10 Movie Cameos That Left Us All Speechless

Nobody saw these insane movie cameos coming.

By Jack Pooley /

At their best, cameos will enhance an already enjoyable movie with their shock factor and comedic timing. A truly great cameo will stick in the audience's mind forever more, often becoming iconic and unforgettable even if the rest of the film falls by the cultural wayside.

Advertisement

And while cameos both fun and disposable are commonplace in Hollywood, every so often they're so brilliant, shocking, and hilarious as to make their own pop-culture imprint and leave viewers picking their jaws up off the floor.

These 10 films certainly achieved that with their show-stopping cameo appearances from name actors and performers nobody ever expected to see.

From shock A-lister cameos that set up future movies to wildly unexpected comedy gags featuring famously busy actors, seconds-long gags, and even legendary appearances from sports icons, these are the cameos that remain as crowd-pleasing and mind-blowing today as they were upon original release.

Considering how they're all among the most talked-about and fondly remembered scenes from their respective movies, they're proof perfect that a relevant, well-written cameo can take on an incredible life of its own...

10. Bruce Willis - Split

Perhaps the greatest trick M. Night Shyamalan ever pulled wasn't the all-timer twist at the end of The Sixth Sense, but by shooting and releasing a sequel to his 2000 superhero movie Unbreakable without anyone knowing.

Advertisement

Despite premiering at Fantastic Fest four months before general release, Split's secrets remained mostly contained until mainstream audiences got to see it for themselves and marvel at its stunner of an ending.

In the final scene, after Casey (Anya Taylor-Joy) has been freed and The Horde (James McAvoy) has fled, Shyamalan cuts to a diner where various patrons are discussing The Horde's similarities to a certain wheelchair-bound maniac, before Unbreakable's David Dunn (Bruce Willis) joins the conversation and drops his name - Mr. Glass (Samuel L. Jackson).

Though Shyamalan's follow-up Glass ultimately turned out a colossal disappointment, this reveal was so expertly executed and brilliantly surprising that audiences well and truly believed the director had gotten his groove back.

Advertisement