20 Foreign Language Movies You Must See Before You Die

Country: Hong Kong.

Plot: A tough cop and an undercover policeman team up to take down a Triad.

When it comes to action films, it's certainly not all about Hollywood and East Asian cinema has proven particularly strong in this field. There are many other great examples, such as Hero, The Raid and The Killer among many others, but it's this ultra-violent, ultra-cool and ludicrously entertaining action masterwork from Hong Kong action maestro John Woo that deserves a mention the most.

Hard Boiled is filled with brilliant, beautifully constructed, almost ballet-like action scenes that are genuine works of art loaded with gore, explosions, terrific visuals and nail-biting tension, making this among the most exciting films ever made. In particular, the climactic hospital shootout is arguably the finest action set-piece of all time. That being said, it's not all about the action scenes.

While on the surface a simple story about cops, gangsters and moles, Hard Boiled benefits from strongly drawn characters and the surprisingly poignant tone, so it's great outside of the set-pieces s too.

There are very few things in the history of action cinema which better this.