10 Movies Every Action Fan Needs To See

10. Commando

It’s worth noting that in 1985 Arnold Schwarzenegger hadn’t yet transformed himself into the world’s #1 action star and was still appearing in glorified exploitation movies. Mounted on a budget low enough to give it a B-movie feel, Commando gets everything said and done (and exploded and sent flying through a window) in 90 minutes without extraneous subplots or “dramatic” scenes where Arnold attempts to add “depth” to his character.

In fact, all Arnie does over the course of the movie is kill people and make jokes. He snaps one guy’s neck, rearranges the body so it looks like he’s sleeping and says, “He’s dead tired.” When the main villain is speared by a length of piping that gushes forth steam, Arnie says, “Let off some steam.” Repeat ad nauseum.

None of which does justice to just how much fun this piece of no-think escapism is once it gets going. Some cartoon villains kidnap Arnie’s daughter so he kills them one after the other, which eventually leads to an assault on the bad guys’ lair where everything explodes in impressive fireballs. As throwaway filmmaking goes, Commando is some sort of masterpiece.