10 Most Influential Action Movies, Ranked (2025)

The action genre will probably never die, what with so many blockbusters nowadays being definable – wholly or in part – as action movies, and with seeming popularity around the world. Action movies showcase great fight sequences, thrilling and sometimes over-the-top stunt work, and a level of spectacle that very few people experience in their everyday lives (probably for the better, in all honesty).

What is now understood as the action genre today, though, is relatively modern, as going back multiple decades reveals some movies classifiable as “action,” but not as many as one might expect, at least pre-1960 or so. So, the following films – some older, and some more recent – are selected to showcase action movies at their most influential, to best understand the genre and the trends found within its history. It’s not necessarily the same as ranking the best action movies ever, and admittedly, some of these fit within other genres beyond just action, but all can be seen as influential to some extent.

10 'Gladiator' (2000)

Director: Ridley Scott

For a short while throughout the 2000s, historical epics that also functioned as action/war movies made something of a comeback (following the epic being most popular, as a genre, back in the 1950s and 1960s), with Gladiator being a contributor to this. One might argue it began with the also successful Braveheart, but that film’s action scenes weren’t quite as frequent, and the way they were shot wasn’t as mimicked by later films.

Gladiator saw Ridley Scott helming impressive battle and gladiatorial scenes that felt gritty and physical, all the while incorporating numerous special effects, sometimes computer-generated. It was done pretty seamlessly for the time, and the quick editing used to accentuate certain shots within action scenes proved somewhat influential. You can’t quite say Gladiator influenced The Lord of the Rings and its battle scenes, but without Gladiator’s success, there might not have been the likes of Troy, Kingdom of Heaven, The Last Samurai, Alexander, or 300.

9 'Spider-Man' (2002)

Director: Sam Raimi

Sure, Spider-Man is a superhero movie first and foremost, but the majority of superhero movies can also be considered action flicks, what with these movies often involving battles between good and evil (at least traditionally). And Spider-Man was important for signifying an increased interest in pulpy, broadly appealing, action-heavy superhero fare, being a little more explosive and dynamic than superhero films from decades past, like Superman and Batman.

X-Men was also significant for influencing the rise of superhero movies as one of the most popular sub-genres within the broader action genre, but Spider-Man was the bigger hit, was arguably better, and had more personality. Not too many films tried to match it tonally, which was for the best, but it’s undeniable that there were many more superhero movies greenlit (and successful) in the years following 2002.

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Spider-Man

PG-13

superheroes

Action

Adventure

Sci-Fi

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See Also

The 25 Best Action Movies of All Time - IGN110 Best Action Movies Of All Time Ranked - LooperBest Action Movies, Ranked by Metacritic50 Essential Action Movies Every Serious Film Fan Should See

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Release Date

May 3, 2002

Director

Sam Raimi

Cast

Tobey Maguire , Kirsten Dunst , Willem Dafoe , James Franco , Cliff Robertson , Rosemary Harris , J.K. Simmons , Joe Manganiello

Runtime

121 minutes

8 'The Dark Knight' (2008)

Director: Christopher Nolan

A few years on from Spider-Man came 2008, which was stacked with superhero movies. Of those, The Dark Knight was almost definitely the best, and it represented another shift for the genre, thereby suggesting another direction for this kind of action movie to go in: one that favored a certain level of realism and increased intensity over the more comic book-flavored thrills found in something like Spider-Man.

Part of that came about because of the central villain, and part of it was due to The Dark Knight focusing more on crime/thriller elements and staying far away from anything that felt fantastical, supernatural, or related to science fiction (even compared to Batman Begins). For better or worse, certain comic book movies released during the 2010s seemed like they wanted to scratch the same itch as The Dark Knight, but seldom anywhere close to doing so as effectively.

7 'The Avengers' (2012)

Director: Joss Whedon

Okay, one more big superhero movie worth mentioning: 2012’s The Avengers. This one gets off to a bit of a rocky start but eventually finds its groove, bringing together numerous Marvel heroes – all of whom had been established to some extent in previous MCU movies – and having them bicker at first, but then eventually learn to work together to take on a threat only defeatable as a team.

The Avengers showed the potential in big-budget crossover movies, making things work on a scale that reshaped the MCU going forward, and also likely influenced DC to rush out a Justice League movie (that didn’t end up going so well). Further, love it or hate it, but The Avengers was also quip-heavy and packed with snarky humor, and it feels like many light-hearted action movies (not just those from the MCU) adopted the carefree and self-aware humor/style found in this flick.

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​The Avengers

PG-13

Science Fiction

Action

Adventure

Superhero

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Release Date

May 4, 2012

Director

Joss Whedon

Cast

Chris Evans , Robert Downey Jr. , Mark Ruffalo , Chris Hemsworth , Scarlett Johansson , Jeremy Renner , Tom Hiddleston , Clark Gregg , Cobie Smulders , Stellan Skarsgård , Samuel L. Jackson , gwyneth paltrow , Paul Bettany , Alexis Denisof , Tina Benko , Jerzy Skolimowski , Kirill Nikiforov , Jeff Wolfe , M'laah Kaur Singh , Rashmi Rustagi , Powers Boothe , Jenny Agutter , Arthur Darbinyan , Donald Li , Warren Kole

Runtime

143 minutes

6 'Enter the Dragon' (1973)

Director: Robert Clouse

Though Bruce Lee’s tragic death meant he didn’t star in many martial arts movies, the ones he did feature in can all be counted as classics within the genre. And the final film he completed in whole, Enter the Dragon, was certainly his greatest overall, with its premise following his character spying on a crime lord who’s holding a strange martial arts tournament on an island.

The film was popular enough that it likely served as an early – or even introductory – movie for many to the martial arts genre, and broke ground by going bigger than other kung fu films made before it had. Enter the Dragon has plenty of hand-to-hand fight scenes, but it also functions as a sports movie and a spy film, combining all sorts of interesting sub-genres into one surprisingly coherent and inevitably groundbreaking movie.

5 'The Bourne Supremacy' (2004)

Director: Paul Greengrass

Action movies had successfully been gritty and down-and-dirty long before 2004, but The Bourne Supremacy was a different kind of gritty. 2002’s The Bourne Identity had already carved out a somewhat distinct feel for the Bourne series, but The Bourne Supremacy intensified things stylistically by going all-out with the somewhat divisive shaky-cam technique, especially during action sequences to make things feel more chaotic and uneasy.

It seemed to open the floodgates, and not for the best, because many action movies from the late 2000s (and even into the 2010s) relied on shaky-cam to mask poor fight choreography or hide stunt doubles. The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) redeemed the Bourne series by making the shaky-cam there a little less aggressive, but the damage had already been done to a certain flavor of 21st-century action cinema… especially the sorts of action flicks that starred Liam Neeson.

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The Bourne Supremacy

PG-13

Action

Crime

Thriller

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Release Date

July 23, 2004

Director

Paul Greengrass

Cast

Matt Damon , Franka Potente , Brian Cox , Julia Stiles , Karl Urban , Gabriel Mann

Runtime

108 minutes

4 'The Matrix' (1999)

Directors: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski

The brand of action seen in The Matrix (and some of its sequels) was unlike anything else that came before, though it did very consciously take influences from different areas before blending them all into something unique. This was martial arts combined with sci-fi sensibilities, emphasizing wire-fu and impressive slow motion both in hand-to-hand fights and sequences involving heavy gunplay.

The Matrix did all this with utter confidence, and it was a new kind of cool for viewers right at the end of the 1990s. As such, it wasn’t surprising to see The Matrix referenced and parodied in all sorts of movies that came out over the subsequent decade or so, with films like Equilibrium and V For Vendetta certainly scratching the same itch (though it didn’t feel too jarring regarding the latter, considering the directors of The Matrix – the Wachowski sisters – both worked as producers and writers for that 2005 film).

3 'Die Hard' (1988)

Director: John McTiernan

Like The Matrix, Die Hard kicked off its own rather successful series, but nothing sequel-wise has ever come close to the action movie perfection of the first movie. This works as both a thriller and an action movie, following an NYPD cop named John McClane who becomes trapped inside a building that’s been taken over by terrorists, and might well be the only person inside who can thwart their plans and save the people taken hostage.

After a decade filled with action movies that showcased beefy, larger-than-life heroes, McClane was a breath of fresh air, and Bruce Willis – though tough and heroic – did bring a certain believability and everyday quality to the role. Suddenly, it became apparent that action movies could become a whole lot more exciting if you put an underdog at the center of them instead of an unstoppable/comically muscular man. Similarly, “Die Hard on an x” effectively became its own sub-genre, with subsequent movies that seemed somewhat reminiscent of this 1988 classic including the likes of Con Air, Speed, Air Force One, and Under Siege.

2 'The General' (1926)

Directors: Clyde Bruckman, Buster Keaton

Despite being close to a century old, The General still delivers some of the best action you’ll ever see on screen. This could well be the earliest feature-length movie to recognizably function like an action film, and if not, then it’s certainly the earliest genuinely great action movie ever made, all the while also being funny, tense, a war movie, and something of an adventure film, too.

In The General, Buster Keaton plays a man whose prized locomotive is stolen, and the woman he loves is also kidnapped, so he sets off on a dangerous chase to rescue both train and girl. The set pieces are imaginative and the stunts performed here remain truly impressive to this day, with so much of The General, from a technical perspective, setting standards high early on for what action movies could be capable of showing.

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The General

Passed

Comedy

Action

Advenutre

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Director

Clyde Bruckman , Buster Keaton

Cast

Buster Keaton , Marion Mack , Glen Cavender , Jim Farley , Frederick Vroom , Frank Barnes , Charles Henry Smith , Joe Keaton

1 'Seven Samurai' (1954)

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Seven Samurai upped the potential for action movies even more than The General, and came out at a point in cinema history where it’s more easily identifiable as an example of said genre. It’s fairly old, sure, but so much of Seven Samurai feels like it’s barely aged a day, what with its perfect three-act structure and expert pacing that ensures 3.5 hours fly by surprisingly fast.

Elevating samurai movies and action films more generally speaking, Seven Samurai laid the groundwork for how to pull off an action movie on an epic scale. There’s a focus on building a team, constructing a plan, and then executing a final battle that remains satisfying to watch again and again, regardless of how many times you’ve seen the film. Seven Samurai has been referenced and parodied countless times, and because it’s a movie that contains so much, it’s an essential one to pull lessons from, for anyone who’s ever considered working on something within the action genre.

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Seven Samurai

NR

Drama

Action

Where to Watch

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Director

Akira Kurosawa

Cast

Toshiro Mifune , Takashi Shimura

Runtime

207 minutes

NEXT: Underrated Action Movies That Are Perfect From Start to Finish

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