Renny Harlin: RANKED
- Nick Digilio
- Feb 10
- 8 min read
Updated: Feb 21
Renny Harlin (born Renny Lauri Mauritz Harjola in Riihimäki, Finland in March of 1959) is one of those filmmakers who somehow managed to be huge, influential, wildly successful, catastrophically unsuccessful, critically dismissed, financially celebrated, totally misunderstood, and relentlessly productive all at the same time.
And I mean that as the highest possible compliment.
This is a guy who has worked in Hollywood, Europe, Finland, Bulgaria, and China, who has directed giant studio blockbusters, micro-budget genre flicks, straight-to-video oddities, prestige misfires, cult classics, box-office gold, and some of the biggest financial disasters in movie history.
His films have grossed over $520 million in the U.S. and more than $1.2 billion worldwide, making him the most internationally successful Finnish filmmaker ever in terms of revenue, and yet somehow he still feels like a secret weapon, a guy who flies just under the radar, never fully embraced, never fully dismissed, always working.
I’ve been fascinated by Harlin for decades, partly because his career makes absolutely no sense if you try to look at it through the usual Hollywood success/failure lens. He doesn’t fit neatly into any box.
He comes from Finland, growing up in the long shadow of the Soviet Union, studying at the University of Art and Design Helsinki, making commercials and industrial films, then hustling his way into the American film business in the early ’80s.
His first feature, Born American from 1986, is not just a terrific low-budget action movie that did insanely well on VHS in the States, but also a blunt political statement soaked in Cold War anxiety.
You can feel Finland’s geopolitical position in every frame of that movie. It’s martial arts, it’s exploitation, it’s action, but it’s also a worldview. That’s something people don’t talk about enough with Harlin: there’s always perspective in his work, even when it’s wrapped in genre trappings.
He follows that with Prison, a scrappy, nasty little haunted-prison horror film that’s absolutely perfect for the late-’80s VHS era, and then—boom—he lands A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, which is not only one of the best entries in the franchise, but at the time became the highest-grossing Nightmare movie ever.
Scary, funny, imaginative, technically sharp, and commercial as hell. Three movies in, and Harlin has already proven he can do action, horror, satire, politics, and spectacle, all on tight budgets, all with confidence.
And that’s what gets him the keys to the kingdom in 1990. Die Hard 2. One of the greatest action sequels ever made, and yes, I will say it until the day I die: it’s better than Die Hard.
Smarter, meaner, funnier, more overtly satirical, and staged with a level of technical precision that most so-called “great” American action directors can’t even touch.
Harlin understands geography, momentum, rhythm, and clarity in action scenes in a way that puts a lot of overpraised filmmakers to shame. Comparing Michael Bay to Renny Harlin is absurd. Bay is noise. Harlin is choreography.
And honestly, I think someone like James Cameron is monumentally overrated when it comes to staging large-scale action compared to what Harlin can do with a camera.
That same year he also makes The Adventures of Ford Fairlane, which got clobbered by backlash against Andrew Dice Clay, but is actually a wild, funny, star-stuffed, beautifully shot satire of American celebrity culture, misogyny, rock stardom, and sleazy Hollywood excess, filtered through the eyes of a Finnish outsider.
Again, perspective. Again, technique. Again, a sense of humor that people completely missed at the time.
Then comes Cliffhanger in 1993, which might have one of the best opening ten minutes in modern action cinema. Period. Tense, terrifying, gorgeously shot, with stunt work that still makes palms sweat.
Harlin turns mountains into horror landscapes and gives John Lithgow one of his most deliciously unhinged villain performances. This is peak ’90s blockbuster filmmaking done right.
And then, yes, comes the Geena Davis era. Harlin marries one of the biggest stars in the world, starts a production company with her, and makes Cutthroat Island, which becomes one of the most infamous box-office bombs of all time, nearly sinking Carolco Pictures.
It’s easy, lazy, and wrong to reduce Harlin’s career to that failure. Especially when it’s followed by The Long Kiss Goodnight, one of the most underrated action movies of the ’90s, written by Shane Black, featuring Geena Davis giving the best performance of her career and Samuel L. Jackson firing on all cylinders.
It’s savage, funny, violent, satirical, and staged with absolute authority. Harlin doing Shane Black is a match made in action-movie heaven.
By the end of the decade he delivers Deep Blue Sea, which I will happily call one of the greatest shark movies ever made. It’s smart, stupid, hilarious, suspenseful, and legendary for that Samuel L. Jackson shark kill alone. Harlin understands that big, dumb spectacle works best when it’s self-aware, and this movie knows exactly what it is.
After that, the industry turns on him. Studio politics, Exorcist: The Beginning controversies, divorces, shifting tastes, and suddenly the guy who once ruled multiplexes is making movies all over the world (Finland, Eastern Europe, China) often straight to video or streaming.
And here’s the thing: even when the scripts are bad, even when the concepts are tired, even when he’s making stuff like The Legend of Hercules or the recent Strangers trilogy, the technique never disappears. Ever.
You watch a Harlin movie and you know a real filmmaker is behind the camera. He knows lenses. He knows movement. He knows how to stage chaos. He knows how to cut action so you can actually see it.
He’s made Finnish-language films, Chinese-language action movies, war films, horror films, racing movies, exploitation flicks, prestige attempts, and weird genre hybrids.
He has unproduced projects littering his career like fascinating alternate timelines—Alien 3, Sgt. Rock, Nosebleed, Warriors of the Rainbow. He’s lived everywhere, worked everywhere, and never stopped making movies.
And now, thanks to the modest financial success of the Strangers films, he’s back in theaters again, lining up new projects like Deep Water, The Beast, and Black Tides.
I love Renny Harlin. I love his work ethic, his technique, his fearlessness, and his refusal to quit. I think he’s one of the most technically proficient and prodigiously talented action directors of all time, and history is going to be much kinder to him than critics ever were.
Any time I see his name in the credits, I’m in. Always.
So I sat down and did something that wasn’t easy: I took a career packed with highs, lows, oddities, masterpieces, misfires, and cult classics, and narrowed it down to fifteen movies.
These are not the only good Renny Harlin films. These are the fifteen I love the most, ranked in order of preference. I don’t dislike any of these movies. Some I adore more than others, but they’re all winners in my book.
So here they are. My ranking of the 15 best Renny Harlin movies.
RENNY HARLIN'S TOP 15 MOVIES (in order of preference):
This is the crown jewel. I don’t hedge on this, I don’t qualify it, and I don’t apologize for it. Die Hard 2 is better than Die Hard, and Renny Harlin is the reason why. This movie is gigantic, ruthless, hilarious, and technically flawless. The action choreography is crystal clear, the set pieces are insane, and the movie understands that the whole thing is a satire of American macho action excess filtered through a Finnish sensibility.
Bruce Willis is looser, funnier, and meaner, the villains are terrific, the snow-covered airport is a brilliant setting, and the escalation is relentless. This is big-budget action filmmaking done at the absolute highest level, and very few directors before or since have staged spectacle this well.
One of the most criminally underrated action movies of the 1990s and one of the smartest Shane Black scripts ever put on screen. Geena Davis gives the performance of her career here, balancing comedy, menace, vulnerability, and pure badass energy, while Samuel L. Jackson is in full scene-stealing mode.
Harlin directs the hell out of this movie, finding the dark humor, the satire, and the brutality without ever losing control. The action scenes are ferocious, inventive, and funny, and the movie constantly comments on the genre even as it delivers exactly what you want from it.
This is one of the very best films in the Nightmare franchise, and it’s the movie where Harlin proves he can play in a studio sandbox without losing his edge. It’s imaginative, genuinely scary, visually inventive, and packed with great kills and dark humor.
Harlin leans into the dream logic in a way that feels playful but still menacing, and the movie has an energy and confidence that a lot of later franchise entries completely lack.
That opening sequence alone earns this movie a permanent place in action cinema history. It’s terrifying, emotional, and executed with jaw-dropping precision. Harlin turns mountains into horror landscapes and makes vertical space feel genuinely dangerous.
The suspense is relentless, the action is clean and brutal, and the pacing is superb. John Lithgow chews the scenery in the best possible way, and Stallone is perfectly cast.
A shark movie, a monster movie, an action movie, and a comedy all rolled into one glorious, ridiculous, expertly made package. Harlin understands exactly how far to push the absurdity without breaking the movie.
The pacing is terrific, the effects are used smartly, and the cast is stacked with great character actors who know what movie they’re in. That Samuel L. Jackson moment alone guarantees immortality.
A nasty, atmospheric, low-budget horror film that shows Harlin’s instincts right out of the gate. It’s grimy, creepy, and perfectly tuned to the late-’80s VHS horror boom. The haunted prison setting is used beautifully, and Harlin squeezes every ounce of tension out of the location. Raw, mean, and effective.
One of Harlin’s later-period surprises and a great example of how strong his technique still is. This Chinese-language action thriller (one of the chapters in his "Chinese Trilogy") set largely in a morgue is tight, tense, and expertly staged. Harlin knows how to use space better than almost anyone, and this movie proves it.
Harlin’s debut and already loaded with confidence, politics, and attitude. This is a tough, muscular low-budget action movie soaked in Cold War paranoia. You can feel Finland’s geopolitical tension in every frame. It’s more than just punches and explosions... it’s perspective.
One of Harlin’s Chinese-language epics that deserved more attention. It’s visually striking, technically sharp, and full of confident action staging. Even when the mythology gets dense, Harlin’s command of motion and scale keeps it engaging.
A film forever tied to behind-the-scenes chaos, but much more interesting than it gets credit for. Harlin leans into pulp horror rather than restraint, and the result is weird, aggressive, and often unsettling. Not a classic, but a fascinating genre artifact.
A movie destroyed by timing and backlash rather than quality. Andrew Dice Clay was box-office poison when this came out, but the film itself is sharp, funny, star-packed, and gorgeously shot. Harlin directs it like a neon-soaked noir satire, and it absolutely works.
Goofy, uneven, but often very entertaining. Jackie Chan’s physical comedy and Johnny Knoxville's idiotic stunts/jokes, mesh well with Harlin’s ability to stage movement and chaos. When it works, it’s a blast. When it doesn’t, it drags. Still, a solid global action-comedy effort.
Yes, it’s one of the biggest bombs in movie history. No, it’s not a bad movie. It’s ambitious, expensive, energetic, and often gorgeous. The action is practical and massive, the production design is stunning, and Geena Davis throws herself into it completely. History has been too cruel to this one.
A glossy, ridiculous, over-the-top racing melodrama that fully commits to its own nonsense. Harlin stages the racing sequences with clarity and excitement, even if the soap-opera emotions are dialed up to eleven. Dumb fun, but very well made dumb fun.
A slick, twisty ensemble thriller that got buried by studio delays. It’s stylish, well-cast, and packed with clever kills and atmosphere. Not top-tier Harlin, but solid, entertaining, and far better than its reputation.
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