Get some action

Get some action

By Brett Buckalew, Special to Metromix

Action junkies know that the most exhilarating examples of the genre ditch the hallmarks of smart filmmaking—logic, plausibility and subtlety chief among them—to focus on going as crazily over-the-top as possible.

Judging by the eye-catching trailer for comic-book adaptation “Wanted,” opening June 27, connoisseurs of outrageous action are in for a non-stop assault: Angelina Jolie leans backwards out of a fast-moving car’s window while firing a shotgun at her adversaries; James McAvoy pops off a bullet that shifts course to hit the side of a target; and a black-suited baddie crashes through a high-rise window and floats off into the air instead of plummeting to his death.

Before we see what other deranged sequences that film has up its sleeve, revisit ten classics that bypass boring old realism to score a direct hit on the adrenal glands.