Deconstruction and self-awareness have become a much bigger part of the film and television industries over the last twenty years, as slowly the old tropes which used to make up the biggest films in Hollywood and the world have become more laughable.

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Writers, directors, and actors have enjoyed using tongue-in-cheek humor in their mocking of Hollywood action movies for a variety of reasons and in many different ways. While the genres of the films that manage to do these deconstructions vary, there is usually an element of comedy in the way that they will take the action genre apart.

6 Big Trouble In Little China

An Image From Big Trouble In Little China

John Carpenter managed to create many of the slasher and horror tropes known today through his work on films like Halloween and The Thing. He even made many of the infamous action tropes known today with his work on films like Escape From New York. But he reunited with Kurt Russell, who appeared in two of those three films, for Big Trouble In Little China.

Comparatively, this film takes a truck-driving, all-American Russell, and makes him the useless, confused character in the midst of the Asian heroes and villains of this fantastical version of Chinatown. Mostly a comedy but regarded as a cult classic action film, Big Trouble In Little China is a perfect take on the martial arts films of the time and the way they were too commonly “Americanized” to try and make them more appealing to Western audiences.

5 Hot Fuzz

An Image From Hot Fuzz

Hot Fuzz is the middle entry in what is known as the Cornetto Trilogy. These three films all parodied various types of movies. Shaun of the Dead tackled zombie films, The World’s End took on alien invasions, but Hot Fuzz dealt with buddy cop action movies and how Hollywood had romanticized them so greatly over the years.

Starring Simon Pegg as a hotshot London police officer who took out too many criminals and is sent to a small town where nothing ever happens, he gets a small-time cop partner and begins to uncover a massive conspiracy within the town. Blatantly mentioning some of the most famous Hollywood action movies like Bad Boys 2 and Point Break, Hot Fuzz was a pitch-perfect take on them and how over-the-top they can be.

4 21 Jump Street

A Poster For 21 Jump Street

Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill both helped make their careers with their appearances in another take on the buddy cop action genre. 21 Jump Street is actually a remake of the television series from the 80s of the same name, which featured the likes of a young Johnny Depp and more as youthful police officers who could infiltrate high schools and solve crimes under the guise of students.

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It was an interesting concept, and 21 Jump Street boldly played with both that and many of the other high school film and action film ideas that Hollywood has become so fixated on over the years. Mostly, it took them apart, but some it played into so that it could go completely over-the-top, in some similar ways to other comedic films like Hot Fuzz.

3 Shoot Em Up

An Image From Shoot Em Up

Of all the ways in which films have gone over the top in their comedic attempts to deconstruct the action genre, Shoot Em Up has perhaps gone the farthest. Featuring Clive Owen as a mostly silent protagonist who finds a newborn and tries to keep it alive against hordes of enemies with the help of a prostitute.

The overly gory sequences and absolutely madcap style of the editing in this film helped it become an immediate cult classic, with so many memorable moments that confused and alienated some viewers but created a sense of absolute madcap genius that endeared the film hugely to many others.

2 The Man Who Knew Too Little

An Image From The Man Who Knew Too Little

Bill Murray films are responsible for creating entire sub-genres of cinema. For example, Groundhog Day is memorably remembered as the first and greatest example of the “time-loop film” where a person or persons repeat the same day over and over. The Man Who Knew Too Little is one of the very first examples of a normal person becoming caught up in spy operations, another trope that has been used by many films.

While The Man Who Knew Too Little isn’t as well-remembered as some Bill Murray films, it deserves to be for the hilarious way that the usually deadpan Murray is thrown into this insane situation and completely deconstructs undercover and spy action films.

1 Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

An Image From Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Robert Downey Jr will always be best-remembered for his performances in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Iron Man. However, three years before his run as Tony Stark began, he appeared in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, a film by Shane Black that was a completely ingenious parody of many other investigative and undercover police movies.

A small-time thief is mistaken for an actor and sent to Hollywood to train for a role under a detective, and he becomes embroiled in an investigation involving the most ridiculous case of mistaken identities ever shown on film. This was Shane Black’s directorial debut, but given that he had previously written films like Lethal Weapon, he was the perfect man to deconstruct the action genre in this brutal, hilarious manner.

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