Following our previous year-by-year lists of musicals, Japanese cinema and horror, our blow-by-blow account of action cinema keeps pace with this ongoing evolution over the last 100 years. Compared with most action lists online, it digs much deeper into the roots of the modern action movie in the 1920s, 30s, 40s and 50s, reclaiming names like Raoul Walsh, William A. Wellman and Howard Hawks as key action auteurs, no less than Kathryn Bigelow or John Woo. Think of this as the nascent genre's epic training montage.
Via the revolution of CGI and the digital action spectacles of the Wachowskis, George Miller and S.S. Rajamouli, the list brings us bang up to date and into our own volatile period, when action at the movies continues to be not just intrinsic to the medium but also seen as somehow crucial for its survival.
