8 Forgotten Action Movies That Deserve to Be Rediscovered on Prime Video

Image via Universal Pictures Published Jul 21, 2026, 7:52 AM EDT Daniel is a 27-year-old List Writer for Collider living in the south suburbs of Chicago, Illinois. As an avid film buff, he watches and analyzes many films and TV shows, especially in the horror genre, and regularly attends movie screenings. Sign in to your Collider account You never know what you can rediscover on Prime Video. This widely used platform is still thriving in the ever-evolving streaming world, bringing audiences the hottest new shows and latest hit movies. Truly, it's become a perfect platform for movie-watching, as it has a wide array of cinema's heaviest hitters that continue to make it essential for all of us buffs out there. From Best Pictures to the most beloved classics, it has something for all movie lovers to enjoy. And through it all, it's where you can find so many of the greatest action movies that time has forgotten. Being that it has countless movies available in its arsenal, Prime Video also has those relatively obscure or misunderstood yet highly enjoyable action films. From hard-to-find hidden gems to long-since forgotten cult classics, let's take a look at the eight action movies on Prime Video that deserve to be rediscovered. They're thrilling and epic, tense and suspenseful, and they're honestly some of the best in the action genre, but they just haven't made much of an impact for one reason or another. 1 'The Lost City of Z' (2017) Image via Bleecker Street Take a journey exploring an action-adventure flick that hardly anyone talks about these days. Directed by James Gray in 2017, The Lost City of Z is a biographical adventure drama based on the book of the same name, detailing the epic journey of famed British explorer Percy Fawcett, played by Charlie Hunnam. It's a story filled with history and exciting wonder, as it follows this adventurer on his mission to prove the existence of a lost ancient civilization in the Amazon. Packed with stunning set pieces and a talented supporting cast, including Sienna Miller, Tom Holland, and Robert Pattinson, The Lost City of Z is a solid 141 minutes of thrills, adventure, and decent history. It may have bombed at the box office and didn't make too much traction after it released, but now you can experience it on Prime in all its unique and visually impressive glory, and it might just surprise you. Much like the lost city its protagonist is trying to find, this film is just waiting to be rediscovered. 2 'Miami Vice' (2006) Creating a film adaptation to revitalize a once-popular TV show hasn't always worked out too well these days, especially if the film in question comes out more than a decade after the show's been off the air. But, despite coming out a little too late, 2006's Miami Vice proved to be a solid, surprisingly tight and action-packed homage to its predecessor. Directed by action legend Michael Mann, who once produced the Miami Vice '80s show, the story sees Oscar winner Jamie Foxx and nominee Colin Farrell as two undercover detectives infiltrating Miami's drug underworld. Though a modest box office hit, Miami Vice's critical reception was much less welcoming. The story was uneven, and the two leads noticeably lacked the charisma and tone of the original. It's not a perfect action movie by any means, but it is still well-paced and action-heavy, and Mann's directing talents are on full display here. For any Prime users, this one is definitely worth a chance, and it'll probably blow you away. 3 'The Substitute' (1996) Image via Warner Bros. The 1990s are full of hidden action gems; some of them are still undiscovered. Released in 1996, Robert Mandel's The Substitute is one such underrated cult action film that deserves better attention. It sees Platoon's star Tom Berenger as a hardened covert mercenary who goes undercover as a substitute teacher in a crime-ridden Miami high school to take down the vicious gang that attacked his girlfriend. Tense, thrilling, and undeniably kick-ass, The Substitute is a blast that can more than satisfy any action lover out there. Sure, it's clichéd, a bit of a mess, and isn't the most well-acted, but the story is fun, Berenger gives a commanding presence as the lead, and it doesn't take itself too seriously. It may have been roasted by critics at the time and swept under the rug, but The Substitute should really see new light. Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz Which Action Hero Would BeYour Perfect Partner? Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn't work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back. 🎖️Rambo 🍸James Bond 🏺Indiana Jones 🔧John McClane 🎭Ethan Hunt FIND YOUR PARTNER → 01 You're dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you. ASomeone who already has three contingency plans running and is calmly working through all of them. BSomeone who reads the terrain instinctively and knows exactly how to use it against the enemy. CSomeone who keeps their nerve and their sense of humour when everything is falling apart. DSomeone who knows the history of wherever we are and what we're walking into. ESomeone with the right contact, the right cover identity, and the right exit already arranged. NEXT QUESTION → 02 You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission. AOn foot through terrain no one else would attempt — I move where vehicles can't follow. BOn a motorcycle, a cargo plane, or anything else that gets me there before I think too hard about it. CIn something that belongs to someone else — borrowed, stolen, or improvised under fire. DFirst class, with a cover identity and a gadget that does something I won't explain until it's needed. EBy whatever means are available — I've driven, flown, and once arrived by camel. The destination matters, not the method. NEXT QUESTION → 03 You're pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of. ADisappears into the environment, flanks them silently, and ends it before I've reloaded. BCracks a one-liner, grabs a fire extinguisher or a chair, and improvises something that somehow works. CProduces a gadget specifically designed for this exact scenario and uses it with infuriating precision. DPulls out a whip, a pistol, and an archaeological insight that somehow gets us out alive. ENeutralises the threat with maximum efficiency and minimum words — they were already three moves ahead. NEXT QUESTION → 04 The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are. AA bar with terrible lighting, cold beer, and absolutely no questions about feelings. BThe finest restaurant in the city, a bottle of something expensive, and a conversation that is equal parts brilliant and exhausting. CA local dig site, a museum after hours, or a long story about why that particular artefact matters to human civilisation. DPizza. Bad TV. Falling asleep halfway through a movie neither of you were watching anyway. EA debrief that turns into three hours of contingency planning that somehow becomes the most fun you've had all week. NEXT QUESTION → 05 How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability. APrecise and minimal — tell me what I need to know and nothing else. Every word has a cost. BDeadpan and dry — keeping it light keeps me sharp, even when everything is on fire. CEnthusiastic and slightly chaotic — but always with useful information buried somewhere in the noise. DCalm and controlled through an earpiece, with a plan that covers every variable I haven't thought of yet. EBarely at all — silence is a language and they speak it fluently. NEXT QUESTION → 06 Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership. AInfiltrate their inner circle, learn everything, and dismantle them from inside out before they know we're there. BStudy the historical pattern — every villain of this type has a weakness written somewhere in the past. CGet them talking. The more they monologue, the more time I have to figure out how to beat them. DGo through them. Directly. With as much force as the terrain allows. EFind the one thing they haven't accounted for — there's always one thing — and make sure we're holding it. NEXT QUESTION → 07 Things go badly wrong and you're captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters. ACome in alone, quietly, and get me out before anyone knows they were there. BHave already been working on the extraction since the moment I disappeared — the plan is already running. CCome in loud, come in fast, and worry about the collateral damage later — I'd do the same for them. DUse every resource, every contact, and bend every rule until I'm out — they don't leave people behind. ECharm their way in somehow, bluff through the hard part, and still manage to look good doing it. NEXT QUESTION → 08 What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn't replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn't know you had. ATechnology that shouldn't exist yet and the training to use it under any conditions. BSurvival instinct so refined it borders on supernatural — and the scars to prove it's been tested. CKnowledge of history, language, and culture that makes them invaluable in places where force is useless. DThe ability to walk into any room in the world and immediately become the most trusted person in it. EStubbornness that refuses to accept a situation is hopeless — and the improvisational skill to back it up. NEXT QUESTION → 09 Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together. AA partner who never fully switches off — always watching exits, always calculating threats, even at dinner. BA partner who gets the job done brilliantly but has the emotional availability of a locked filing cabinet. CA partner who makes everything ten times more complicated than it needs to be — but who always comes through. DA partner who gets personally attached to every relic, ruin, and artefact we encounter, which slows everything down. EA partner who was not built for this and knows it — but shows up anyway, every time, without being asked. NEXT QUESTION → 10 It's the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one. AOne line. Absolutely dry. Delivered like the world isn't ending. Then we move. BNothing said at all — just a look that means we both already know what has to happen. CA plan I don't fully understand that somehow accounts for everything, delivered in thirty seconds flat. DA piece of historical context that reframes the entire situation and tells us exactly what to do next. ESomeone who steps forward instead of back — because that's who they've always been. REVEAL MY PARTNER → Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse. RamboYour partner doesn't talk much, doesn't need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you've finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You'll never need to ask if he has your back. You'll just know. James BondYour partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it'll take you a moment to remember what's actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You'll never be bored. You'll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing. Indiana JonesYour partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar's eye and a brawler's instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn't matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you'll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them. John McClaneYour partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren't so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay. Ethan HuntYour partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you've finished reading the briefing, and the plan he's settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn't exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 4 'From Paris with Love' (2010) Get pumped for not one of the brightest action spy thrillers out there, but certainly one of the most delightfully entertaining. Released in 2010 by French director Pierre Morel, From Paris with Love is one of those popcorn action flicks you've just got to enjoy for how insane and mindlessly fun it is. Featuring one of the best unhinged performances by John Travolta, it's a story about a French ambassador's aide and a trigger-happy CIA agent as they work together to thwart a terrorist plot in Paris. From Paris with Love is a wild, fast-paced story. It doesn't always make the most sense, but it doesn't care, and just wants to provide a decent blend of action spectacles and spy thriller elements to satisfy anyone who gives it a chance. Yes, it's over-blown, disjointed, not the best-acted, and certainly doesn't have the most plausible action sequences, but it sure doesn't try to be anything else. And who can ignore John Travolta's hilariously over-the-top performance as CIA agent Charlie Wax? Honestly, this is one enjoyable cult action classic for any Prime users who just want some mindless excitement one night. 5 'Red Sun' (1971) Image via Les Films Corona A forgotten Spaghetti Western action spectacle, 1971's Red Sun is a unique and joyful blast that needs to be seen. It's not the most polished, well-structured, or memorable film of its kind, but it is certainly one that will leave you entertained from beginning to end. Toshirō Mifune and Charles Bronson, two of the 20th Century's most charismatic tough guy actors, star in this adventure about a samurai bodyguard and a tricky bandit as they reluctantly team up to retrieve a Japanese Ambassador's stolen sword somewhere out west. Red Sun combines two different cultures' action styles — samurai sword-fighting and cowboy shootouts — and blends them into this thrilling Western adventure story that's also part buddy comedy. It's honestly worth watching just to see these two iconic action legends pairing up for the first and only time on the big screen. You get to see Toshiro Mifune's stoic samurai protector as he faces Charles Bronson's cocky, tough-as-nails gunslinger, and it's hard to look away whenever the two appear together. Overall, it's an exciting hidden gem that can satisfy both fans of the Samurai and Western action genres. 6 'The Jackal' (1997) Kick the dust off this next misunderstood and highly intense action thriller from 1997. Director Michael Caton-Jones' The Jackal is a roller-coaster ride, an epic blend of suspenseful tension and pure action excitement that has sadly faded into obscurity for some time. The film sees iconic leading stars Bruce Willis and Richard Gere in a nail-biting story, following an international assassin as he's hired to target the First Lady, leaving the FBI to employ an incarcerated IRA sniper to hunt him down before he strikes. Willis and Gere are simply a blast to watch in this film. It follows the two as the world's best killers in a tense game of cat-and-mouse, and only one will win. The story is tightly written; it keeps the pace going, and doesn't leave a dull moment. The truly beloved Bruce Willis, of course, is the best standout, as he shows a different side to himself in this rare and fascinating villain performance as the titular Jackal. He plays him as cunning, ruthless, and eerily intelligent. Really, The Jackal is for any Willis fans out there and certainly needs more attention. 7 'Spy Game' (2001) Image via Universal Pictures Get hooked on this masterful spy thriller from 2001. The late action director Tony Scott's Spy Game should be your next go-to on Prime if you're looking for an edge-of-your-seat experience. It cranks the tension and suspense to the max, delivering an excellent blend of action, drama, and spy thrills to leave you wanting more. Two titans of the acting world, the late Robert Redford and Brad Pitt, star in this race-against-time story. When his hot-shot protégé is compromised on his latest mission and left for dead by the CIA, an experienced spy will do everything he can to bring his friend back home. Spy Game was a critical and commercial darling, and yet despite its success, we hardly talk about it today. It's a near-flawless action film, complete with everything in its story to keep viewers drawn in. And it's still not discussed among spy fans as one of the best in the genre today, alongside other notable films. Perhaps due to being overshadowed by other spy films at the time or poor marketing, Spy Games is sadly underrated. But with Prime Video comes new life, and thankfully, you can personally see why this hidden gem deserves to be in the spotlight. 8 'Enemy of the State' (1998) Image via Buena Vista Pictures Distribution Finally, this last one is truly one of the best action thrillers of the late 1990s, a pulse-pounding joyride that, despite its greatness, has almost been forgotten over the years. Tony Scott returns with 1998's Enemy of the State, a thriller that keeps up the momentum, providing audiences with nonstop excitement. Starring Academy Award-winning actors Will Smith, Jon Voight, and the late Gene Hackman, it follows a labor lawyer as he's unintentionally roped into a dangerous conspiracy after coming across evidence of a political assassination being carried out by the NSA. Enemy of the State is truly a blast that needs to be seen. What follows in this nearly two-and-a-half-hour-long chase thriller is pure entertainment. From Scott's direction, Smith's and Hackman's combined star power, and the non-stop thrills, it's fascinating to experience. Even though it's not often remembered, it's still a solid story that doesn't let go of your attention. And, through Prime Video, it's beginning to see a new dawn. Enemy of the State Release Date November 20, 1998 Runtime 132 minutes Robert Clayton Dean, a successful lawyer, unwittingly receives evidence of a politically motivated murder. Pursued by a ruthless NSA official and his team, Dean's life is turned upside down as he becomes the target of a high-tech surveillance operation. With the help of a former intelligence operative, Dean must navigate a web of conspiracy and corruption to clear his name and bring the truth to light.