The 20 Best Action Movies on Amazon Prime Video

Skyfall, Jurassic Park, The Bourne Identity, and more.

This list is regularly updated as movies rotate on and off of Prime Video. *New additions are indicated with an asterisk.

Action movies are typically among the most popular films available on DVD, VOD, and streaming services. People love to tune in, tune out, and escape while watching beautiful people doing impossible things. If you have an Amazon Prime subscription and are looking to do exactly that, its vast library contains some of the best action titles ever made, alongside its comedies, horror films, and family-friendly options. Amazon cycles films on and off of its service regularly, but these are the best action movies on Prime Video right now.

Allied

Year: 2016
Runtime: 2 hours 4 minutes
Director: Robert Zemeckis

Star power doesn’t get much brighter than Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard in this World War II thriller from the director of Back to the Future and Flight. The pair play a Canadian intelligence officer and a French Resistance fighter who are paired on a mission in Casablanca in 1942 in this elaborate period piece from the writer of Eastern Promises and Locke. It’s a sexy, smart movie for adults.

The Batman

Year: 2022
Runtime: 2h 56m
Director: Matt Reeves

Matt Reeves now owns the saga of the Dark Knight as a sequel to the 2022 action blockbuster has already been announced. Dropping on HBO Max while it was still in theaters, The Batman is an ambitious epic reboot of the legendary hero, anchored by Reeves’s craft and fascinating performances from Robert Pattinson, Zoe Kravitz, Paul Dano, and many more. Along with a ton of DC Universe movies, it’s been imported over to Prime for now. Watch it while you can.

Beast

Year: 2022
Runtime: 1h 32m
Director: Baltasar Kormakur

Who doesn’t want to see Idris Elba punch a lion? This B-movie takes a bit too long to get to the good stuff but it’s fun once it gets going. The star of The Wire brings a gravity to a relatively ridiculous story of a family that gets caught in a deadly situation involving wild animals that have been terrorized by local poachers. Yes, it’s a B-movie with a social conscience too!

The Bourne Identity

Year: 2002
Runtime: 1h 58m
Director: Doug Liman

Prime is typically pretty poor at providing entire franchises, often picking one or two films from a series of films instead of the whole thing, and the weirdness continues with this month’s drop of the first, second, and Renner variations on the story of Jason Bourne (Ultimatum and the Damon-led reboot are missing). The first two films still rock, especially the second movie, which amps up the action and results in one of Matt Damon’s best movies overall.

Casino Royale

Year: 2006
Runtime: 2h 24m
Director: Martin Campbell

It’s hard to believe the most famous movie spy in history ever needed a comeback, but that’s really what happened when Daniel Craig stepped into 007’s shoes and it turned out to be one of the most acclaimed James Bond movies of all time. An origin story for the suave superspy, Casino Royale introduced new layers to the classic character, resulting in an action film that felt like it had real stakes. This is one of the best modern action movies, period, not just in the Bond franchise.

Escape from New York

Year: 1981
Runtime: 1h 39m
Director: John Carpenter

John Carpenter’s 1981 action masterpiece imagined the distant future of 1997 when the island of Manhattan had become a maximum-security prison. When Air Force One is hijacked and crashed into New York on purpose, only Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell) can stop the madness.

Goldeneye

Year: 1995
Runtime: 2h 10m
Director: Martin Campbell

The legend of 007 was in a pretty dark place in the mid-‘90s as the response to Timothy Dalton playing James Bond had been pretty much a universal shrug. Enter Pierce Brosnan in this film that revitalized the screen legend in a way that’s still going today. Brosnan’s best Bond film features the character trying to stop a rogue MI6 agent, played by Sean Bean. (Note: There are a bunch of other 007 films on Prime too from all eras.)

Highlander

Year: 1986
Runtime: 1h 50m
Director: Russell Mulcahy

There can be only one. Christopher Lambert stars as Connor MacLeod, who was born in the Scottish Highlands in the 16th century and killed there, only to discover that he was born immortal and is now a part of a massive secret war to leave only one highlander remaining. Yeah, it’s all really silly, but this movie became a massive cult hit, thanks in part to Lambert and Sean Connery’s fun performances.

The Indiana Jones franchise

Year: 1981
Runtime: 1h 55m
Director: Steven Spielberg

Everyone is getting cautiously excited for James Mangold’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, releasing later this year. It’s the perfect time to catch up with the saga of cinema’s most beloved treasure hunter in the beloved first four (well, at least three) films in this franchise. The perfect Raiders of the Lost Ark and its three sequels are all on Prime, waiting for your marathon.

*Inglourious Basterds

Year: 2009
Runtime: 2h 32m
Director: Quentin Tarantino

One of the most famous filmmakers of all time is reportedly prepping his last film, The Critic. Before then, why not catch up with one of his best in this Oscar-winning revision of history? For his last few films, QT has been blending actual history with his love of cinema to create a hybrid that only he could make. And Christoph Waltz’s Oscar-winning performance here might be the best in any Tarantino movie.

Interstellar

Year: 2014
Runtime: 2h 49m
Director: Christopher Nolan

The most underrated film from the director of The Dark Knight and Oppenheimer remains this 2014 sci-fi epic, a film that’s better if you approach it as an emotional journey instead of a physical one. Matthew McConaughey gives one of the best performances of his career as an astronaut searching for a new home for mankind, and realizing all that he left behind to do so. It’s a technical marvel with some of the most striking visuals and best sound design of Nolan’s career.

*Jurassic Park

Year: 1993
Runtime: 2h 1m
Director: Steven Spielberg

An instant classic when it was released in 1993, Steven Spielberg’s dinosaur blockbuster spawned a franchise that’s still humming almost three decades later with the 2022 release of the wildly successful Dominion. The first three films in the series, including Spielberg’s sequel The Lost World, are on Prime right now.

*Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Year: 2003
Runtime: 2h 18m
Director: Peter Weir

Russell Crowe stars in this brilliant period action film based on the novels by Patrick O’Brian that recreates warfare on the water arguably better than any other film. This really should have been the start of a franchise. Crowe plays Jack Aubrey, Captain in the Royal Navy, and Paul Bettany does his best film work as the ship’s surgeon. This was nominated for 10 Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director.

The Mission: Impossible franchise

Year: 1996
Runtime: 1h 50m
Director: Brian De Palma

The highly anticipated Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning will release its first part later this year, but Prime Video has you set to catch up with the story of Ethan Hunt to date, starting way back in 1996 with an adaptation of the hit TV show that no one could have predicted would still be relevant over a quarter-century later. Watch em all, but especially the ones since Ghost Protocol, which have been truly spectacular.

Once Upon a Time in the West

Year: 1969
Runtime: 2h 46m
Director: Sergio Leone

One of Sergio Leone’s best films, his Western stars Henry Fonda, Jason Robards, Claudia Cardinale, and Charles Bronson. It’s an epic film that casts Fonda against type as the bad guy and contains some of the best imagery in Leone’s career, anchored by one of the best scores ever written by Ennio Morricone. In a 2008 poll by Empire of over 10,000 readers, filmmakers, and critics, this film was the highest-ranking Western.

*Skyfall

Year: 2012
Runtime: 2h 17m
Director: Sam Mendes

One of the best James Bond movies ever made is now the centerpiece of the 5-movie arc of Daniel Craig. The actor plays 007, of course, fighting against Javier Bardem’s Raoul Silva this time around in a story that touches on the very legacy of the big screen superspy. Consistently riveting, and beautifully shot by Roger Deakins, this is top tier Bond.

Stagecoach

Year: 1939
Runtime: 1h 36m
Director: John Ford

It won’t play the same as modern action movies, but this could be the gateway to classic Westerns for someone in your family. Give them the gift of a flick that really changed the genre, in no small part because it really introduced the world to a young man named John Wayne. Based on a 1937 short story by Dudley Nichols, this is the tale of a group of strangers on a stagecoach as it travels through Apache territory. It has influenced too many action films since to count them all.

The Suicide Squad

Year: 2021
Runtime: 2h 12m
Director: James Gunn

James Gunn almost made up for the previous version of Suicide Squad with one of the better films in the modern DC Universe. The reason this take works is that Gunn knows not to take it seriously, bringing some of his Troma experience to bear on this ludicrously violent and anarchic action film. Idris Elba, John Cena, Joel Kinnaman, and many more star, but the movie is stolen by Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn because of course it is.

The Untouchables

Year: 1987
Runtime: 1h 59m
Director: Brian De Palma

Brian De Palma directed one of the best movies of his notable career in this 1987 action epic that won Sean Connery an overdue Oscar. Connery co-stars with Kevin Costner as Elliot Ness and Robert De Niro as Al Capone in this story of how Ness took down one of the most famous criminals of all time. Tense and riveting, it’s a great action movie that’s anchored by phenomenal performances and De Palma’s unique eye.

V for Vendetta

Year: 2006
Runtime: 2h 12m
Director: James McTeigue

This action thriller took on new life in 2020 when people started referencing its issues of social unrest during a pandemic. In this vision of the future from the Alan Moore and David Lloyd graphic novel, an anarchist named V (Hugo Weaving) teams with a woman named Evey (Natalie Portman) to inspire the world to rise up. It was underrated when it came out and plays with even more urgency almost two decades years later.

The Wave

Year: 2015
Runtime: 1h 45m
Director: Roar Uthaug

Disaster movies aren’t the exclusive property of American filmmakers! Norway can make ‘em too! This is one of the best disaster movies of the 2010s, the story of an avalanche in Norway that leads to an 80-metre wave that rolls through the region around it, causing havoc.

Wonder Woman

Year: 2017
Runtime: 2h 15m
Director: Patty Jenkins

A major chapter of the DC Universe is about to end, which means it’s time to assess what worked best. This is undeniably near the top of the list. Take the recent DCU drop to Prime to go back and check out the phenomenal and best non-Batman film in the modern DC Universe. Gal Gadot stars in the title role and really anchors what’s an old-fashioned adventure film, one that owes as much to serial action flicks of the ‘40s and ‘50s as it does to movies with Batman and Superman.

Annnnnd: Action!

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