It's arguable there is no greater action movie star than Arnold Schwarzenegger, but how do his films from the genre rank from worst to best? He's played heroes and villains, ruthless robots and kindergarten cops, and even served two terms as the governor of California. With bulging muscles, a singularly bizarre presence, and a whole lot of heart, Schwarzenegger parlayed a bodybuilding career into one of the most profitable and prolific film careers in Hollywood history.
Arnold's major breakthrough came with 1982's Conan the Barbarian, a box-office hit that captured the imagination of James Cameron, who then cast him as the titular role in the action game-changer The Terminator. That movie made Schwarzenegger an international star on par with that other titan of action filmmaking, Sylvester Stallone. Much of the '80s saw the two stars in competition, with Stallone's kill machine Rambo finding a match with Schwarzenegger's Commando, and each of them trying to outdo the other's brand of macho bloodshed. In truth, though, Schwarzenegger has always had more of a goofy, playful energy than Stallone. While he was releasing his straightforward action films, he also managed to find time for genre oddities like Total Recall or family comedies like Kindergarten Cop. The latter proved extremely potent, setting up Schwarzenegger as a family-friendly action hero, and teeing up the incredible success of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, at the time the highest-grossing film in history.
After that peak, Schwarzenegger's star faded mildly, and after a few attempts in the late '90s and early aughts at reigniting the fire, he left the movies to become "the Governator." Two terms later, Arnold has returned to Hollywood in full force and shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. From the highs of his James Cameron collaborations to the lows of his tenure as Mr. Freeze, here are Arnold Schwarzenegger's action films ranked from worst to best.
How does one even go about ranking the endlessly derided franchise-ender that is Batman and Robin? Joel Schumacher's villain disaster Batman flick doubles down on the neon-drenched cartoony excess of the first, but despite Uma Thurman's vampy turn as Poison Ivy this really is a grade-A dud on all counts. The only element that crosses into "so bad it's good" territory is Schwarzenegger's performance as Mr. Freeze, which is still the only character in cinematic history entirely defined by ice puns. However, unfortunately, "Let's kick some ice" and "Everybody just chill" have still not made it into the AFI 100.
To quote Schwarzenegger himself, "It's the worst film I've ever made." A clunky spinoff of the star's far superior Conan the Barbarian films, Red Sonja is a badly acted, poorly conceived, and clunkily written film that replaces the sword and sorcery of its predecessors with downright silliness. Schwarzenegger is top-billed despite only appearing briefly, but not even his Herculean presence could rescue this calamity.
It will forever be a head-scratcher that The Expendables trilogy, a series of films centering on an ensemble of some of our foremost weathered action movie stars, just isn't very fun. The action sequences are consistently disappointing, and the entire cast - from Stallone to Antonio Banderas to Mel Gibson - feels checked out. Schwarzenegger received a Razzie nomination for his performance in this threequel, and it's easy to see why. In Expendables 3, he's far from the inspired, dropped-in performances he gave throughout his superstar phase.
Filmed during Schwarzenegger's second "Governator" term, the first entry in the Expendables franchise only features the star for a brief scene. Yet, despite being buried amidst the ruins of this sadistic, dull exercise in testosterone, it's one of the film's absolute highlights. Uniting action titans Stallone, Bruce Willis, and Schwarzenegger for the first time, this church-set one-liner fest is one of the only moments in the franchise that cashes in on the franchise's "tough guy Avengers" aspirations.
It's not every day the governor of California leaves office and gets right back to kicking a*s and taking names. Nevertheless, that's exactly what Schwarzenegger did in The Expendables 2. It may be faint praise, but this is undoubtedly the best Expendables film, mostly due to some sure-footed direction by Con Air director Simon West. A climactic Scott Adkins and Jason Statham brawl may disappoint, but Arnold does genuinely seem to be having a great time.
Schwarzenegger has led a lot of junky stand-alone actioners in his tenure as a movie star, but the last before he took political office was this accidentally poorly-timed thriller about a firefighter taking revenge on terrorists, originally scheduled to be released October 2001. Pushing it back a year hardly helped; hollow 9/11 comparisons aside, this is an exceptionally rote, uninspired entry in the genre.
A sorry excuse for an attempt to recreate the magic of Total Recall, this convoluted sci-fi actioner about a family man who's been illegally cloned in a shady technological conspiracy features double the Arnolds but significantly less inspiration. His triple Razzie nominations (for Worst Actor, Worst Supporting Actor, and Worst Onscreen Couple - with himself) sum up the overall effects of this withered genre exercise.
The only reason this, by far the worst Terminator film, isn't at the bottom of the list is that its absolute bizarreness and everything-goes-wrong tone make it an infuriating must-see. Schwarzenegger's return to the franchise after 12 years makes the eternally confusing decision of blowing up the events of the first two films (the only films in the series universally accepted as great) and morphing the franchise into a story about Sarah Connor time-hopping with an aged T-800 she's dubbed Pops. No one comes off well here, from Schwarzenegger to Emilia Clarke, and the entire film feels like such a bizarre combination of bland retread and middle-finger to the franchise's fans that it's difficult to even parse what the intent was.
In 1986, Schwarzenegger and Stallone each released star vehicles that were low on brains but heavy on violence. Critics railed against both, but despite the more iconic status of Stallone's Cobra, it's arguable Raw Deal is the better offering. Schwarzenegger's avuncular, playful presence just helps the crass, excessive bloodsport of this type of B-movie go down smoother. That's not even mentioning the scene where the movie star screams at his drunken wife after she throws a cake at his head, "You should not drink and bake!"
This decade-late follow-up to the dynamic-switching Terminator 2 has undergone a bit of a critical reevaluation in recent years, but its greatest sin is still its incredible ordinariness. Coming on the heels of two of the greatest action films of all time, the third entry loses James Cameron as director and chooses to more or less remake the second film with a jokier tone and a bleaker ending. Schwarzenegger is fun enough, even if he would soon drop his movie stardom in favor of politics, but the film's only real innovation is Kristanna Loken as the first female Terminator. Unfortunately, even that distinction is mildly derailed by the film's decision to have one of her primary abilities be that of magical breast expansion.
Schwarzenegger's second Conan film eschews the straight-faced gravitas of its predecessor for pure camp. The results are mixed, though the whole enterprise admittedly comes off more entertaining than not. Grace Jones, a year before her iconic turn as May Day in A View to a Kill, is a lot of fun as the warrior Zula, and while Schwarzenegger's relationship with comedy would ebb and flow in the coming years, his drunk scenes here wonderfully endearing.
The box-office disappointment of Last Action Hero in 1993 torpedoed Schwarzenegger's undefeated reign as an action movie superstar, leading him to begin a career reevaluation that would transform into his time as the Governator. Before he transitioned into the everyman father at the center of holiday cult classic Jingle All the Way, however, he tried one more back-to-basics action flick to regain his Box Office King status, and the results were Eraser. He plays a U.S. Marshal helping people in Witness Protection, but it's a stale performance in a stale film, and its goofy use of technology was dated upon arrival.
Y2K anxiety was obviously rampant in 1999, and this supernatural thriller attempted to cash in on the craze. Schwarzenegger plays an ex-cop who finds a new purpose protecting a woman chosen to conceive the Antichrist with Satan himself. This period of the faded action king's career (the late '90s into the early aughts) was an up-and-down ride populated by hits and misses. Despite some interesting ideas, this decidedly falls in the latter category, the super-sized apocalyptic tone buoyed by an outsized performance that veers headfirst into camp.
After a long absence from the franchise, Linda Hamilton returned as Sarah Connor. It's still nowhere near the high bar set by the first two entries, but it's solid nonetheless and certainly the best Terminator movie of the last decade. Mackenzie Davis is an engaging presence, and Gabriel Luna's Rev-9 is the closest the series has come to constructing a villain as bone-chillingly terrifying as the T-1000. The formula is decidedly a riff on The Force Awakens, with Hamilton and Schwarzenegger acting as mentors for a new generation of heroes and villains, but the scenes of Arnold as an aged T-800 living a peaceful, bucolic life are oddly moving.
A Stallone and Schwarzenegger team-up had been bandied around by fanboys for decades, and in the afterglow of The Expendables, it became an inevitability. Al Pacino's Heat it is not, but Escape Plan has its undeniable pleasures. A barebones pulp machine featuring Stallone as a prison designer who has to bust out of jail with the help of Schwarzenegger's inmate, the film inspires easy charm while also making viewers long for the type of script that would rise to the level of these titans of the genre.
Odd couples don't come much odder than Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jim Belushi, but that's just the pairing Hollywood cooked up for this 1987 action-comedy. Directed by '70s master Walter Hill (The Warriors), this film was a chance for Schwarzenegger to expand his range, as well as for Belushi to fill the immense shoes of his brother. Both do just fine, and the buddy cop shenanigans proved Arnold a solid candidate for future comedies, even if this one never really rose to anything beyond solid.
The pairing of director David Ayer and Schwarzenegger still seems like a good idea. Ayer is a director skilled at exploiting tough-guy swagger, and Schwarzenegger is one of the most legendary tough guys around. His performance here, as a gruff and grizzled soldier dealing with his compatriots getting whacked over stolen cartel money, is one of his most mournful, with a gunslinger finale that ranks as one of the movie star's best scenes.
Unfortunately released alongside Jurassic Park, the highest-grossing film of 1993, and quickly forgotten about, Last Action Hero is worth a second look. Directed by John McTiernan and written by Shane Black, it follows a young boy who gets sucked into the world of action movie character Jack Slater. The tone is that of a satire of action movie tropes, and a lot of it is fun if a bit smug. Unfortunately the casting of Schwarzenegger is a bit misguided; while it's fun to see such a self-critiquing performance from the star, he's always brought a winky cheekiness to his action films, and so this feels a bit like putting a hat on a hat.
After a decade off the screen (and some minor ribbing at how much he hated Terminator Salvation), Schwarzenegger appeared in this underrated return to form, certainly the best of his films post-governing. Directed by Korean filmmaker Kim Jee-woon, this is a full-blooded back-to-basics actioner about a small-town sheriff leading a group of misfits in battle with a drug lord. Arnold slips back into his movie star role like he never left at all, and the result is a film that is as explosively engaging as it is downright fun.
Kindergarten Cop is maybe the most important film in Schwarzenegger's entire career, if only for the simple reason that it gave him a vehicle that played to his strengths as both an action star and a comedic presence, simultaneously endearing audiences to him as a family movie tentpole. Without this film cementing that image, it's arguable Terminator 2 would never have been the box office success it was. Even watching it now, it's hard to resist Schwarzenegger's chemistry with the adorable and annoying cast of children he's surrounded by here. For all his movie star bravado, Arnold has always been a big kid at heart, and Kindergarten Cop leans into that with magnificent results.
Schwarzenegger's breakout film is such a singular use of his persona, a perfect parlaying of his bodybuilder status and iconic speech, that it's no wonder it kicked off a decade of him being the king of the action genre. That said, those who might think Arnold would be the main draw here are likely to be surprised by the sheer muscularity of the film as a whole. Conan the Barbarian is a full-blooded sword and sorcery epic, one of the gold standards of the genre until Peter Jackson adapted The Lord of the Rings.
The misogyny and anti-Muslim xenophobia at the heart of True Lies has always been a source of controversy, giving a sour taste to this otherwise-intriguing final collaboration between Schwarzenegger and his Terminator maestro James Cameron. Both men have admittedly done better work, but this is still a fascinating relic, both as a rare Cameron-directed film that didn't become a genre-defining box office juggernaut, and as a pure flexing of Schwarzenegger's fully developed movie star muscles. In many ways, this marks the end of his superstar decade, bringing a close to one of the most singularly successful runs of any actor.
This is peak '80s action movie ridiculousness, pitting a fully weaponized Arnold Schwarzenegger against an entire army, all to save his daughter. The results speak for themselves. Arnold looks like a tank here, popping off one-liners, firing machine guns, and busting open padlocks with his bare hands. Every action star wishes they could rock a red-blooded, insane star vehicle like Commando. Nobody could do it like Arnold.
Loosely adapted from Stephen King's novel of the same name, this sublimely silly post-apocalyptic genre piece focuses on a futuristic game show wherein a "running man" must escape death at the hands of professional killers. A sci-fi Network by way of Andy Warhol, The Running Man is as eerily prescient in its picture of 2019 pop culture as it is a gleefully fun ride. Schwarzenegger is in fine form here, the steady hand at the center of this lunacy, but he's also got a sublime foil in Richard Dawson's villain. Arguably the most underrated film in his entire repertoire, The Running Man deserves any Schwarzenegger fan's attention.
How to find a proper foil for Arnold Schwarzenegger, one of the most larger-than-life, invincible movie star presences in cinematic history? That was the question John McTiernan so brilliantly answered in Predator, one of the defining action films of the 1980s. In it, Schwarzenegger (and a who's who of '80s action stars, including Carl Weathers) goes head to head with an alien who's come to Earth with the sole purpose of hunting humans for sport. Stunningly designed by the same man who helped create the Xenomorphs and Terminators, the creature is one of the scariest movie monsters of all time. The surrounding film is a powerhouse piece of action filmmaking, with McTiernan staging the setpieces with gusto while never losing an edge-of-your-seat sense of tension. Predator has now spawned a multi-film franchise, but nothing can ever beat the original.
James Cameron's B-movie masterpiece was an undeniable game-changer, but it's also the best casting Schwarzenegger ever received. The ruthless villain T-800 is the actor's most terrifying role; he's never been this cold-blooded or dangerous again, nor has a film ever made better use of his singular weirdness. Schwarzenegger's physical grandeur, odd tics, and bizarre speech feel like a complete match for the titular Terminator, and only enhance the mystique of the character. It's one of the best villain performances of all time, and an inspired bit of casting that launched one of the most impressive action movie careers in history.
Paul Verhoeven's sci-fi stunner is a gleeful mind-bender about memory implants, Mars espionage, and Arnold Schwarzenegger going absolutely ham. Verhoeven finds a certain amount of giddy release in letting Schwarzenegger so fully off the chain, but the film's cheeky, violent, and ultimately vulnerable style is also a perfect match for all of the movie star's best assets. Total Recall sees Schwarzenegger simultaneously at his wildest and most human. For a real treat, listen to the Mind-Bending Edition commentary with Schwarzenegger and Verhoeven.
"I'll be back" was one of the most iconic lines in the original Terminator, and seven years later Schwarzenegger made good on his promise. The resulting film is not just the actor's best action film, but arguably the greatest action film ever made. James Cameron is working at the height of his powers here, capitalizing on all of his best talents for simple but muscular storytelling. Of course, he's also breaking a ton of new ground here, from the CGI of the T-1000 to the introduction of the female action movie star that is Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor. Arguably his masterstroke, though, is bringing Schwarzenegger back not as the villain, but as the hero. His performance here is purely sublime, a poignant portrait of a robot learning to love. His farewell scene underlines the ineffable singularity of Arnold Schwarzenegger's titanic movie star - an otherworldly presence with a massive heart.
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