Credit: Far Out / Sony Pictures Releasing
Thu 6 August 2026 19:13, UK
Scarlett Johansson is one of those actors who has only improved as her career progressed.
Since her debut in the 1994 comedy-drama North, she has become a seriously accomplished performer, not to mention one with a vast range who can excel across a wide variety of genres.
Over the years, Johansson has taken on increasingly interesting roles as time has gone on, perhaps most memorably playing an alien drifting through Scotland in the British arthouse flick Under the Skin. Later, when working on projects such as Marriage Story and Jojo Rabbit, she delivered two of the very best performances of her career.
In recent years, it definitely feels like Hollywood has taken advantage of Johansson’s considerable acting chops rather than just treating her as a pretty face, and that’s very satisfying to see. At her best, Johansson is a force to be reckoned with.
She prides herself on authenticity and truth, no matter what the role is. “You put a little piece of yourself into every character that you do,” she told the Irish Independent.
Adding, “Even if you’re playing some psychotic person, which of course I’m not, some part of you is in that character and it’s hopefully believable. I always come back to the fact that my own instinct is better than something I build in my mind.” Even when it comes to action, she thinks that this exhibition of self is vital when it comes to making a character resonant.
This quality is something that is evident in each of her four favourite movies: Auntie Mame, Groundhog Day, Priscilla: Queen of the Desert, and Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
Further reading: Cutting Room Floor
The latter choice has particular significance, for if there’s one genre Johansson has really made her mark in, it’s the action genre. This is partly thanks to her tenure as Natasha Romanoff / Black Widow in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which began with 2010’s Iron Man 2 and concluded with 2021’s regrettable Black Widow.
She’s also pulled together other memorable action-hero roles, such as in The Island, Lucy in 2014, and Ghost in the Shell three years later. On each occasion, she has approached the genre with the vital mix of integrity and fun. All too often, action movies slide down either side of those two tenets, but taking inspiration from Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Johansson has managed to perfectly hit the right line.
Her choice for the height of the genre is hardly surprising. Terminator 2 is easily one of the finest films in the history of the action genre, and it really showed just what an action film can accomplish. It was thrilling from start to finish without ever losing sight of the need for story.
As well as having revolutionary special effects, the movie absolutely excelled as a sequel that evolved upon the original, and it was a stellar mixture of style and substance, too. With its well-crafted characters and powerful ending, it showed that action cinema can work on a dramatic level as well as a visceral one.
The project also features a memorably bad-ass performance from Linda Hamilton, who, alongside Sigourney Weaver in Aliens, undoubtedly paved the way for the action heroines of the future.
In more ways than one, the many action movies that Johnasson has starred in owe a debt to Terminator 2. Even now, more than 30 years removed from its triumphant release, James Cameron’s glorious sequel is as influential as ever.
As ScarJo said of the inspiration behind Black Widow, “It’s pretty gritty, but it’s also surprising.”
Adding, “Some of the movies that we talked about, we talked about The Fugitive, we talked about Logan, we talked about Terminator 2.” It appears that the latter is a constant touchstone in her work.
Having hailed from indie movies, when it comes to the more commercial side of cinema, it seems that the 1991 epic is always a touchstone for Johansson, proving the timeless worth of the old android classic. Hasta la vista, baby, indeed.
