The arthouse action genre is an emerging film genre in contemporary cinema that traces its roots back to Asian and European films.^[1][2] Characteristics of arthouse action films include stylized action, an arthouse atmosphere, and a disjointed, fragmented narrative with more complexity than the typical action flick. These come together to create a sense of "dreamy surrealism." ^[1][2]

List of films

• The Wages of Fear (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1953)^[3]
• Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa, 1954)^[1]
• Yojimbo (Akira Kurosawa, 1961)^[4]
• Sanjuro (Akira Kurosawa, 1962)^[5]
• Django (Sergio Corbucci, 1966)^[1]
• Branded to Kill (Seijun Suzuki, 1967)^[6]
• Point Blank (John Boorman, 1967)^[7][8]
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service (Peter R. Hunt, 1969)^[7]
• Trial of the Road (Aleksei German, 1971)^[9]
• Assault on Precinct 13 (John Carpenter, 1976)^[10]
• Sorcerer (William Friedkin, 1977) ^[11]
• The Exterminator (James Glickenhaus, 1980)^[12]
• Gloria (John Cassavetes, 1980)^[1]
• The Soldier (James Glickenhaus, 1982)^[12]
• Runaway Train (Andrei Konchalovsky, 1985)^[13][14]
• Batman (Tim Burton, 1989)^[1][15][16]
• The Killer (John Woo, 1989)^[17]
• El Mariachi (Robert Rodriguez, 1992)^[17]
• Léon: The Professional (Luc Besson, 1994)^[17]
• Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)^[18]
• Starship Troopers (Paul Verhoeven, 1997)^[7]
• Run Lola Run (Tom Tykwer, 1998)^[17]
• Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (Jim Jarmusch, 1999)^[1]
• The Bourne Identity (Doug Liman, 2002)^[19][20]
• Kill Bill: Volume 1 (Quentin Tarantino, 2003)^[21]
• Oldboy (Park Chan-wook, 2003)^[15]
• Miami Vice (Michael Mann, 2006)^[22][7]
• Apocalypto (Mel Gibson, 2006)^[23]
• The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow, 2008)^[24][25]
• Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010)^[26][27]
• Drive (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011) ^{[28][7][29][30]}
• Hanna (Joe Wright, 2011)^[31]
• Haywire (Steven Soderbergh, 2011)^[32]
• Looper (Rian Johnson, 2012)^[33][15]
• The Grandmaster (Wong Kar-Wai, 2013)^[34]
• Only God Forgives (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2013)^[35]
• Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-ho, 2013)^[15]
• The Northman (Robert Eggers, 2022)^[36]
• Everything Everywhere All at Once (Daniels, 2022)^[37]
• RRR (S. S. Rajamouli, 2022)^[38]

Notable directors

• Seijun Suzuki^[39][40]
• Akira Kurosawa^[41]
• Kathryn Bigelow^[24]
• James Glickenhaus^[12]
• Nicolas Winding Refn^[2]
• Steven Soderbergh^[42]
• Joe Wright^[43]
• Quentin Tarantino^[44][45]