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What a time to be alive
In the 2000s, adaptations dominated action cinema. It can often feel like everything is a remake, reimagining, or a soft reboot of something that came before it, and that was especially true in the early 2000s.
Quentin Tarantino, who mainstreamed this mash-up approach to filmmaking in the ’90s, rose to a new level with Kill Bill (2003), which blended the best parts of Shaw Brothers kung fu, spaghetti westerns, and sexploitation into something original and very much his own brand.
Filmmaker Edgar Wright took tired action tropes and transposed them onto an English village setting in Hot Fuzz (2004). On the surface, the best action films of the ’00s often looked like they were made in the ’70s or ’80s; they took preconceived notions of what it meant to be an action film and reimagined them for a new generation.
Let’s not waste any more time: Here are the 20 best action movies from the 2000s, ranked. Did your favorites not make the list? Sound off with the best ’00s action movies you can think of in the comments.