10 Best Movies Like Bullet Train

Summary

• Bullet Train
  ‘s unique action-comedy style sets it apart, but there are other movies with similar elements that provide a thrilling experience.

• The best movies like
  Bullet Train
  are fast-paced, funny, and maintain high energy, making them purely entertaining popcorn movies.
• Films like
  Snatch, Smokin’ Aces,
  and
  Mr. & Mrs. Smith
  showcase the same exciting elements that made
  Bullet Train
  a hit.

With its wild action, colorful characters, and bloody sense of humor, many viewers are seeking other movies like Bullet Train that provide a similar thrill ride. The 2022 action comedy sees Brad Pitt play a reluctant assassin who boards a bullet train on a seemingly easy mission to retrieve a briefcase — only to find the train filled with deadly people who want it as well. Bullet Train was a surprise hit and a crowd-pleasing ride with a star-studded cast to back up Pitt’s hilarious leading role, and thanks to its fresh and edgy feeling left many audiences wanting more.

Bullet Train‘s Easter egg-filled action-comedy style makes it a unique movie, yet not so unique that there aren’t other movies like it out there ready to be enjoyed. Whether they’re handsomely cast thrillers about assassins, high-concept action stories set on trains, or just strikingly stylish action films, the best movies like Bullet Train exude the elements that helped it become such a hit. These movies are fast-paced, funny, and maintain the high energy that matches Bullet Train as a purely entertaining R-rated popcorn movie.

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10 Snatch (2000)

The Hunt For A Diamond Turns London’s Criminal World On Its Head

Brad Pitt’s career as an actor has been littered with eclectic roles in highly stylized modern classics. His performance in Guy Ritchie’s Snatch is a noteworthy addition to that list for Bullet Train fans thanks to Ritchie’s signature dialogue, which is strongly echoed in Bullet Train, particularly the characters of Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Lemon (Brian Tyree-Henry).

A comedic crime caper centering around a large diamond moving throughout the criminal underworld of London, Snatch‘s cast of charactersfeatures Pitt in a supporting role as a bare-knuckle boxer. Though the film isn’t as high stakes as a movie like Bullet Train, it makes up for any lapses in firepower with the kind of blistering storytelling speed that drives Bullet Train‘s plot.

9 Smokin’ Aces (2006)

Assassin, Bounter Hunters, And Cops Descend On The Same Hotel

One of the things that action movies like Bullet Train excel at is creating a linear experience made up of a diverse cast of characters whose stories all intersect in chaotic ways. Like Bullet Train, Smokin’ Aces is about various colorful assassins all converging in a single location, this time a hotel at Lake Tahoe that houses their shared target.

Smokin’ Aces is also a similar movie to Bullet Train in that it’s one of the few films in this highly graphic style that can claim to be as star-studded, if not more so. Aside from boasting the movie debuts of Alicia Keys and Common, the film also stars Ryan Reynolds, Ben Affleck, Chris Pine, Ray Liotta, Andy Garcia, and many other notable actors in supporting roles or cameos.

8 Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005)

A Married Couple Discover They Are Rival Assassins

The success of movies like Bullet Train reminds audiences that while he certainly fits the part almost effortlessly, Brad Pitt is not typically cast as an action star. One of Pitt’s most defining action roles is without doubt his similarly comedic turn as another hired gun in Mr. & Mrs. Smith.

Though it is mostly remembered in popular culture for lying at the center of the public’s introduction to Pitt’s relationship with his co-star, Angelina Jolie, director Doug Liman packs the screen with explosive spectacle beyond the two stars’ headline-making onscreen chemistry. The two stars play a husband and wife who discover that the other has been keeping a secret life as an assassin, and they each display their talents for comedy as well as action choreography.

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7 The Wolverine (2013)

Wolverine Goes To Japan And Is Mixed Up In A Mob War

Though Hugh Jackman’s titular Marvel Comics character is one of the most famously indestructible superheroes of all time, The Wolverine was the first X-Men film from director James Mangold, who presented the character in a much more vulnerable light. Following the disappointing X-Men Origins: Wolverine, the 2013 sequel was the second attempt to give the popular mutant his own solo movie, and it worked out much better.

Before the Western-enthused drama of Logan, this Japan-set detective thriller put Wolverine in a number of his wildest action sequences, including a fight both in and on a moving bullet train. The full Extended Cut includes most of the film’s unusually graphic violence, and it’s this version that viewers seeking a similar experience to Bullet Train should seek out.

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6 John Wick (2014)

A Skilled Killer Seeks Vengeance For His Murdered Puppy

Action movie fans who enjoyed the functioning ecosystem of killers and handlers in Bullet Train really need to look no further than the world of John Wick (Keanu Reeves). The eponymous former assassin is certainly much quicker to kill than Pitt’s Ladybug, but Reeves’ deadpan delivery, mixed with his complete physical dedication to his performance as an unstoppable assassin, means that his quest for blood is never without its own sly sense of humor.

The original movie in the ongoing and ever-growing franchise has a straightforward revenge plot but opens up a much wider world of criminal empires that exist below the surface of the normal world. It also unquestionably influenced director David Leitch’s vision of the one in Bullet Train, as he co-directed and produced the first John Wick film.

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5 Train To Busan (2016)

Commuters Attempt To Survive A Zombie Outbreak Aboard A Train

As far as modern action movies set on trains go, there are few as renowned as 2016’s Train to Busan. The film is an engagingly emotional zombie thriller that sees the passengers of the titular train fighting to escape an undead apocalypse at breakneck speed. Like Bullet Train, however, there’s an equal-handed approach to dialogue-driven scenes and action-driven scenes.

Though Train to Busan‘s concept is much more off-the-wall than Bullet Train‘s, it’s actually the more grounded movie overall, balancing its gory action sequences with dramatic moments. Like Bullet Train and many of the best Korean zombie movies, Train to Busan is as much an exploration of its characters and the personal histories that define them as it is an exploration of the limits of its genre.

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4 Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003)

A Wronged Assassin Sets Out To Kill The Boss Who Left Her For Dead

Western action movies directly drawing inspiration from films in Asia isn’t unusual, but seeing them set most of their stories in Asia itself as Bullet Train does still is. While samurai films from Japan and kung-fu movies from China have influenced an innumerable number of Hollywood films for the better, few of them have emulated the actual style of these films with as much accuracy and attention to detail as Kill Bill: Volume 1, the first part of Quentin Tarantino’s revenge epic starring the Bride (Uma Thurman).

Bursting with as much blood, distinct stylistic flair, and dark comedy as Bullet Train, Kill Bill: Volume 1 sees the Bride, once a member of a group of assassins, begin a mission to kill her former associates, with her quest to take down the new head of the Tokyo yakuza, taking up most of this first part. Fans of Bullet Train may come for the intense action but will want to stay for Tarantino’s famously quotable dialogue.

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3 Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)

A Hitman Attends His High School Reunion

People who preferred the sense of humor derived from the bickering between trained killers in Bullet Train over the action will want to check out this cult gem about a hitman (John Cusack) suffering a midlife crisis during his high school reunion. Juggling a former girlfriend (Minnie Driver) and rival assassins between phone calls with his assistant (Joan Cusack) and his therapist (Alan Arkin), Cusack’s contract killer in Grosse Pointe Blank is in a similar headspace to Brad Pitt’s Ladybug in Bullet Train, and the film’s quirky 90s soundtrack gives it a similarly robust personality.

2 Lucky Number Slevin (2006)

A Case Of Mistaken Identity Puts Josh Hartnett At The Center Of A Mob War

Action thriller movies like Bullet Train propel their plots along through the power of the slick twists and turns in their stories, and few others revel in bluffing and tricking the audiences as much as Lucky Number Slevin. Like Bullet Train, the movie’s story revolves around unwilling participants in a complex plan involving warring gangsters, and the cast’s pedigree lends some believability to the tall tale. Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, Ben Kingsley, and Stanley Tucci support Josh Hartnett and Lucy Liu in this dialogue-driven crime yarn that will impress fans of Bullet Train‘s narrative flow.

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1 The Commuter (2018)

Liam Neeson Plays A Cat-And-Mouse Game Aboard A Train

Liam Neeson is another respected dramatic actor whose dabbling in the action genre always causes a stir and this action thriller about a mysterious conspiracy aboard a bustling commuter train is similar to Bullet Train in several ways. The film’s cast of veteran actors is so large that it leaves room for smaller supporting work from the likes of Florence Pugh and Letitia Wright, and the detective elements of the plot mean that the audience is kept guessing right up until the finale.

In The Commuter, Neeson plays an insurance salesman who, after being suddenly fired, finds himself wrapped up in a far-reaching conspiracy that hinges on a mystery passenger on his commuter train home. While the action in The Commuter may be more relative to the speed of the train in the story when compared to a movie like Bullet Train, it still has plenty of explosive surprises throughout.

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• 

  Bullet Train

  Summary:

  Packing a stellar cast with the likes of Brad Pitt, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, and Zazie Beetz, David Leitch’s Bullet Train tells the story of an assassin for hire who bumps into multiple dangerous criminals aboard a high-speed Shinkansen trip from Tokyo to Kyoto. The 2022 action comedy is an adaptation of Kōtarō Isaka’s novel « Maria Beetle ».

  Release Date:

  2022-07-29

  Cast:

  logan lerman, Karen Fukuhara, Hiroyuki Sanada, Joey King, Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Masi Oka, Brad Pitt, Zazie Beetz, Michael Shannon, Sandra Bullock

  Director:

  David Leitch

  Genres:

  Thriller, Action

  Rating:

  Not Yet Rated

  Writers:

  Zak Olkewicz

  Runtime:

  126 minutes

  Budget:

  87 million

  Studio(s):

  Sony

  Distributor(s):

  Sony