When John Wick came out of retirement to exact his deadly vengeance on the criminals who killed his dog, he kickstarted a new era of action filmmaking. The 2014 film, directed by former stunt performer and coordinator Chad Stahelski and starring Keanu Reeves as the hitman, was an acclaimed sensation, spawning three sequels and a wave of new action films that eschew the once-popular shaky cam style in favor of longer takes that show off complex fight choreography and physical stunts.
In the movies, John Wick’s supply of bullets seems endless, but there are only four movies in the franchise: John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017), John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum (2019), and John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023). (There's also a spinoff TV series called The Continental, which does not feature Reeves.) If you’re in the mood for more action movies like John Wick, read on for 25 movies that will get your blood pumping. Some of them pre-date Reeves' run as the stoic hero, but they all have a similar vibe and focus on fight choreography and tangible action.
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1 | Atomic Blonde (2017)
David Leitch, a former stunt performer like John Wick director Chad Stahelski, was an uncredited co-director on that 2014 film and made his proper directorial debut three years later with Atomic Blonde, which stars Charlize Theron as a spy who will do whatever it takes to get her hands on a list of double agents as the Berlin Wall falls. As to be expected from a movie by one of the main hands behind John Wick, Atomic Blonde has many stylistic and tonal similarities to that modern action classic, and there may be no female performer who does action better than Theron.
2 | The Beekeeper (2024)
When scammers steal all of an elderly woman’s money and drive her to suicide, her neighbor—seemingly a quiet beekeeper played by Jason Statham—decides to get revenge and take down the organization responsible. He’s well-equipped to do so, having formerly been a member of an elite clandestine organization known as Beekeepers. This tale of vengeance had audiences buzzing, as it was one of the first decent hits of 2024.
3 | Bullet Train (2022)
Also directed by David Leitch, Bullet Train has a lot of John Wick-style action but with a decidedly more comical slant. Brad Pitt stars as a former assassin who gets roped into what should be one easy last job obtaining a briefcase aboard a bullet train in Japan, only to discover that a lot of other deadly killers are also trying to get their hands on it. Joey King, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, and Hiroyuki Sanada co-star.
4 | Crank (2006)
Jason Statham stars as Chev Chelios, a hitman whose enemies (with the help of his double-crossing employer) inject him with a deadly drug that stops the flow of adrenaline and will inevitably cause him to die if he doesn’t keep his heart rate up. Faced with this death sentence, Chelios does what any hitman played by Jason Statham would do: a bunch of dangerous stunts, sex, and drugs that keep his blood pumping long enough for him to get his deadly revenge on those who wronged him. Crank is a crass, unsubtle movie, but it’s a fun one.
5 | Dredd (2012)
Sylvester Stallone played Judge Dredd in a ‘90s adaptation of the comic series, which told the story of a violent enforcer of law and order in a dystopian future megacity. The 2012 movie, though, which stars Karl Urban as the title character, has become an acclaimed cult classic. Judge Dredd and his young partner (played by Olivia Thirlby) must fight their way up a 200-story tower in order to take down a powerful drug lord within.
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6 | The Equalizer (2014)
For an actor with as many credits to his name as Denzel Washington, the man does not have many franchises in his filmography. That speaks to the quality of The Equalizer, a series that Washington enjoys enough to have made three of them. He stars as Robert McCall, a retired Marine and CIA officer who uses his skills to right wrongs—to equalize them, if you will. In the first movie, which came out in 2014, he’s protecting a young woman from being trafficked by the Russian mob.
7 | Equilibrium (2002)
A great example of "gun fu," the cinematic fighting style that combines martial arts with firearms that the John Wick films employ to great effect, Equilibrium stars Christian Bale as an enforcer in a dystopian future where emotions and art are illegal. When Bale’s character misses a dose of his emotion-suppressing drug, he begins to awaken, eventually having to face off with the totalitarian agents he once served with.
8 | The Fall Guy (2024)
David Leitch makes another appearance on this list with 2024’s The Fall Guy, a love letter to stunt performers that’s half action movie, half rom-com. Ryan Gosling stars as a stuntman who finds himself doing stunts for real when he attempts to take down a dangerous criminal conspiracy that threatens to ruin his ex-girlfriend’s directorial debut. Emily Blunt co-stars.
9 | Gunpowder Milkshake (2021)
Karen Gillan stars as a young hitwoman in this Netflix film, which is very much in the mold of John Wick. When her character, Sam, has a change of heart and the assassin agency she works for turns on her, she must team up with her estranged mother, who is also an elite hitman (Lena Headey) and three other professional killers (Carla Gugino, Michelle Yeoh, and Angela Bassett) to survive and keep a young girl safe.
10 | Hard Boiled (1992)
A classic Hong Kong action flick, Hard Boiled stars Chow Yun-fat as a police inspector who goes by “Tequila.” While investigating the Triad, Tequila encounters a top assassin (Tony Leung) who is actually a police informant in deep, dangerous cover. Together, they must navigate a complex situation that culminates in a crazy shootout that takes place in a hospital maternity wing, of all places.
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11 | Hot Fuzz (2007)
Edgar Wright’sHot Fuzz is a parody of action movies, yes, but it’s also a pretty great action movie on its own merits, too. Simon Pegg stars as Nicholas Angel, a super-intense cop who is transferred from London to a sleepy country village where there’s no crime and no need for his enforcement — or so it would seem. There’s actually a criminal conspiracy afoot that will turn this rural community into something out of Lethal Weapon or Point Break—both of which get explicit shout-outs in Hot Fuzz.
12 | Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2 (2003 and 2004)
Quentin Tarantino's two-part martial arts revenge story stars Uma Thurman as an ex-assassin known as “The Bride” who wakes from a coma years after her former boss and fellow assassins nearly killed her when she tried to walk away. Lucy Liu, Michael Madsen, Daryl Hannah, and Vivica A. Fox star as the other members of the Deadly Viper assassination squad, while David Carradine plays their leader, the titular Bill. Both movies are exceptional action classics—Volume 1 is a bit bigger and splashier with its action while Volume 2 has more catharsis (and still has plenty of action).
13 | Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014)
If the James Bond series were a little more vulgar and had its tongue in its cheek, it would look something like the Kingsman franchise, which began in 2014 with The Secret Service. Taron Egerton stars as Gary "Eggsy" Unwin, a rebellious young man who is recruited into an elite secret British spy agency. The sequel and prequel, Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017) and The King's Man (2021), respectively, are worth checking out if you like director Matthew Vaughn’s mix of stylized action and dark, cheeky comedy.
14 | Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Mad Max: Fury Road is the best action movie on this list by virtue of being one of the greatest films ever made. George Miller’s masterpiece is the fourth movie in his Mad Max series, and it’s basically one non-stop car chase across a desolate wasteland. It’s incredible action filmmaking with a deft understanding of economical worldbuilding and great (if taciturn) performances from Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron, who star as two impromptu allies trying to escape from the clutches of the grotesque, tyrannical warlord Immortan Joe.
15 | The Matrix (1999)
It’s wild that Keanu Reeves has starred in not one but two massively influential action movies that changed cinema. Before he was John Wick, Reeves was Neo, the prophesied figure who just might be able to free humanity from the simulated reality in which the Machines have trapped mankind. The Matrix is the Wachowskis’ cyberpunk action masterpiece, and even though bullet-time got poorly imitated and parodied to death in the years after the movie’s release, it’s still exhilarating to see Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) do a flying kick and to watch Neo dodge bullets.
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16 | Monkey Man (2024)
Dev Patel stars as a young Indian man who seeks revenge on the corrupt police chief and government responsible for the destruction of his village in 2024’s Monkey Man, which is also Patel’s directorial debut. Ambitious if a little uneven, Monkey Man is clearly inspired by John Wick but its quality suggests that there may be even better action movies to come from Patel as he develops as a filmmaker.
17 | Nobody (2021)
Nobody might be the movie on this list that’s the most like John Wick, in that it’s about a retired assassin who gets back in the game when his loved ones are threatened by organized crime. However, unlike Reeves, Bob Odenkirk is not typically thought of as an action star, as he’s better known for comedies and his time on TV as Saul Goodman in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. And yet Odenkirk acquits himself exceptionally well in the role of mild-mannered family man-turned-deadly killer.
18 | Oldboy (2003)
Park Chan-wook’s acclaimed 2003 film follows Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik), a man who has, for reasons unknown to him, been imprisoned by unknown captors for a decade and a half. When he’s finally released, his quest for vengeance on the men who stole 15 years of his life from him takes some brutal, strange, and disturbing turns. A one-shot fight between the Oh Dae-su and several goons in a corridor is an especially legendary bit of action filmmaking.
19 | One Shot (2021)
Were it not for its gimmick, One Shot would not be an especially notable action movie. It’s a fairly minor film about a Navy SEAL squad transporting a prisoner and fighting off forces who want them all dead. But, as the title might have given away, the entire 97-minute-long movie is edited in a way that makes it look like it’s all one, long, unbroken shot. It definitely is a gimmick, yes, but it’s a cool one.
20 | The Raid (2011)
The Raid is, along with John Wick, one of the most influential action movies of the century so far. This Indonesian film, which was directed by Gareth Evans, follows a squad of 20 police officers who set out to raid an apartment building where a suspected drug lord operates, only to find that it’s a trap and they’re surrounded. Their only chance for survival is to fight their way to the top of the building, showing off some jaw-dropping fight choreography in the process.
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21 | Sisu (2022)
When a bunch of Nazis in the final days of World War II cross a gold prospector in Finland’s Lapland region, they soon find themselves regretting it, because this prospector was once a legendary and deadly commando. Sisu isn’t especially deep, but it is 90 minutes of a badass old dude brutally murdering Nazis in increasingly inventive ways. What’s not to like?
22 | Snowpiercer (2013)
In director Bong Joon-ho’s climate change class metaphor, a man-made ice age has wiped out all of humanity except for the inhabitants of Snowpiercer, a high-tech train that speeds around the world with first-class passengers living lavishly towards the front and the impoverished in squalor near the caboose. Chris Evans leads a group of tail-end passengers in a violent, justified revolt as they fight their way to the front of the train.
23 | Taken (2008)
Liam Neeson’s late-career turn into an action star began in 2008 with Taken, a movie where he played a father who, as an ex-CIA officer, had a “very specific set of skills.” When his teenage daughter and her friend are kidnapped by human traffickers while on vacation in France, Bryan Mills puts all those skills to use to hunt down his daughter’s abductors, killing them and rescuing her. Style-wise, Taken’s action is probably closer to that of The Bourne Identity than John Wick, but the vibes still feel very Wick-ian.
24 | Upgrade (2018)
After a man (Logan Marshall-Green) is paralyzed during a mugging that also results in the death of his wife, he agrees to be implanted with a high-tech computer chip that allows him to move again. That’s not all the chip can do, though, as it can also take full control of his body and allow him to exact his revenge on the men who attacked him and his wife. Leigh Whannell, who co-created Saw and helmed the 2020 The Invisible Man remake, directs.
25 | Violent Night (2022)
Yes, Die Hard is technically a Christmas movie, but what if it was really a Christmas movie? Violent Night stars David Harbour as Santa Claus, who hops down the chimney of a rich family’s mansion just as armed mercenaries are trying to take them hostage. Santa, who used to be a Viking warrior before he was Jolly Old St. Nick, must take them all out.
