Clockwise from top left: V for Vendetta (YouTube); James Gunn (Richard Harbaugh/Getty); The French Connection (YouTube); The Villainess (YouTube); Mad Max: Fury Road (YouTube)
Like many of us under stay-at-home orders, James Gunn apparently has some time on his hands: The Suicide Squad and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 director took to Twitter recently to provide a list of 54 “A+ Action Movies to Watch in Quarantine.” And while his taste is not infallible (as our Alex McLevy has pointed out, “people, Godfather Part II is not a better film than the first one, The Godfather is essentially flawless”), we felt like his list was pretty thorough and wide-ranging. So here are his selections for the best action movies—and where you can them watch at home right now.
77 Comments
Great list. Whenever I see The Raid I also think of Dredd because they both came out around the same time and have the same exact plot. However they have very different styles but remain equally enjoyable. So I’m adding Dredd to this list as well.
Maybe swap it for Thunderball. Not even a good movie by Bond standards.
I get ostracised by the rest of the UK for this opinion, but “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” is the best Bond film hands down.
You may all throw things at me in the comments below.
Nope, The Spy Who Loved me is the best Bond film. Connery is the best Bond, but TSWLM is the best Bond movie.
I’m sure you know this, but that’s actually an increasingly popular take, especially among big-league filmmakers. To the point that I was super surprised that it wasn’t on this list. Christopher Nolan is obsessed with it (and a huge chunk of Inception is a total homage). Soderbergh digs it, too. From wiki: The filmmaker Steven Soderbergh writes that “For me there’s no question that cinematically On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is the best Bond film and the only one worth watching repeatedly for reasons other than pure entertainment … Shot to shot, this movie is beautiful in a way none of the other Bond films are”.[81] The director Christopher Nolan also saw On Her Majesty’s Secret Service as his favourite Bond film; in describing its influence on his own film, Inception, Nolan said, “What I liked about it that we’ve tried to emulate in this film is there’s a tremendous balance in that movie of action and scale and romanticism and tragedy and emotion.”[82]
Love that movie. Very underrated.
Good to see Equilibrium get some love. Excellent B-movie shoot ‘em up.
The “Gun-Kata” 🙂
Where’s guy who provides a link to this list in list form instead of 56 click-through pages
On mobile it is a list, not a slide show. Takes forever to load, but it’s a list.
This is the exact opposite it should be. A list online, and a slideshow on mobile makes far more sense. Way to go AV Club!
In Chrome, you can open up the developer console to simulate a mobile device:https://superuser.com/questions/1214829/how-can-i-view-the-mobile-version-of-a-webpage-in-google-chrome-for-desktopIn fact, I’m doing it right now! The screen will shrink to the size of whatever mobile device you are simulating, but it seems to work.
You can also just drag your browser window until it’s as narrow as a mobile device.
Man, FUCK these slideshows.
Normally I agree, but I liked this, if only because they put a link to the trailer for each on the each slide. A slideshow where there is just a picture is annoying, but the ability to watch a trailer for any of these I was unfamiliar with was a great waste of 30 minutes for me.
I came here to ask the same thing. The only “shortcut” I know for these garbage click-throughs is to jump to the comments by adding /slides/## (where ## is the last slide’s number) to the end of the URL.I’m not even that upset that it’s a blatant grab for whatever metric they’re selling for ad revenue (clicks, interactions, unique page views, whatever), it’s just bad web design. I guess that shouldn’t surprise any of us considering Jim “The Herb” Spanfeller is the head vampire in charge of draining the G/O sites.
That’s how I got here!What kind of fucking masochist clicks through FIFTY-SIX slides.
56! Fifty-six slides? Fifty six! 56!!
Unrelated, happy 4/20.
The lack of any Schwarzenegger (unless I missed it) is a serious oversight.Terminator, T2, Commando, and Predator are all excellent action movies.
Not to mention True Lies, Total Recall, Conan the Barbarian.
By Crom yes! Conan get’s overlooked so much. That film wasn’t just brawn. It deserves to be on anyone’s list, and if you do not listen, then to hell with you!
and Predator!
Charlton Heston’s greatest role.
Commando is peak popcorn 80s action. A weird side note that I always think about is that Rae Dawn Chong is the daughter of Tommy Chong, and was born in Edmonton, Alberta, my home town. That’s not going to be too interesting to most people, but it’s always strange to me that people like Tommy Chong, Kevin Smith, or Joe Rogan fall in love with our overly-sprawled-out, working class, so-north-it’s-not-funny city.
Commando Spoiler:That part where he tells Sully he was gonna kill him last:HE LIED!
Well, now that I know that you can tell me how he met his end: I guess he didn’t let him go?
You had me at Seven Samurai.
Congratulations AVClub. You have successfully transitioned to being Forbes!
Thats what happens when you throw a Spanfeller in the works.
Hey, remember that time Jeffrey Epstein paid Forbes’ sad content mill to write articles about how he was a patron of science and definitely not a pedophile? I’m not saying Spanfeller is a pedophile, but my sponsored article on Forbes.com definitely leaves room for debate.
Are you fucking kidding me with this slide show nonsense? I know you despise your commenters already, but this is a big “fuck you” to the casual readers as well.
I changed the URL to /slides/56 just to reach the comments and say that I REFUSE to click though 55 slides.
Haha, I did the same! Skippin’ all that.
No Star Wars? Or The Godfather? Back to the Future? Spielberg besides Raiders? Cameron? Classics? Animated?
Action movies?
The Godfather is action PACKED! Why…it’s…huh. Never noticed just how much inertia is in that film.
Besides Godfather, it’s a legit-enough question, no? But that just reminded me that in my local Blockbuster back in the day Jim Jarmusch’s ‘Dead Man’ somehow got filed as an action movie haha
this is a list of strictly action movies.
I was thinking maybe it was specifically geared towards movies people haven’t seen 300 times already?
this is the last g/o site i am still visiting i swear to god if you guys keep publishing lists that force me to click-through i am just done with this place and your tj maxx ceo
Wasn’t Edge of Tomorrow directed by Doug Liman?
He didn’t take nearly as many risks with this list as he did with his Twitter account.
I thought James gun was cancelled. Oh wait. Forgot that this woke crowd only cares about canceling if it’s a person they disagree with politically.
Kung Fu Hustlematrixbourne ultimatumdie hard edge of tomorrowjsa: joint security areaelite squad: the enemy withinlady vengencemission impossible falloutbullittnorth by northwestyellow seathe raidheronight watchcrouching tiger hidden dragontakenthe heroic trio the french connectionrobocop (the 1987 one, obv)the killer legend of drunken masterfong sai yukfury roadkill bill vol 1the villainessrevengecrankkingsman the secret serviceescape from NYbattle royalefull contactoldboythunderballla femme nikitaleon the professionalmagnum force speedraiders of the lost ark71 paybackequilibriumjohn wickmesrine killer instinctmesrine public enemy #1where eagles darems. 45green snakecaptain phillips seven samurairolling thunder wild bunchv for vendettale pact des loups
Hey look! A List.But why can’t kinja have single spacing?
You today’s hero of the internet (to me).
James Gunn recommends 54 “A+ Action Movies to Watch in Quarantine”The AV Club recommends 56 A+ Ads and Chumboxes to Click in Quarantine
Clicks to see if Brotherhood of the Wolf is listed, feels rising hope that it will be after seeing list curation, gradually becomes angry that it isn’t there, and then it is there right at the last second! What a ride!
Happy to see Equilibrium on this list. Would be pleased if Johnny Mnemonic were on it too. And I think that A+ is far too generous for many of the flicks listed here.
Not Hot Fuzz? Fuck off.Also Crank 2 is way better than Crank even though Crank is goodz
To be honest, far from being an action film those SCUBA scenes in Thunderball practically put me to sleep, but to each their own.In fact, to be honest I dunno I’d consider any Connery film to be an “action” film in the modern sense of the term. They’re a bit too slow and suspenseful in the old-school Hitchcockian sense.
So you must really have problems with North By Northwest in the list then, huh?
Well, he did list North by Northwest also…
And to the surprising amount of people in the greys demanding if I have a problem with North by Northwest being in this list and therefore considered an action movie by someone else; the answer is yes. Yes, I do have a problem. A seething, hate-filled problem.And vengeance will be mine, I assure you.
So what’s the problem?
To begin with, sarcasm.
Yup, not liking the clicking spamming bonanza, but anyway, there are some damn fine movies here. Equilibrium, The Matrix, Seven Samurai/ and The Wild Bunch, Battle Royale, Leon, Wick, and so many others and others that I mostly know about and a few that I definitely need to see! About 4 months or so, before the Plague Times, I talked my buddy into sitting through Equilibrium and he was blown away! Then the next time we hung out, it was Battle Royale. Similar result. Good to see both of these movies on the list, as they have been recently refreshed for me while finding another fan of them both.
Great list but there are a few titles that are painfully missing from it. needs to be on that list:I saw the devil
Casino Royale
Hard boiled
The Raid 2
Iron Monkey
Personal favorites: Casshern
Minority Report
Butterfly n Sword
Payback is a fun movie that nails its 1970s grit vibe. Plus, extra points for specifying the “Theatrical Version” which is better than the Director’s cut.But minus points for no Point Break.
Must’ve seen that movie a half dozen times before accidentally watching the directors cut. Movie suddenly ends and I’m like, where the fuck did the entire third act go?
A 50+ page slideshow? Really?
No Big Trouble In Little China or Midnight Run? This isn’t a list, it’s a mockery.
if you think I’m clicking 56 fucking slides so you can show me 100+ fucking ads, you’re out of your mother fucking mind
This format needs to die. Not a quick, merciful death. No, it needs to be shot in both knees and left to die slowly in the trunk of a black car under a desert sun with a tub of vomit as its only option for hydration. If you must use this format, at least have an option to show the full list on a single page.
Also, I would have liked some explanation for why these are his picks instead of a bunch of trailers. Let me in his head, please.
Can’t wait for the Herb to start banning comments on AV Club and Kotaku as more writers are forced to write these garbage slide shows and users call him out on it. It happened to Deadspin, it will happen to every other GMG website he touches.
I fucking LOVE The Wild Bunch…but is it action? I mean, I guess but…is it?Someone help me out here.
Happy to say I own most of the movies listed (75-80%-ish). A little disappointed not to see Taxi (1998) or any Jackie Chan (just watched Armor of God (1986) and Armour of God II: Operation Condor (1991) earlier this week, but there’s only some much space/time I suppose.
Drunken Master was in there.
Why include movies that aren’t available in any format?Also slideshow sucks!
Well I have seen 27 of these movies. The Enforcer and The Dead Pool have more action than Magnum Force as far as Dirty Harry movies, but The Gauntlet is a bit more action packed (though not a Dirty Harry movie). I was surprised there were no Schwarzenegger movies on the list. As far as James Bond movies the action in Live and Let Die blows away Thunderball. Though Bullitt and The French Connection make an appearance what about The Getaway, The Seven Ups, or even Charlie Varrick.? These are great Crime action movies too.But this list is one person’s opinion and I would rather re-watch The Wrecking Crew than Equilibrium.
I noticed that if I get a notification from stupid fucking Kinja that someone has replied to one of my posts and clicking on said notification takes me to the first slide that the only way to get to the comments again is to click on all 56 stupid fucking slides. Can someone get a message to Fred from Kinja so that he can lie to us and assure us that he appreciates our feedback and that they are working on a solution while he jerks off into a sock?
You can change the URL in the address bar from /slides/1 to /slides/56 to jump ahead. But, also, yes, fuck Kinja.
Tried that doesn’t work
hmmm French Connection 2 was better than the first, imo
Wow, this format. Like, okay, it’s already annoying as hell when it’s 11 listed items that have a single paragraph description. Sure, rapacious vultures want to squeeze every possible cent out of this until it drives people away (the raison d’etre of venture capitalism, buy a company, milk it for profit and shutter it a few years later). But 56 items with no description taken from somewhere else?Gtfo.
Some of these aren’t really action. I wouldn’t call Lady Vengeance action. Nor Old Boy.