Film
Avenging Angel
A law student with a prostitute past hunts her old detective-protector's killer through LA's criminal underworld. Eighties action-thriller that swings between grindhouse energy and genuine character work, with Betsy Russell carrying the film through its tonal shifts. For viewers who want their revenge plots messy, their heroines complicated, and their action unpretentious.
If you liked this
Ms .451981
A silent, mute rape-revenge thriller with visual storytelling so precise it barely needs dialogue. Isabelle Adjani's performance becomes the entire film—pure fury made physical. Raw, unflinching, and endlessly imitated.
But Graphic sexual violence upfront. The pacing is deliberate and sometimes glacial. It's uncompromising in ways that can feel punishing.

Sudden Impact1983
Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry, finally letting a woman with her own revenge plot share the screen. Taut, mean-spirited, and interested in trauma as the engine of the story rather than just its excuse.
But By modern standards, the gender dynamics feel dated. Eastwood's persona can overshadow everything else if you're not already invested in the franchise.

Johnny Handsome1989
Mickey Rourke as a career criminal given a second chance through surgery, then forced back into crime. Stylish, genuinely weird, and interested in whether redemption is even possible. Michael Mann's protégé Walter Hill directs with pulp precision.
But The New Orleans setting is gaudy and overwrought. Some viewers find Rourke's intensity exhausting rather than compelling.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Avenging Angel
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Thief1981
Both explore characters trying to escape their pasts through competence and willpower, only to discover the world won't let them. Both are interested in the moral cost of survival.
Michael Mann's debut: James Caan as a professional thief navigating betrayal and the possibility of escape. The film is more interested in the geometry of crime and the silence between conversations than in heist sequences. Tangerine Dream's synthesizer score is hypnotic.
But Technically a heist film, but almost no actual heists. Long stretches of deliberative quiet. It's cerebral and glacial, the opposite of action-packed.

More like this (8)
Commando1985
Arnold Schwarzenegger as a retired Special Forces dad rescuing his daughter. Absurdist action where the plot is tissue-thin and the set pieces are glorious. Pure eighties excess, unapologetically dumb in the best way.
But No pretense at character development. It's a muscle man shooting things for ninety minutes. If you need emotional stakes, this isn't it.

Dead or Alive1999
John Woo's operatic action-thriller about a cop and a killer becoming mirror images of each other. Chow Yun-fat is magnetic. The violence is balletic, the melodrama genuine, the Hong Kong sensibility electric.
But The plot is secondary to the action set pieces. Subtitles. Some sequences feel indulgent even by Woo's standards.

Near Dark1987
Kathryn Bigelow's vampire western transplants the genre into the American heartland. A gang of creatures living off the grid, killing as necessity, shot with documentary realism and genuine dread. Bill Paxton as a villain who's genuinely terrifying.
But Slow-burn tension that some find tedious. The love story at its center doesn't resonate with everyone. Surprisingly little action for an action film.

Cherry 20001987
Melanie Griffith as a woman in a post-apocalyptic wasteland searching for a replacement for her malfunctioning sex robot. Bonkers premise played completely straight. A forgotten gem that's part road movie, part action thriller, entirely its own thing.
But The premise is admittedly absurd. The tone wavers between satire and sincerity. It's genuinely weird in ways that won't appeal to genre purists.

Blue Collar1978
Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, and Yaphet Kotto as auto workers who stumble into union corruption and pay the price. Gritty, angry, darkly funny. Paul Schrader's directorial debut is interested in class betrayal and how the system grinds people down.
But It's a downer with no heroic resolution. The pacing is deliberate. Contemporary audiences often find it slow and repetitive rather than meditative.

Trouble Bound1993
Harry Dean Stanton and Patricia Arquette as misfits on a motorcycle journey through the upper Midwest. A noir mood in daylight, minimal plot, maximum atmosphere. Stanton's weathered presence carries you through.
But Almost nothing happens plot-wise. The reward is purely atmospheric and character-based. If you need narrative momentum, this will frustrate you.

After Dark, My Sweet1990
Both feature protagonists defined by survival skills and traumatic pasts, moving through criminal worlds where good intentions don't save you. Both understand that sometimes you can't outrun what you are.
Jason Patric as a drifter with a violent past falling into a kidnapping scheme in the California desert. Noir fatalism meets eighties decay. Based on Jim Thompson's novel, it has the paranoia and inevitability of real pulp fiction—characters are trapped not by plot but by who they are.
But The protagonist is morally compromised from the start. The pacing is deliberately sluggish. It's depressing in a way that lingers.

Lola Montès1955
A woman's survival through her body and her wits in a world controlled by men; both films are interested in the performance of identity as a survival mechanism, and the cost of being looked at.
Max Ophüls' final film: a circus ringmaster narrates the life of a famous courtesan through elaborate, impossible set pieces. Exuberant, baroque, told in reverse chronological order. A meditation on female agency, performance, and the male gaze, wrapped in velvet and tragedy.
But In French with subtitles. Nearly three hours of operatic melodrama shot in vivid Technicolor. The narrative structure is fractured and deliberately disorienting.

People
Cast
Betsy RussellMolly Stewart/Angel
Rory CalhounKit Carson
Robert F. LyonsLt. Hugh Andrews
Steven M. PorterYo-Yo Charlie
Ossie DavisCapt. Harry Moradian
Susan TyrrellSolly Mosler
Paul LambertArthur Gerrard
Barry PearlJohnny Glitter
Estee ChandlerCindy
Tim RossovichTeddy Butts
Frank DoubledayMiles Gerrard- Howard HonigSergeant Hal Baylor
Directing
- Robert Vincent O'NeilDirector
- Betsy PollockFirst Assistant Director
- Judith SaundersScript Supervisor
- Sandy CollisterSecond Assistant Director
Writing
- Sandra K. BaileyStory Editor
- Joseph Michael CalaWriter
- Robert Vincent O'NeilWriter
Production
- Diana GalvinAssistant Production Coordinator
- Joel SoissonAssociate Producer
- Michael S. MurpheyAssociate Producer
- Debra RubinsteinCasting
- Don LevinExecutive Producer
- Mel PearlExecutive Producer
- Claudia SantiagoExtras Casting
- Mary SantiagoExtras Casting
- Craig PointesLocation Manager
- Jeffery GaryPost Production Coordinator
- Keith RubinsteinProducer
- Sandy HowardProducer
- Claudia TempletonProducer's Assistant
- Katherine CaveProducer's Assistant
- Patricia WhitcherProducer's Assistant
- Tara SandlerProducer's Assistant
- Brett LaumannProduction Assistant
- Dixie MarloweProduction Assistant
- Vladimir FerkelmanProduction Assistant
- Angela HealdProduction Coordinator
- David HirschProduction Executive
- John TarnoffProduction Executive
- Victoria PlummerProduction Secretary
- Ed CassidyPublicist
- John WatsonPublicist
- Hugh McCallumUnit Production Manager