John Woois a legendary filmmaker who hails from Hong Kong and has made some of the region’s best action movies. Considering Hong Kong cinema is known for delivering great action movies (among other genres of course), it’s therefore safe to say that Woo has directed some of the greatest action films of all time, most notably titles likeA Better Tomorrow,The Killer, andHard Boiled. His movies are often defined by plentiful explosions, tons of slow motion, tragic characters involved with melodramatic stories, and, of course, flocks of doves flying around for dramatic effect.
However, between 1993 and 2003, John Woo made half a dozen feature films in Hollywood, with all carrying his visual trademarks to some extent while having predominantly American casts and sometimes even larger production values.The resulting Hollywood John Woo movies are certainly mixed when it comes to quality, but there’s some gold in there for sure, and the best of his American movies aren’t far off the best of his Hong Kong movies.His seventh American movie -Silent Night- was released in late 2023 after a 20-year gap, making it a perfect time to revisit his English-language/American movies and rank them from worst to best.
7’Windtalkers' (2002)
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Peter Stormare, and Noah Emmerich
Despite a large budget and some talented actors,Windtalkers, unfortunately, isn’ta great war movie, at the end of the day.Windtalkersended up severely underperforming at the box office, likely thanks to middling reviews. It’s a shame, because the premise here isn’t a bad one by any means, following how Navajo Indian soldiers were used by the U.S. Army while fighting in the Pacific to relay messages, as Japanese forces couldn’t decipher their language.
Windtalkersdoesn’t utilize this premise very well though, with the titular windtalkers themselves getting lost within the large cast, and the excessive combat sequences that have spectacle, but at a cost. It boils down toWindtalkershaving brutal action that nevertheless feels like it’s supposed to be exciting, creating something of a dissonance between the horrors of war and the glee of action with John Woo’s fingerprints on it. Maybe some will enjoy what’s on offer here, but it’s heavily flawed, and few people would call it one of the better World War II movies out there.
Windtalkers
Watch on Amazon Prime
6’Paycheck' (2003)
Starring: Ben Affleck, Uma Thurman, and Aaron Eckhart
One year afterWindtalkers, John Woo bounced back to some extent, with 2003’sPaycheckmaking enough at the box office to be a commercial success (Paycheckgot people paychecks), while overall being of a slightly higher quality. The emphasis there is on “slightly,” becausePaycheckis still far from great, and though it blends a complex narrative with plenty of genres, and contains a decent cast, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone including it among theirall-time favorite science-fiction movies.
It’s essentially about a vast conspiracy revolving around a piece of technology that allows people to see into the future and follows a man trying to uncover the mysteries behind it all after much of his memory is wiped.Paycheckis overly convoluted and quite silly, and not always in a good way… but John Woo’s style shines through more as it goes along, enough so that the overblown action near the end is a good amount of fun (even if it’s unfortunately neutered somewhat by a PG-13 rating).
Watch on Max
5’Silent Night' (2023)
Starring: Joel Kinnaman, Kid Cudi, and Harold Torres
Even with its flaws (and there are quite a few), one does have to admire theambition ofSilent Night, at least to some extent. It focuses on a man who’s been wounded in a way that’s left him unable to speak, but he expresses his anger and desire for revenge against those responsible for his son’s death in other ways. Such ways often include violence and/or shooting people.Beyond being an action movie based around the quest for revenge,Silent Nightalso manages to be a Christmas movie.
Things are taken to an extreme in the whole “silence” department, too, considering this movie plays out without any dialogue. A modern silent film belonging to the action genre and with a Christmas flavor sounds like it could’ve been great, or at least novel, but sadly,Silent Nightisn’t quite as exciting or fun as it perhaps could’ve been. You could do worse as far as American John Woo movies go, sure, but it’s also hard to imagineSilent Nightever achieving classic status, or even wowing many.
Silent Night
Watch in Cinemas
4’Broken Arrow' (1996)
Starring: John Travolta, Christian Slater, and Samantha Mathis
Those who like theiraction movies as bombastic and ridiculous as possiblewill likely have a blast withBroken Arrow, which might just be John Woo’s goofiest American movie (it has some tough competition though). It’s about a stealth-fighter pilot going rogue and stealing two nuclear warheads from the Air Force, after which his co-pilot is enlisted to track down his former colleague, given he has the best chance of anyone when it comes to retrieving the weapons.
Though it was only John Woo’s second movie made while working in America, the director really goes for broke here, giving the audience plentiful explosions, chases, and ridiculous fights to be entertained and/or perplexed by. It’s an uneven and somewhat unwieldy movie, but works as good, stupid fun when approached and watched with the right mindset (a scenery-chewingJohn Travoltaas the main villainalways helps, too).
Broken Arrow
Rent on Apple TV
3’Mission: Impossible II' (2000)
Starring: Tom Cruise, Thandiwe Newton, and Ving Rhames
The second movie in the long-runningMission: Impossibleseries, this installment is often seen - perhaps not unfairly - as the weakest of the seven so far. That being said,it’s far from bad, and will satisfy those who want to see Woo’s sense of action get blended up with spy-themed adventure. The stakes are particularly high here, with series protagonist Ethan Hunt needing to stop a former Impossible Mission Force agent from unleashing a biological weapon upon the world.
It’s expected thateveryMission: Impossiblemoviewill require some suspension of disbelief, butMission: Impossible IIpushes things particularly far. It’s very cheesy and very over-the-top, but those are the things about it that prove hardest to forget, and much can be forgiven once you’ve witnessed the sight of two men drive motorcycles directly at each other at top speed, jumping off when they both intersect and colliding in midair before fighting. Then, of course, the motorcycles explode. Movie magic.
Mission: Impossible 2
Watch on Paramount+
2’Hard Target' (1993)
Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Arnold Vosloo, and Lance Henriksen
Action movie die-hards might’ve known John Woo’s name before 1993, but those who weren’t aware of his sensibilities before he (briefly) left the Hong Kong film industry sure became aware thanks toHard Target. In many ways, this was the perfect movie for Woo to use to announce his entrance into Hollywood, and American action movies (especially the bombastic and kind of wild ones) were never the same again.
John Woo directsJean-Claude Van Dammeto great effect here, with the elaborate action - courtesy of the former - pairing strangely well with the stoicism of the latter. The movie sees Van Damme’s character fighting against a group of comically evil people who hunt homeless men for sport. It takes a while to get going, butonceHard Targetreaches its second half, it delivers ridiculous action set piece after ridiculous action set piece and becomes hugely entertaining to watch.
1’Face/Off' (1997)
Starring: John Travolta, Nicolas Cage, and Joan Allen
One ofthe funniest action moviesof all time,Face/Offis the greatest movie John Woo directed in America, and it’s not even close. It’s a landmark 1990s action/sci-fi/thriller that asks the age-old question: what ifNicolas Cagewas a bad guy, and John Travolta was a good guy, and then the plot unfolded in a way where they swapped faces, and Cage and Travolta would therefore effectively have to play the other?
It is stupid, yes, butFace/Offalso works surprisingly well as a genuinely great action movie, somehow getting you invested in its ridiculous world, cartoonish characters, and unbelievable sci-fi technology.Cage and Travolta commit wholeheartedly and make the whole thing work much better than it should, and Woo’s skillful action scenes here are as good as those found in his Hong Kong classics. As far as big and wonderfully dumb action movies go,Face/Offis essentially close to perfect.
