During the 80s and 90s, we had several leading action stars, but in the 21st century there is only one guy who succeeded them all, and that is Jason Statham. He has established himself as a leading action star in Hollywood.
He started his movie career in Guy Ritchie movies Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch as a part of the ensemble cast. The success of these movies has put Statham in the public eye and he was able to break into Hollywood. The best Jason Statham movies with a lead role were made in the 2000s decade.
Every big action star has their own movie franchise, and in the case of Jason Statham, that is the Transporter trilogy. The success of the first one in 2002 has spawned two sequels, Transporter 2 (2005) and Transporter 3 (2008). There are several other must-watch movies from the 2000s, such as Crank, Crank: High Voltage, and The Bank Job.
It was the last decade (2010-2019) where he found real commercial success. Besides the action series The Expendables (2010–2014), where he is part of the best possible ensemble cast, he has also appeared in the Fast and Furious franchise, finishing the decade with the huge commercial hit Hobbs & Shaw.
With Statham as a leading actor, there are several other movies worth mentioning: The Mechanic, Parker, The Meg, etc.
Here is the list of the 20 best Jason Statham movies (ordered by release date):
1. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998)
Genre: Comedy, Crime
Director: Guy Ritchie
Starring: Jason Statham (31), Jason Flemyng, Dexter Fletcher
After participating in a rigged card game, four friends find themselves in serious debt to the crime lord. To pay off debts, they decide to rob a small-time gang in the flat next door. The confusion really starts when a pair of antique shotguns go missing in a completely different scam.
2. Snatch (2000)
Genre: Comedy, Crime
Director: Guy Ritchie
Starring: Jason Statham (33), Brad Pitt (37), Benicio Del Toro
In this British crime comedy, Statham is a part of an ensemble cast, together with Brad Pitt, Benicio del Toro, and others. It’s his second collaboration with Guy Ritchie. After this movie, Statham was able to break into Hollywood.
The story is set in the London criminal underworld, where two plots intertwine. In one plot, there is a search for a stolen diamond, and in the other, Statham plays a boxing promoter named Turkish, who gets involved in a match-fixing scheme by a criminal called Brick Top.
With a score of 8.3 and over 700,000 votes, it’s the highest-rated Jason Statham movie on IMDb.
3. Transporter (2002)
Genre: Action, Crime, Thriller
Director: Louis Leterrier, Corey Yuen
Starring: Jason Statham (35), Qi Shu, Matt Schulze
Statham plays Frank Martin, a highly skilled driver who transports packages for clients with no questions asked. He has a rule not to open the packages, but when he sees that his latest package is moving, he decides to break the rules and open it. To his surprise, he finds a beautiful gagged woman inside. Now, both their lives are in danger.
The Transporter is the ultimate Jason Statham action movie. It is the first installment in the Transporter franchise and his first lead role. All the stunts in the movie were performed by Statham himself.
4. Transporter 2 (2005)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Louis Leterrier
Starring: Jason Statham (38), Amber Valletta, Kate Nauta
In this sequel, Frank Martin surfaces in Miami, where he temporarily drives and protects the son of a wealthy US official. When the boy is kidnapped by mercenaries hired by a Colombian cartel, Frank must save him and stop the kidnappers’ plan to release a deadly virus.
5. Crank (2006)
Genre: Action, Crime, Thriller
Director: Mark Neveldine, Brian Taylor
Starring: Jason Statham (39), Amy Smart (30), Carlos Sanz
Professional assassin Chev Chelios (Statham) gets poisoned with “The Beijing Cocktail” by his rival Verona. The poison will kill him if his heart rate drops. In order to stay alive, he must keep his adrenaline high and he does this in various ways, by taking drugs, fighting, etc. Besides protecting his girlfriend Eve, he is also set to get his revenge against those who poisoned him.
The film was followed by a sequel, titled Crank: High Voltage.
6. The Bank Job (2008)
Genre: Crime, Thriller
Director: Roger Donaldson
Starring: Jason Statham (41), Saffron Burrows (36), Stephen Campbell Moore
Based on the 1971 Baker robbery in London, this heist thriller follows Terry Leather (Statham), a former model who is offered a lead on a bank heist by a woman named Martine. Unbeknownst to Terry, her real goal is a safe-deposit box containing compromising photos of a royal.
According to the movie producers, the plot is based on a true story that was prevented from being told in 1971 to protect a member of the Royal Family.
7. Death Race (2008)
Genre: Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Director: Paul W.S. Anderson
Starring: Jason Statham (41), Joan Allen, Tyrese Gibson
The US economy has collapsed, and the crime rate has increased, leading to the privatization of prisons. In one such prison, Warden Claire earns profits by broadcasting a brutal car race over the internet. When steelworker Ames finds himself in that prison, he has a choice: either participate in the death race or rot in prison forever.
8. Transporter 3 (2008)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Olivier Megaton
Starring: Jason Statham (41), Robert Knepper, Natalya Rudakova
In the third and final installment of the Transporter franchise, Frank Martin is forced to take a job. He has a bracelet on his wrist that will explode if he moves away from the car. The job is to transport a kidnapped woman from Marseilles to Odessa. On the route, he needs to deal with thugs who want to intercept the girl’s safe delivery to her destination.
9. Crank: High Voltage (2009)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Mark Neveldine, Brian Taylo
Starring: Jason Statham (42), Amy Smart (33), Clifton Collins Jr.
It is the sequel to the 2006 film Crank and it’s even crazier than the first one. It’s non-stop action as the first movie, but with a lot of humor added.
This time, ex-hitman Chev Chelios is kidnapped, and his heart is stolen and replaced with a battery-powered one that can keep him alive for only a short time. While he is out there trying to find his heart, he needs to keep himself electrically charged if he wants to stay alive.
10. The Mechanic (2011)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Simon West
Starring: Jason Statham (44), Ben Foster, Donald Sutherland
Statham stars as Arthur Bishop, an elite assassin with a unique talent for cleanly eliminating targets, making his hits look like accidents or suicides. Things take an unexpected turn when he needs to take out his own mentor, Arthur. This murder will bring Arthur’s son, who now seeks revenge, to his doorstep.
The Mechanic is a remake of Charles Bronson’s film from 1972.
11. Blitz (2011)
Genre: Action, Crime, Thriller
Director: Elliott Lester
Starring: Jason Statham (44), Paddy Considine, Aidan Gillen
Detective Tom Brant is assigned to take down a serial killer named “Blitz,” who kills police officers. The investigation will lead him to the killer, but the evidence against him is weak. After he is released, Brant and his new partner Nash will put the killer under surveillance because they are expecting another attack.
12. Killer Elite (2011)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Gary McKendry
Starring: Jason Statham (44), Clive Owen (47), Robert De Niro (68)
In this action thriller based on a novel (which was loosely based on real events), Statham plays an assassin (again) who comes out of retirement to save an old friend, played by Robert De Niro.
13. Safe (2012)
Genre: Action, Crime, Thriller
Director: Boaz Yakin
Starring: Jason Statham (45), Catherine Chan, Chris Sarandon
Statham plays Luke Wright, an ex-cop and cage fighter whose life is destroyed by the Russian mob because he won a fixed fight. While contemplating suicide in a subway station, he realizes that a young girl named Mei is being chased by the Russian mafia. He winds up protecting the girl but soon finds out that the girl is a math genius and that the Chinese Triads and corrupt New York police are also after her. The criminals want to use her in their criminal activities.
14. Parker (2013)
Genre: Action, Crime, Thriller
Director: Taylor Hackford
Starring: Jason Statham (46), Jennifer Lopez (44), Michael Chiklis
Statham plays Parker, the criminal antihero previously played by Mel Gibson in 1999’s Payback.
Parker is a professional thief who is double-crossed and almost killed by his crew after the heist. Now he sets out for revenge, but he has help from a real estate agent (Jenifer Lopez).
15. Redemption (2013)
Genre: Action, Drama, Thriller
Director: Steven Knight
Starring: Jason Statham (46), Agata Buzek, Vicky McClure
It stars Jason Statham as an alcoholic homeless ex-soldier haunted by his past. One night while he is chased by a group of thugs, he hides in an empty apartment. Realizing that the resident will be absent for some time, he seizes the opportunity to assume the owner’s identity.
16. Homefront (2013)
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Gary Fleder
Starring: Jason Statham (46), James Franco, Winona Ryder (42)
A former DEA agent moves with his daughter to a small Louisiana town. Everything is quiet until his daughter fights off a bully in school, as her father taught her to. It turns out that the boy is related to a local meth drug lord who now discovers that a former DEA agent lives in the same town.
The story is based on a novel and has been adapted into a screenplay by Sylvester Stallone.
17. Wild Card (2015)
Genre: Action, Crime, Drama
Director: Simon West
Starring: Jason Statham (48), Michael Angarano, Dominik Garcia
Statham plays Nick Wild, a recovering gambling addict and a Las Vegas bodyguard. When a woman he knows, Holly, is beaten, she asks Nick to find the man responsible. It turns out to be a gangster named DeMarco. When Nick confronts DeMarco, he is attacked, but the gangster is overpowered. Holly arrives and takes $50,000 from DeMarco instead of killing him. Nick takes his half of the money and goes to the casino to play blackjack, but the problems with the mob are not over.
18. Mechanic: Resurrection (2016)
Genre: Action, Adventure, Thriller
Director: Dennis Gansel
Starring: Jason Statham (49), Jessica Alba (35), Tommy Lee Jones
In a Mechanic sequel, Bishop is retired and lives under secret identity in Rio de Janeiro. His arch-nemesis shows up and kidnaps his girlfriend, in order to force him to complete three difficult assassinations.
The movie was a commercial success grossing $125 million worldwide.
19. The Meg (2018)
Genre: Action, Horror, Sci-Fi
Director: Jon Turteltaub
Starring: Jason Statham (51), Bingbing Li, Rainn Wilson
A group of scientists encounters the largest shark ever to exist called Megalodon, believed to be extinct a long time ago. To rescue the crew, they seek help from a deep-sea rescue diver (Jason Statham). He has already encountered this beast, losing half of the crew, but nobody believed him. Now he is their only chance.
20. Hobbs & Shaw (2019)
Genre: Action, Adventure
Director: David Leitch
Starring: Jason Statham (52), Dwayne Johnson (47), Idris Elba
Hobbs & Shaw is a Fast & Furious franchise spin-off with Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham reprising their roles of Luke Hobbs and Deckard Shaw. The plot follows Lawman Hobbs and outcast Show who must team up to fight terrorists with cybernetic implants that allow superhuman abilities.
We could have added The Expendables to the list too, but we consider those to be Stalone’s movie, not Statham’s, even though, he is a co-star together with Stalone. We decided to leave those out and add only the lead roles.
15 Best Jason Statham Movies According to IMDb
According to IMDb, these are the 15 best Jason Statham movies in the lead (or lead ensemble) role:
- Snatch (2000) – 8.3
- Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) – 8.2
- The Bank Job (2008) – 7.2
- Crank (2006) – 6.9
- The Transporter (2002) – 6.8
- The Expendables 2 (2012) – 6.6
- The Mechanic (2011) – 6.6
- Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019) – 6.5
- Homefront (2013) – 6.5
- The Expendables (2010) – 6.5
- Safe (2012) – 6.5
- Killer Elite (2011) – 6.4
- Death Race (2008) – 6.4
- Revolver (2005) – 6.4
- Transporter 2 (2005) – 6.3
15 Best Jason Statham Movies According to Box Office
- Hobbs & Shaw (2019) – $761 million
- The Meg (2018) – $530 million
- The Expendables 2 (2012) – $315 million
- The Expendables (2010) – $275 million
- The Expendables 3 (2014) – $215 million
- Mechanic: Resurrection (2016) – $126 million
- Transporter 3 (2008) – $109 million
- Transporter 2 (2005) – $85 million
- Snatch (2000) – $84 million
- The Mechanic (2011) – $76 million
- Death Race (2008) – $76 million
- Killer Elite (2011) – $56 million
- Homefront (2013) – $52 million
- Parker (2013) – $46 million
- The Transporter (2002) – $44 million
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