Revenge is nothing new. Since the dawn of time people have been violently seeking justice for treses against them. Despite this, storytellers still find innovative ways of making the theme feel new. The most recent example of this is The Last of Us Part II, which follows Ellie on a journey to avenge a fallen loved one.
Maybe saying "enjoyed" or "liked" would be the wrong choice of words, but anybody who appreciated the recent Naughty Dog game's dark narrative will also love the following ten revenge movies. Maybe it is a dish best served cold, but it sure is entertaining to watch.
Death Sentence (2007)
James Wan's first non-horror movie starred Kevin Bacon as a man protecting his family from a brutal gang after his son is killed in a robbery. He starts out as someone simply defending himself before becoming more aggressive towards the criminals.
Some of the imagery here hearkens back to Taxi Driver, which was an obvious inspiration for the director, and the violence is often as extreme as that movie's final shootout.
John Wick (2014)
This Keanu Reeves vehicle is more flashy than the other ones on the list, but receives mention for how insignificant the vengeance seems at first.
While one would ultimately want some sort retribution for having their dog murdered by a bunch of punks, John Wick goes all out, making sure the criminals never forget whom they wronged. As the movie goes on, audiences and Wick's targets learn what exactly the dog meant to John and why its death just unleashed hell on the criminal underworld. The film was an astounding success, prompting a whole franchise based on the character.
Rhythm Section (2020)
Blake Lively stars as a woman whose life is ruined after her family dies in a plane crash. After falling into drug addiction and sex work, she discovers the crash was actually caused by a bomb and eventually trains to be a killer and find those responsible.
What makes Rhythm Section unique is the character's inexperience and incompetence, bringing an increased tension to the action and chase scenes. The movie was a critical and commercial flop, though, but it is absolutely worth checking out.
The Virgin Spring (1960)
The oldest film on the list, The Virgin Spring follows a father's quest for vengeance after his daughter is brutally raped and murdered by several men. The film was notable for the graphic depiction of the young woman's murder, which was censored in the United States.
Director Ingmar Bergman was heavily inspired by Akira Kurosawa when making The Virgin Spring, and his movie itself went on to influence Wes Craven's Last House on the Left.
The Revenant (2015)
The Revenant is known for many things, but it's best ed as the movie that finally earned Leonardo Di Caprio his first Oscar. It was also one of the most grueling and technically straining films shot in recent memory.
To achieve a visual atmosphere like never seen before, The Revenant was filmed using natural light in the middle of the wilderness, meaning much of the filming conditions were left up to the mercy of nature. The arduous work paid off, as this period revenge tale received countless accolades and made over five hundred million dollars at the box office.
Mad Max (1979)
Long before Fury Road and even prior to him saving a small community in The Road Warrior, Max Rockatansky was just a police officer in a society on the verge of collapse with a loving wife and small child. Unfortunately for him, a brutal motorcycle gang takes that away from Max, prompting the cop to go out for brutal revenge.
The scope of the action scenes seen in the original Mad Max are especially impressive when considering its relatively minuscule budget when compared to its sequels, which is an amazing aspect of George Miller's directorial debut.
Memento (2000)
Guy Pearce stars in this early film from Christopher Nolan which put the now legendary director on the map. The protagonist is on the hunt for those who killed his wife, but he suffers from short term memory loss and uses photos to keep track of all the information he has acquired. As the movie goes on, the lines between truth and lies get increasingly blurred.
Told in reversed order where the ending opens the movie, Memento runs with two different timelines to help the audience get into the main character's mindset.
Kill Bill (2003 & 2004)
Quentin Tarantino had already become a Hollywood icon by the time the 2000's rolled around, with crime capers like Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs redefining the cinematic landscape in the '90s. But when he came back with Kill Bill, he took a sharp turn for the different.
Unlike Tarantino's previous works, Kill Bill draws heavy influence from samurai cinema to tell its bloody revenge tale about a woman coming back from the brink of death to hunt down the assassin's who attacked her and killed her fiance's family. Told in two parts due to its gargantuan length, Kill Bill has all the staples of a Tarantino film, from the gratuitous violence to barrage of homages. Kill Bill can be viewed in a single sitting as was intended with Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, which was released in 2011.
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011)
Stieg Larsson's novels -- collectively known as the Millennium Trilogy -- became a huge hit, prompting film adaptations both in Sweden and eventually in the United States. The first story, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, follows a journalist investigating the disappearance of a woman in the late '60s, which causes him to cross paths with Lisbeth Salander.
The vengeance part of the story mostly revolves around Lisbeth, who enacts cruel yet just punishment on several people who wronged her. The American remake, directed by David Fincher, is just as good or even better than the original Swedish movie it's based on.
Oldboy (2003)
This Korean film's premise is brutal and unfair no matter which way one looks at it. A man is imprisoned for fifteen years without any knowledge as to why and then one day suddenly set free. He spends the rest of the movie finding those responsible for his confinement and does so with extreme violence, though the answers he finds may not be what he wanted to hear.
Saying anything more about this classic would be a disservice to those who have yet to see it. Oldboy is a modern masterpiece of revenge and tragedy that spawned a horrible American remake that's better forgotten.
