too. As far as epics go, it’s on the shorter end of things, at about 2.5 hours, while other epics find themselves hovering around the three-hour mark fairly often, but the runtime here really does feel about right. It’s enough to complete the whole story, even if 24 years later, there was an odd sequel to Gladiator that wasn’t even that bad, though it was rather forgettable.
Anyway, Gladiator, as in the good one, is about a Roman general who gets betrayed, is made a slave/gladiatorial fighter, and then seeks vengeance (while inspiring broader societal change) against the man who wronged him. The action’s impressive, the story’s simple but engaging, the acting is a lot better than you might expect, and then the music also goes above and beyond. Lots of good ingredients here, and they’re all well-utilized within the wholly filling dish that is Gladiator.
9
‘A Touch of Zen’ (1970)
You could go back in time to when people were first familiar with the earliest short films, in the late 1800s, show them A Touch of Zen, and they’d probably have their minds blown (assuming they’re not already hysterical about you rocking up from 2026). You can also show people living in, like, 2026 A Touch of Zen, and their minds might well be almost just as blown, because this is a very distinctive and impressive epic.
There’s still enough action by the end to make A Touch of Zen qualify as an action movie, with the fact that it’s also more than just “another” martial arts film being a big reason why it feels so staggering to watch.
It’s long enough that it doesn’t feature a lot of fighting for about an hour or more, saving it for the second half of a movie that ends up being about three hours long. There’s still enough action by the end to make A Touch of Zen qualify as an action movie, with the fact that it’s also more than just “another” martial arts film being a big reason why it feels so staggering to watch, regardless of the time/year when you do end up watching it.
8
‘Avengers: Infinity War’ (2018)
Avengers: Infinity War is absolutely overflowing with superheroes, balancing them all after they’d been introduced in previous movies, and then it also ambitiously made its villain, Thanos, more or less the main character. He’d also technically been introduced and seen earlier in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, yet Infinity War was his time to shine, and it was the film responsible for making him an iconic character beyond just the comic book world.
There was also Avengers: Endgame, which was similarly ambitious, but most of it wasn’t really as immense a balancing act as Avengers: Infinity War, since there were technically fewer characters at play for the majority of that one’s runtime. Still, both movies are impressive in their own ways, and when judged together as a duology of sorts; a duology that’s the one to beat, going forward, for any future Avengers-related movies.
7
‘The Odyssey’ (2026)
It is the most recent movie here, yet The Odyssey does feel like something instantly special, and the spectacle here is such that the extent to which it impresses just feels too hard to deny. In case you’ve been living under a rock for 3000 years (congrats for staying alive for that long as well, by the way), The Odyssey is about a man who tries to get home after taking part in the Trojan War, and nothing really goes very well for him and his fellow soldiers, to say the least.
Call it more of an adventure story if you want, and The Odyssey is also a work of fantasy (while downplaying some fantastical elements of the original story), but Christopher Nolan’s take on this tale does have a good deal of large-scale action. 2026’s The Odyssey is also paced like an action movie, with 172 minutes flying by in a way that feels much closer to two hours in length than three.
6
‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’ (2000)
30 years on from A Touch of Zen, there was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, with the two movies kind of scratching the same itch, thanks to the fact that beyond both being martial arts movies, the pair are also – and more specifically – wuxia films. These are martial arts movies that have some fantastical elements, but not necessarily high fantasy elements. No actual dragon-slaying here, for example, despite the title, and if fighters have magical abilities, they’re of the more subdued variety (no spell-casting or anything like that).
It’s a way to make action feel heightened, because Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon does indeed have skilled fighters among its cast of characters who are also capable of certain surprising feats. Things aren’t too heightened, though, and so Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon also satisfies as more of a drama and romance film at times, with the characters feeling grounded and real enough for that side of things to be emotionally resonant. It does have to balance quite a lot, yet does so throughout its entire runtime very impressively.
5
‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ (2018)
You’re allowed to have a favorite Mission: Impossible movie that isn’t Fallout, sure, but you’re also allowed to look at people who make such a claim with a little by way of suspicion. This just feels like everything the series is good at dialed up to just the right level, because Mission: Impossible – Fallout does succeed at upping things scale-wise and stakes-wise compared to previous movies, yet not to the point where everything becomes too ridiculous.
What might be ridiculous is suggesting Tom Cruise was as Oscar-worthy here as he was in something like Magnolia or Born on the Fourth of July, but also… maybe? He’s always felt right in his element in the Mission: Impossible movies, and feels particularly in control – and at his best – in this sixth (and, again, greatest) entry in the series.
4
‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ (2015)
Mad Max: Fury Road is famously the movie that feels a bit like one long car chase that lasts for approximately two hours, even if it’s not literally that, which is probably for the best, because that would be exhausting. What’s important is that it feels that way, thanks to being so well-paced and edited, with Mad Max: Fury Road taking very little time to get going, and then it manages to keep building in intensity throughout.
It’s amazing that director George Miller turned 70 the year Mad Max: Fury Road came out, with it taking multiple decades for him to realize the full potential of the whole series. That’s not a knock against the first three movies (and the second, in particular, is also hugely impressive), but Fury Road is Fury Road, and it’s overall just next-level stuff.
3
‘The Raid 2’ (2014)
The second-last martial arts movie worth mentioning, when it comes to seriously impressive action films (the final one here is a bit more than “just” a martial arts movie) is The Raid 2. Also, The Raid (2011) is extremely impressive. It’s always worth an honorable mention, whenever The Raid 2 otherwise steals the spotlight, since The Raid takes place in so confined a setting, and has such a simple premise, yet remains riveting and always exciting throughout.
Things expand quite a lot in The Raid 2, with the fallout of the events of The Raid (2011) getting wrapped up fairly hastily early on, and then the main character finds himself given a similar task to Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Departed. The Raid 2 has shades of that film (or, more accurately, Infernal Affairs), plus some other gangster movies, and then it throws so much varied action on top of all the crime-related chaos. It’s maximalist stuff, and has the kind of fight scenes that do very much need to be seen to be believed.
2
‘Seven Samurai’ (1954)
Well, maybe The Raid 2 was the third-last martial arts movie worth mentioning, because samurai movies are a sub-genre within the whole martial arts genre, and Seven Samurai… it’s in the title, you know? It’s obviously a samurai movie. It’s probably even the definitive samurai movie, as in a good one to watch if you want to see what that particular genre/sub-genre is all about.
Granted, you’ll need a fair bit of time on your hands to watch the whole of Seven Samurai, since it’s so long, but it’s the good kind of lengthy, and far from slow-paced or ever at risk of being tedious, too. This film sort of wrote the rulebook in terms of how action movies could exceed three hours in length and remain enthralling throughout, and it’s an obviously iconic piece of entertainment in the same way that it sort of goes without saying that books like To Kill a Mockingbird and Nineteen Eighty-Four are undeniable classics within the literary sphere.
1
‘The Matrix’ (1999)
While The Matrix is entirely different in genre and tone from Citizen Kane, it feels worth comparing the two here in the sense that with both, they’re a bit harder to appreciate now, so many years on from release, owing to how influential and replicated they’ve ended up being. The better comparison is probably Seven Samurai, admittedly, since that was a very ambitious action movie, though also a different sort of action movie to The Matrix.
The original Matrix film is about as spectacular as sci-fi action movies have ever been, and lots of what it does stylistically (the slow motion, special effects, well-staged gunfights alongside expertly choreographed hand-to-hand combat, etc.) proved instantly influential. It probably wasn’t until Mad Max: Fury Road or maybe Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse that you got some other sci-fi movies that were possibly more influential, and then even beyond influence, The Matrix just astounds on an action front and everything here, technically speaking, still holds up ideally. No Jack Nicholson in sight, but this is still as good as it gets.
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Jeremy Urquhart
Almontather Rassoul
