10 Wildly Underrated Action Movies Of The 90s

"Ahead of its time." That's really all you can say about 1993's failed action-comedy experiment, Last Action Hero. In what was supposed to be Schwarzenegger's next mega-blockbuster, the film dove headfirst into the burgeoning world of self-referential entertainment and returned to the surface with nary a gold doubloon to show for it.

Directed by John McTiernan (Die Hard, Predator), with a screenplay by Shane Black (Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout), and starring Arnie in the midst of his "I am a comedian now please?" phase, the movie had all the ingredients for success.

But audiences were baffled by the genre-bending, reality-swapping meta-humor, and the film remains one of the most egregious flops of the decade. Which begs the question: Was a Schwarzenegger movie really "too smart" for mainstream audiences? Is that...is that even a thing? Maybe. Maybe the movie was simply asking viewers to embrace too many things at once.

McTiernan wanted you to laugh at the ridiculousness of a bad guy getting impaled by an ice cream cone, but he also wanted you to appreciate the sequence as you would John McClane launching himself off the top of a building with a fire hose strapped around his waist.

But you know what? You really should be able to do both of those things at once.