Everyone remembers the classics, but action cinema is far bigger than its franchises and box office darlings. Lurking in the margins are films that were too weird, too gritty, or too out-of-step with the times to earn mainstream love. They came and went, barely a box-office whisper. But they deserved more.
With this in mind, this list looks at some of the lesser-known treasures the genre has to offer. Sure, most of them are not that obscure, but many action fans might not have seen them yet. Some were critical flops. Others were modest hits that never found the legacy they deserved. All of them kick ass.
10
‘Extreme Prejudice’ (1987)
Directed by Walter Hill
Image via Tri-Star Pictures
“I think we’re heroes and heroes need a cause, man.” Extreme Prejudice is the dusty, sunburned lovechild of a western and a paramilitary thriller. It’s Walter Hill (director of The Warriors) doing Peckinpah through the lens of ’80s Reagan militarism, with Nick Nolte as a Texas Ranger and Powers Boothe as his old best friend turned drug lord. Border towns. Black ops squads. Slow-motion shootouts. You can feel the testosterone dripping off the celluloid. Sure, it’s a little goofy and over-the-top, but that’s the point.
This is the kind of movie where men glare, guns talk, and loyalty bleeds. The action scenes are brutal and beautifully staged, especially the finale, which feels like The Wild Bunch reimagined for the VHS generation. Acting-wise, the supporting cast (including Michael Ironside and Clancy Brown) is also stacked with hard-nosed charm. Despite all this, Extreme Prejudice came and went in 1987, yet its gritty moral ambiguity and practical carnage feel oddly fresh today.
- Release Date
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April 24, 1987
- Runtime
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101 minutes
- Director
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Walter Hill
- Writers
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Deric Washburn
9
‘Southern Comfort’ (1981)
Directed by Walter Hill
“It’s the swamp. It’s got its own rules.” This is another muscular gem from Hill. Before Predator, before Deliverance, there was Southern Comfort, a slow-burning action-survival nightmare set deep in the Louisiana bayou. Here, a group of National Guardsmen on a training exercise take a wrong turn, steal a canoe, and unwittingly provoke a group of Cajun hunters. From here, the movie plays out as a fusion of traditional action elements and some unconventional themes.
The action here is muddy, tense, and relentless, but the real enemy is fear itself. The bayou is both setting and antagonist, an unknowable force swallowing them whole. The storytelling is also a little more subtle than you might expect. Hill strips away exposition, letting the performances and terrain do the heavy lifting. Powers Boothe and Keith Carradine give grounded, haunted turns as soldiers who slowly realize they’re outmatched and out of place. As a whole, Southern Comfort is grimy, atmospheric, and brutally effective.
- Release Date
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September 24, 1981
- Runtime
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105 minutes
- Director
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Walter Hill
- Writers
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David Giler
8
‘The Long Kiss Goodnight’ (1996)
Directed by Renny Harlin
Image via New Line Cinema
“Chefs do that.” Before Jason Bourne, there was Samantha Caine (Geena Davis), a suburban schoolteacher who turns out to be a lethal assassin with a suppressed past. The Long Kiss Goodnight is pure ’90s excess: quippy, violent, and wildly entertaining. Davis is phenomenal in a rare action lead, transforming from small-town mom to icy killer over the course of two chaotic hours.
This movie has everything. Explosions, one-liners, spy intrigue. You name it. All these chaotic ideas are anchored by the criminally underrated pairing of Davis and Samuel L. Jackson. His role as a sleazy private detective is arguably one of his funniest performances, and their chemistry crackles. It helps that the script, from Shane Black, is razor-sharp and darkly hilarious. Finally, Renny Harlin directs it all with a flair for slick set pieces and ridiculous stunts (a woman blows up a building while ice skating, for example).
- Release Date
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October 11, 1996
- Runtime
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121 Minutes
- Director
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Renny Harlin
- Writers
-
Shane Black
7
‘Bullet in the Head’ (1990)
Directed by John Woo
Image via Golden Princess Film Production Co. Ltd.
“We live for nothing. We die for something.” Prior to becoming an action legend with Hard Boiled and Face/Off, John Woo unleashed this operatic gut-punch of a film. Bullet in the Head is a fusion of an action flick, a war epic, and a friendship tragedy. It’s one of the most emotionally raw films Woo ever made. In it, three childhood friends from Hong Kong head to Vietnam to make money, and everything spirals into betrayal, madness, and ruin.
It’s like The Deer Hunter funneled through Hong Kong’s action cinema aesthetic, with explosive gunfights and a hefty dose of moral collapse. Tony Leung delivers one of his finest early performances, and the third act is absolutely devastating. Despite this (or perhaps because of it), Bullet in the Head bombed in its native market. It never got a proper U.S. release. Still, Bullet in the Head is Woo at his boldest and most bruising.
6
‘Haywire’ (2011)
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Image via Relativity Media
“You shouldn’t think of her as a woman. That would be a mistake.” Haywire is the anti-Bourne: cold, efficient, and stripped of all melodrama. Steven Soderbergh directs it like a jazz riff; elliptical, stylish, and always offbeat. And at the center is Gina Carano, giving a fierce, physically grounded performance as a black ops agent betrayed by her own government. The action is intense and refreshingly real. No shaky cam, no slow motion, just pure, punishing hand-to-hand combat.
Carano’s fight scenes against Michael Fassbender and Channing Tatum feel especially painful. There’s weight behind every punch and crash, and Soderbergh shoots with clarity and respect for space. While the supporting cast is stacked (Ewan McGregor, Antonio Banderas, and Bill Paxton all show up), Carano owns the film. Admittedly, some of the dialogue-based scenes could have used some polishing, but, overall, Haywire remains a lean, elegant genre exercise. It’s further proof (if any was needed) of Soderbergh’s ridiculous range.
- Release Date
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November 6, 2011
- Runtime
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93minutes
- Director
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Steven Soderbergh
- Writers
-
Steven Soderbergh
5
‘Nighthawks’ (1981)
Directed by Bruce Malmuth
Image via Universal Pictures
“This is not a game, people. Lives are at stake.” Nighthawks is what happens when you take a gritty New York cop thriller and inject it with European terrorist paranoia. It’s bleak, cynical, and fueled by a terrific performance from Rutger Hauer as a cold-eyed international killer. Opposite him, Sylvester Stallone, in one of his most restrained roles, plays a counter-terrorism officer operating in the gray, anxious streets of early-’80s Manhattan. His beard’s doing a lot of the acting, but the tension is real, and so is the body count.
What sets Nighthawks apart is its atmosphere: dingy subways, anonymous crowds, fear lingering in every corner. It came out just before First Blood and got buried, but there’s a rough, working-class intensity to it that deserves revisiting. The final scene is pure suspense perfection, and Hauer is unforgettable. Nighthawks was too dark to become iconic, but in the age of sterile blockbusters, its rawness is notable.
- Release Date
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April 10, 1981
- Runtime
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99 Minutes
4
‘Miami Blues’ (1990)
Directed by George Armitage
Custom Image by Jefferson Chacon
“I’m a thief and a killer, baby, and I mean business.” Miami Blues is one of the strangest action films of the ’90s. Alec Baldwin, never sleazier, plays a charming, violent sociopath who steals a cop’s badge and weapon and goes on a bizarre spree of impersonated justice. He arrests criminals, robs them, and smiles the whole time. It’s part black comedy, part crime thriller, part character study, and somehow it works.
Alongside Baldwin, Fred Ward is pitch-perfect as the weary cop on his trail, and Jennifer Jason Leigh adds an offbeat sweetness as Baldwin’s naive girlfriend. The material is tricky, but all the performers navigate it well. The tone is always teetering: violent, sad, funny, and disarmingly intimate. The film didn’t find its audience on release. It made a loss at the box office. Maybe it was too hard to pin down. Nevertheless, Miami Blues is a strange little gem, full of moral rot and Floridian absurdity.
- Release Date
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April 20, 1990
- Runtime
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97 minutes
- Writers
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George Armitage
- Producers
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Edward Saxon, Fred Ward, Gary Goetzman
3
‘Stone Cold’ (1991)
Directed by Craig R. Baxley
Image via Columbia Pictures
“God forgives. The Brotherhood doesn’t.” Stone Cold is absolutely ridiculous and completely awesome. This is the kind of movie where an undercover cop infiltrates a white supremacist biker gang, jumps a motorcycle into a helicopter, and blows up half the screen before the credits roll. Brian Bosworth, former football star turned one-time action lead, plays the hero with a mullet, a sneer, and a fridge full of lizard food.
The finished product is pure ’90s mayhem, but the execution is weirdly excellent; fast-paced, explosive, and constantly on the edge of camp without tipping over. Lance Henriksen is having the time of his life as the villain, and William Forsythe brings wild-eyed menace to every scene. While Stone Cold didn’t launch a franchise or a Bosworth career, it’s still a silly blast from start to finish. Think of it as a redneck Point Break. Louder, dumber, and somehow still memorable.
- Release Date
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May 17, 1991
- Runtime
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92 Minutes
- Director
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Craig R. Baxley
- Writers
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Walter Doniger
2
‘Hard Times’ (1975)
Directed by Walter Hill
“You knock him down… stay down.” There’s a lot of Hill on this list, but he deserves it. Hard Times was his directorial debut, and it remains one of the leanest, most beautifully composed action films of the 1970s. Set during the Great Depression, it stars Charles Bronson as a drifter who gets pulled into the brutal world of underground bare-knuckle boxing. There are no car chases, no gunfights. Instead, Hill serves up grit, economic despair, and a flurry of fists.
What makes this movie great is the sheer force of its simplicity. Hill directs with a minimalist eye, Bronson barely says a word, and the fights hit like hammer blows. James Coburn adds flash as the fast-talking promoter, and the dusty New Orleans backdrop gives everything a lived-in weight. It’s a slow burn, but the payoff is enormous. It may have slipped through the cracks of action history, but it punches well above its weight.
- Release Date
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August 13, 1975
- Runtime
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93 minutes
- Writers
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Bruce Henstell, Bryan Gindoff
- Producers
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Lawrence Gordon
1
‘Rolling Thunder’ (1977)
Directed by John Flynn
Image via American International Pictures
“I’m going to get my gear.” Rolling Thunder is revenge cinema at its most quietly horrifying. William Devane plays a Vietnam POW returning home, broken and adrift. When his family is slaughtered by home invaders, he doesn’t break down, he prepares. Methodically. Coldly. And when he finally snaps, it’s terrifying. His is a simmering, soul-deep fury that erupts in sudden violence. The screenplay (originally by Paul Schrader) crackles with trauma and despair, and Tommy Lee Jones, in an early role, is unforgettable as the war buddy who casually volunteers for the bloodbath.
Not to mention, the climactic shootout in a brothel is a masterclass in slow-build payoff. Despite its myriad strengths, Rolling Thunder wasn’t a hit. It was too dark, too quiet, too angry. But it influenced Tarantino, inspired Taxi Driver-style loner narratives, and proved that action could be personal. It’s the ghost at the edge of the genre, reminding us what vengeance really costs.
- Release Date
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November 2, 1977
- Runtime
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100 Minutes
- Director
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John Flynn
- Writers
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Paul Schrader, Heywood Gould
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