Entertainment - Media News Watch originally published at Entertainment - Media News Watch
Variety’s list of the 50 best action movies ever skips some classics, includes films outside of the genre and snubs the Shaw Brothers.
In the pantheon of the best action films ever, many of the same worthwhile titles come up: Die Hard, Speed, Aliens…And of course there’s Predator, The Killer, Runaway Train – well, not according to Variety, at least, who made some glaring omissions and curious inclusions on their list of “The 50 Best Action Movies of All Time”.
This ranking of the best action movies has, expectedly, come under scrutiny, with many readers wondering, Where’s this movie? Where is that film? Of course, even with the prestige of Variety, this list of “The 50 Best Action Movies of All Time” is still just opinion. Still, we can’t help but notice a few things here…
Where are movies like Predator and True Lies? Predator stands as a fan favorite with some terrific action sequences and is surely deserving of a place on a list of the best action movies, while True Lies is easily Schwarzenegger’s best work of the decade. It’s a mistake to only have one John Woo film (Hard Boil, my personal favorite action flick) on the list. Where are the Shaw Brothers, then? Variety defended this decision, stating that the martial arts genre had evolved so much in the past decades that it has replaced one of the most important studios in Asian cinema history with more modern titles. An interesting point, but that doesn’t work as a legitimate defense of omitting The 36th Chamber of Shaolin.
Still, we should acknowledge that Variety does retain some cred by including some of the best movies every fan of the action genre should see that might fall below the radar by not being on major streaming services like Netflix, like Vanishing Point (#47), Once Upon a Time in China Part II (#37) and Police Story (#27). That said, come on, Five Elements Ninjas is a masterpiece of the genre!
There are also titles that simply don’t fit within the genre, as some – The French Connection (#6), Bullitt (#10) and Ben-Hur (#18) – are less action movies than movies that have singular iconic scenes of action. These three movies deserved to be on the American Film Institute list of 100 most thrilling films ever, but to rank them as some of the greatest action movies is a stretch. The inclusion of Paul Greengrass’ 9/11 film United (93) at #25 is also surprising. It’s a strange choice. Ironically, Variety themselves made an attempt to defend why some movies were missing because they didn’t fit within the genre: “You may well be surprised by the things we excluded, including movies with great action scenes (like “Dirty Harry” or Marvel movies) that ultimately fell slightly outside the genre…”
What do you think of Variety’s list of “The 50 Best Action Movies of All Time”? What do you consider their biggest omission? What are your top action movies? Let us know below!
Entertainment - Media News Watch originally published at Entertainment - Media News Watch
