Jason Statham wasn’t always an action movie legend. He started out as a competitive diver, and even modeled for Tommy Hilfiger and Levi’s. But as soon as he made his big screen debut in Guy Ritchie’s “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” it was obvious. A star was being born.
Statham’s gravely voice, martial arts talent and toned physique served him well, and he quickly became one of the most recognizable action heroes of the 21st century, starring in billion dollar blockbusters and quirky crime thrillers, with a smattering of tough as nails or just plain weird genre films in the middle. And sometimes he also pokes fun at his grizzled persona, proving that he’s having just as much fun as we are.
Not every Jason Statham movie is great, but a lot of them are better than they get credit for. And even the silly ones are often 100% pure Statham. These are the best and/or Jason Statham-est movies he’s made so far.
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11. ‘Safe’ (2012)
Jason Statham has put up with a lot of crap in his movies but “Safe” deals him one of his toughest hands. He plays a cage fighter who accidentally ruins a fixed match, which gets his family killed by the Russian mob. Wait, it gets worse: they curse him for life, so that anyone he talks to for more than a few minutes will always be murdered. He’s at the end of his rope when he encounters a young math prodigy who is somehow in more trouble than he is. She’s hunted by the Chinese Triads, the Russian mob, and the NYPD, which finally gives our hero a reason to live — and fight — again. Contrived stuff, and with more cultural stereotypes than any movie needs, but Boaz Yakin (“Remember the Titans”) directs the hell out of it. “Safe” is intensely made and truly suspenseful.
10. ‘Snatch’ (2000)
Jason Statham made his acting debut in Guy Ritchie’s explosive first film “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” but he played a much bigger role in Ritchie’s sophomore feature. To be fair, in many ways “Snatch” is just more of the same — another big ensemble cast of memorable ne’er-do-wells, overlapping crime stories, wackiness and violence. But it’s sharper this time, with more memorable subplots. Especially Statham’s, who plays a boxing promoter whose fighter gets knocked out by Brad Pitt, who agrees to take his place in the ring. Then he refuses to take a dive, with disastrous results. Statham worked with Ritchie many times. They still haven’t matched “Snatch.”
9. ‘The Fate of the Furious’
Statham debuted as the best “Fast and Furious” villain ever in “Furious 7,” a film whose production was derailed by the sudden, tragic death of Paul Walker. It’s a patchwork film in many ways, satisfying but showing its seams. So the best of Statham’s “Fast and Furious” films is probably the follow-up, “The Fate of the Furious,” which finds him teaming up with his nemesis, played by Dwayne Johnson, and tiptoeing towards the path to redemption by rescuing a baby in the middle of a mile-high gunfight. Statham’s character, like many villains in the franchise, softened over time. “Fate” hits the sweet spot: He’s an anti-villain in the midst of becoming an anti-hero, kicking ass and gradually winning us over.
8. ‘Homefront’ (2013)
Many of Statham’s films have nonsensical storylines, and we are not complaining, but “Homefront” is a welcome exception. Based on a novel by Chuck Logan and adapted to the screen by Sylvester Stallone, Statham plays a DEA agent who retires to a small southern town with his daughter. After a seemingly minor altercation with a school bully, a chain reaction goes off, putting our hero in the crosshairs of an unexpectedly complex meth dealer villain named Gator (James Franco) and a vicious biker gang. The stakes are relatively grounded, but that’s only one reason why “Homefront” has a bigger emotional impact than most of Statham’s films. Credit is also due to the confident direction of underappreciated thriller maestro Gary Fleder (“Kiss the Girls,” “Don’t Say a Word”).
7. ‘The Meg/The Meg 2: The Trench’ (2018-2023)
Jason Statham typically plays a stoic figure, a serious man fighting his way through ridiculous situations. So it only makes sense to pit his stone-faced hero against a giant prehistoric shark. Yup, perfect sense indeed. Audiences couldn’t agree more, since the absurd 2018 monster flick “The Meg” spawned an even sillier follow-up which threw dinosaurs and a giant octopus into the mix. Hollywood didn’t have to spend nearly as much money as they did bringing these “Meg” movies to life but the contrast between all that gloss and all this nonsense makes for one heck of a show. Or, you know, two of them.
6. ‘Wild Card’ (2015)
The best screenplay Jason Statham has ever had to work with comes courtesy of William Goldman, the famous scribe behind “The Princess Bride,” “Marathon Man” and “Misery.” Statham plays Nick Wild, a gambling addict who works as a bodyguard in Las Vegas, desperately trying to make enough money to get out of town. Over the course of a weirdly eventful night he avenges an abused sex worker, which pisses off the mob, and it only gets rougher from there. A cavalcade of smartly written characters join Statham for this underrated gem, a remake of the 1986 Burt Reynolds thriller “Heat,” based on Goldman’s own novel.
5. ‘The Beekeeper’ (2024)
Statham’s killed a lot of bad guys in movies but in David Ayer’s “The Beekeeper” he takes aim at a rare group of villains, the kind that everyone hates equally: phone scammers. Our hero plays an ex-assassin living a quiet, retired life as a beekeeper, until his kindly landlord gets conned out of her life savings by sniveling, amoral tech bros. So he goes on a killing spree, getting violent revenge on behalf of everyone these scammers have ever screwed over, or even annoyed with their incessant calls. The plot turns absurd quickly but that’s just part of the fun. The action is kick ass and the anger is always well-placed.
4. ‘The Bank Job’ (2008)
Roger Donaldson’s fast-paced, clever and wickedly entertaining caper is based on a true story about a group of goons, led by Statham, who tunnel into a bank vault to ransack the safe deposit boxes. They find cash, they find jewelry, but they also find blackmail photos that could humiliate many of the most powerful people in England. “The Bank Job” has a lot of the same appeal as Statham’s quirky collaborations with Guy Ritchie, it’s sprawling and complicated and full of distinctive rogues. But it’s a lot less silly, a little more intense, and easily his best mostly-serious picture to date.
3. ‘Spy’ (2015)
When it came time to take the piss out of his hard-boiled badass persona, Jason Statham took out all the piss. Paul Feig’s comedy hit “Spy” stars Melissa McCarthy as a desk jockey for a spy network who gets pulled into the field, makes some wacky mistakes, and eventually proves that she’s a proper hero. Keeping an eye on her in the field is Statham, doing a comically over-the-top version of his usual schtick, as a tough guy who isn’t nearly as smart as he thinks he is and apparently thinks “Face/Off” was a documentary. He’s second-or-third fiddle in “Spy,” but it’s one of his best and funniest roles yet.
2. ‘The Transporter/Transporter 2’ (2002-2005)
Statham got his own action movie franchise as Frank Martin, a highly principled getaway driver and transporter of illegal goods. When he discovers he’s got a kidnapping victim in his truck, he accidentally does a good deed, and becomes a target for human traffickers. Thrilling action abounds in the first two “Transporter” movies, the second even bigger and more exciting than the first, and the films’ notable queer subtext adds a welcome layer of complexity to Statham’s work. Frank Martin can’t come out and say it, but he’s a gay action icon. (“Transporter 3” was a major letdown but the TV series and “The Transporter Refueled” — neither of which star Statham — are fun follow-ups as well.)
1. ‘Crank’ (2006)
There is no film that plays to Jason Statham’s strengths like Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor’s “Crank.” Statham plays Chev Chelios, a hitman who has just been poisoned, who will die if he doesn’t keep his adrenaline flowing. So he races around town to find an antidote and kick everyone’s butts, stopping every few minutes to do something completely bizarre just to keep his heart pumping, like riding a motorcycle naked through Los Angeles and having sex with his girlfriend in public. The combination of stone-faced stoicism and utter madness is pitch perfect, the excitement is off the charts. And while some admire “Crank 2: High Voltage” for its even greater commitment to cinematic lunacy, the original knows when to slow down for a second, every once in a while, so the weirdness never makes the audience feel numb.
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