Espionage is perfect for movies, where filmmakers get to go between heart-pounding action sequences, tense negotiations and the drama of how living with leading lives of deception can make the people thrown into these situations lose their sense of reality. Spy films have been a staple of Hollywood movie-making for decades, dominating at the box office and with critics since the beginning of film history.
Some of the best spy movies of all time are the ones that are able to perfectly display the high risk and even higher stakes of being an undercover operative, whether that is focused on the more dramatic elements of talking their way out of a dangerous situation or being forced to fight their way to the answers they need. The most flawless movies in this genre are the ones that make audiences feel like they are along for the ride.
Bourne Identity Redefined the Genre
The start of one of the best movie trilogies of all time, The Bourne Identity is the first in a series of adaptations of Robert Ludlum’s classic series of novels about Jason Bourne, a spy suffering from amnesia who is attempting to understand his connection to the CIA. In The Bourne Identity, Bourne, played by Matt Damon, must put together the fragmented pieces of his lost memories in order to figure out who he works for and why.
The film was a huge box office success upon its release, grossing $214 million, and was praised by critics and audiences for its gritty and realistic action sequences. The movie is also credited with making Matt Damon a bona fide action star and household name, taking him from dramatic independent movie darling to one of the biggest movie stars of the 2000s.
Munich Came During Spielberg’s Most Experimental Era
One of the greatest and most influential directors of all time, Steven Spielberg effectively invented the modern movie blockbuster with Jaws and then cemented the rhythms of Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking with colossal hits like Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and Jurassic Park. After receiving wide critical acclaim for his more conventional dramas Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, Spielberg entered a more experimental era in the 2000s.
One of the most interesting movies of this run was Munich, a spy thriller based on the true story of Operation Bayonet, a series of assassinations carried out by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad after a militant group killed 11 Israelis at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany. Named one of the best movies of the 21st Century by The New York Times, the film follows Mossad agent Avner Kaufman as he struggles with the morality of his actions.
Argo Won Best Picture
Hollywood is full of actors who try their hand at directing movies, going all the way back to legends like Orson Welles and leading to the modern day with current titans of the industry like Greta Gerwig. Ben Affleck is one of the more underrated of these directors, with entertaining movies like The Town and Air under his belt.
Affleck’s best and most celebrated directorial work by far is Argo, the Best Picture-winning movie at the 85th Academy Awards that was adapted from the memoir The Master of Disguise by Antonio J. Mendez. The movie follows the true story of CIA Officer Tony Mendez, also played by Affleck, who ran an operation to save six diplomats who were trapped in the United States Embassy in Tehran by pretending they were part of a science-fiction movie crew.
The 39 Steps Still Holds up Today
One of the most influential directors of all time, Alfred Hitchcock, was best known for creating tense thrillers like Rear Window and Vertigo and for effectively reinventing the horror genre with masterpieces like The Birds and Psycho. But Hitchcock was also well known for creating incredibly entertaining action spectacles, using the most advanced filming techniques of the time to create brilliantly crafted films.
Based loosely on the 1915 novel The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan, Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps is considered one of the most important pieces of blockbuster filmmaking of all time, effectively inventing the popcorn movie. The film follows Robert Donat as Richard Hannay, a Canadian civilian who becomes embroiled in British espionage when he is falsely accused of murdering a counter-espionage agent.
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy Is Based on One of the Best Spy Novels Ever
John le Carré is one of the most important British authors of the 21st Century, and one of the prominent voices in the espionage subgenre, with novels like The Little Drummer Girl and The Night Manager still seen as modern classics of the genre. But his most influential and important work is probably Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, still seen as one of the best spy novels of all time.
Tomas Alfredson’s adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is one of the best novel adaptations of the 2010s, with an incredibly stacked supporting cast of actors that includes Colin Firth, Stephen Graham, Tom Hardy, Ciarán Hinds, John Hurt and Mark Strong. The movie stars Gary Oldman as George Smiley, a spy forced out of retirement to help British Intelligence find a Soviet double agent.
Kingsman: The Secret Service Riffs on Classic Films
Based on the comic book series of the same name that was penned by Mark Millar, the comic legend behind Kick-Ass and Wolverine: Old Man Logan, Kingsman: The Secret Service is one of the most entertaining action movies of the 2010s. The comic book and film riff on many of the classic tropes of James Bond movies, telling the story of a secret independent spy agency run by a network of British agents posing as tailors.
The film stars Taron Egerton as Eggsy Unwin, a rough and tumble young man in London who is selected by agent Harry Hart a.k.a. Galahad, played by Colin Firth, to be one of the candidates to replace a recently deceased member of the Kingsman. The movie was a surprisingly colossal success at the box office, earning $414.4 million and spawning multiple sequels.
Bridge of Spies Won a Legendary Theater Actor an Oscar
The most recent decade of Steven Spielberg’s career has served as an interesting final act to one of the most legendary careers in movie history, with many of his most recent films focusing on more nakedly political or experimental subjects. One of the most interesting of his recent films is the spy thriller Bridge of Spies, based on a real-life lawyer named James B. Donovan.
In one of Tom Hank’s most underrated performances, he plays Donovan as he travels to Germany during the construction of the Berlin Wall to try and negotiate a hostage transfer with the Soviet Union, which has captured an American spy and U-2 spy plane pilot named Francis Gary Powers. Mark Rylance won an Academy Award for Bridge of Spies for portraying Rudolf Abel in the film, a Soviet spy who Donovan represented and who was used in the exchange to get Powers back.
Casino Royale Reinvented Bond for a New Era
After decades of the franchise becoming an increasingly silly and critically panned series of ludicrous action slop, the James Bond franchise was desperate for a new and more modern style in the early 2000s. Following the success of The Bourne Identity, Martin Campbell and Daniel Craig teamed up to create a grittier, more 21st-century-oriented version of the classic character by adapting his origin story.
Casino Royale, based on the first in Ian Fleming’s iconic run of James Bond novels, stars Craig as the newly minted Agent 007 of MI6, as he goes on his first official mission to stop a terrorist financier named Le Chiffre by beating him in a high stakes poker game. Casino Royale was a smash hit, with many citing Craig and the movie’s exciting and more modern Bond action sequences as a breath of fresh air for the decades-old series.
From Russia With Love Is the Best of a Long-Running Series
The second James Bond movie, released just one year after the half-century-old franchise began with Dr. No, From Russia With Love is the quintessential Bond film, cementing Sean Connery as the iconic lead behind the most famous spy in fiction. The film follows directly after the events of Dr. No, where Bond is tasked with helping a Soviet consulate clerk defect while agents of SPECTRE try to kill him.
Costing United Artists double what the original film did, From Russia With Love was a massively successful film, earning $79 million and a British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award for Best Cinematography. Many critics have cited the film as the best James Bond movie, saying that the movie was able to maintain much of the political bite of the novel while still supplying great action for the time.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout Is the Best Spy Movie Ever
One of Tom Cruise’s highest-grossing films, part of his most consistent franchise across his filmography, Mission: Impossible – Fallout is arguably the best action movie of the 2010s and one of the best spy movies of all time. Following in the footsteps of Christopher McQuarrie’s phenomenal previous entry in the franchise, Mission: Impossible – Rouge Nation, the film amps up the action with some of the best choreography ever.
The film follows Impossible Mission Force agent Ethan Hunt, played by Cruise, as he and his team work with the CIA in an attempt to stop a terrorist from setting off a nuclear bomb that would kill millions of people. The movie features some of Tom Cruise’s most daring stunts ever, notably the aerobatic work he does with a helicopter in the final act of the film.
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