The 35 greatest Keanu Reeves movies
Oct. 16, 2024Find out why Keanu is The One
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The beguiling mystique of Keanu Reeves can neither be overstated nor underestimated. One of the most popular and influential movie stars of all time, Keanu Reeves has quite the resume for an actor. But which of his movies are rightfully considered some of the greatest of all time?
Born in Beirut to an English mother and a multiethnic father, Keanu Reeves lived in Sydney and New York City before his family settled in Toronto. Reeves' stepfather was director Paul Aaron, who mentored Reeves even after his mom divorced him and fostered his love for acting and theater. While Reeves briefly entertained a career in the Ontario Hockey League, an injury sidelined him, which led him to consider full-time acting.
Reeves' acting career started with the Canadian TV show Hangin' In, but made his feature film debut in the 1986 sports film Youngblood. After 1989, Reeves' career reached new heights and hasn’t come down since.
Amid his dalliances in rock music and comic book creation, Keanu Reeves is still a celebrated actor whose name instantly raises the profile of any project he’s in. In celebration of his ongoing career, here are 35 of the greatest Keanu Reeves movies.
In Ana Lily Amimpour’s mystifying dystopian thriller The Bad Batch, Suki Waterhouse stars as a young woman who wanders the lawless Texas desert. She endures the wrath of cannibals, led by the brawny Miami Man (played by Jason Momoa) only to end up in a safe settlement called Comfort that isn’t all that it seems. Keanu Reeves has a supporting role as “The Dream,” Comfort’s charismatic leader who exercises power through addictive hallucinogens and all-night raves. While Reeves doesn’t show up until more than halfway through the movie, he’s in fine form as a dangerous cult of personality.
33. The Replacements (2000)
Taking heavy inspiration from the real-life 1987 NFL strike that saw a team of “replacement” players for the Washington Redskins win Super Bowl XXII, Keanu Reeves is a hail mary in this early 2000s comedy from Howard Deutch. Gene Hackman leads as a coach for the fictional Washington Sentinels who is tasked with putting together a team of “replacements” amid a league-wide player’s strike. His first draft pick: Shane Falco (Reeves), a faded college football star whose pro career went to pieces after one bad season. The Replacements is far from a division leader among the greatest sports comedies, but Reeves is nonetheless an all-star.
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Before Keanu Reeves jacked into The Matrix, he was Johnny Mnemonic. In this adaptation of William Gibson’s 1981 short story, Reeves plays a “mnemonic courier” – a freelancer of the 21st century who transports sensitive corporate data in his brain. Unfortunately for all couriers, the data wipes out personal memories. On a particularly risky job, Reeves' protagonist is pursued by rival corporations and yakuza who want the data, forcing the clock to run before the sustained brain damage becomes fatal. Plagued with behind-the-scenes production woes and clashes with the studio (which sought to capitalize on Reeves' newfound stardom from Speed), Johnny Mnemonic is a tonally confused sci-fi movie that flip flops between ironic techno parable and bombastic action flick. But it’s nevertheless a fascinating oddity in Reeves' filmography.
Keanu Reeves goes to hell! In this 1991 sequel to the 1987 hit Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Reeves reunites with Alex Winter to return as their title heroes. An evil time traveler and former gym teacher Chuck De Nomolos (Joss Ackland) seeks to rewrite history by making sure that Bill and Ted, as the Wyld Stallyns, never leave a positive influence on society. Chuck assassinates Bill and Ted, which not only ruins the flow of time but sends their souls to the underworld where they are challenged by Death (William Sadler). While it pales in comparison to its predecessor, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey is still a devilish good time. One might even say it’s still “Excellent!”
In this home invasion thriller from Eli Roth, Keanu Reeves plays a family man who confronts the violence of infidelity after two beautiful young women (Ana de Armas and Lorenza Izzo), who come to his front door sopping wet from a rainstorm, tempt him to bed. When Webber kicks the women out the next morning, they soon return with a vengeance. A modern remake of the 1974 psychological thriller Death Game, Knock Knock is a gaudy and grimey picture that throws it back to when Hollywood’s erotic thrillers felt dangerously exciting.
“Klaatu barada nikto!” In this modern remake of the seminal 1951 sci-fi classic, Keanu Reeves plays the steely alien Klaatu who tries to warn humanity of impending doom. A timely reimagining, director Scott Derrickson reinvents the original movie’s Cold War metaphors into one about climate change. Reeves also plays Klaatu as a being who slowly learns what it means to be human – proof that Reeves isn’t always the stoic being he is known to play. Though critics were unmoved by this remake, The Day the Earth Stood Still has aged remarkably well as a cognizant and conscious sci-fi thriller with foreboding vibes.
After Keanu Reeves firmly established his action movie mettle in Speed, he slowed down with the romantic World War II drama A Walk in the Clouds. Reeves stars as Paul Sutton, a soldier who returns home and finds himself disillusioned with the life he left behind. On a trip to Mexico, Paul poses as the husband of a young pregnant woman (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón). He is welcomed by her family and grows enchanted by her home at a scenic vineyard. In this gorgeous movie about finding purpose amid aimlessness, Reeves is magnetic as a true leading male.
In Nicolas Winding Refn’s lethally beautiful horror movie The Neon Demon, Elle Fanning plays an aspiring model who moves to Los Angeles and rises the ranks of the city’s cutthroat fashion scene. Keanu Reeves has a minor role as a sleazy hotel manager, where Fanning’s character Jesse resides throughout the movie. While The Neon Demon doesn’t match up to the lofty highs set by Refn’s previous movies like Drive, its immersion into a superficial underworld is captivating, and Reeves only adds to the movie’s menacing atmosphere.
Shortly after the digital filmmaking revolution took off, it was none other than Keanu Reeves who gave audiences an insider’s glimpse into cinema’s imminent future. In this riveting documentary that is catnip to cinephiles and technology obsessives, Reeves grills A-list directors like Martin Scorsese, James Cameron, David Fincher, Danny Boyle, George Lucas, Christopher Nolan and many, many more, all of them offering their two cents on the benefits of digital filmmaking while pondering what artists and audiences are losing in the process.
Keanu Reeves has a minor role in Always Be My Maybe, but you wouldn’t call it small. In this sunny Netflix rom-com, Ali Wong and Randall Park star as childhood friends who reunite and date as adults despite life’s obstacles getting in their way. Reeves appears playing an exaggerated, cartoonish version of himself, as Wong’s new boyfriend. Not to be outdone, Park’s character, an amateur rapper, gets into a fight with Reeves and writes a bizarrely catchy song titled “I Punched Keanu Reeves.”
Keanu Reeves is Satan’s favorite lawyer in The Devil’s Advocate. In this memorable late ’90s supernatural thriller, Reeves is a hotshot lawyer named Kevin Lomax who, along with his beautiful wife Mary Ann (Charlize Theron), leaves the muggy swamps of Florida to work for a very powerful New York City law firm, a domain ruled by the enigmatic John Milton (Al Pacino). Over time, Kevin discovers the true dark nature of his employer. Without spoiling too much, let’s just say Milton comes from very, very low places.
A landmark movie in the canon of queer cinema, Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho traces the friendship and cross-continent journey undertaken by two friends, Mike (River Phoenix) and Scott (Keanu Reeves). From Portland to Idaho to Rome, the two young men embark on an adventure of self-discovery as they travel to reunite Mike with his estranged mother. Meanwhile, Reeves' Scott is in active rebellion against his privileged upbringing and relishes his grimey lifestyle, but is ultimately biding time until his inheritance is his. Remembered for its avant-garde mise-en-scéne and portrayal of taboo subject matter (such as young male prostitution), My Own Private Idaho is a road trip worth its weight in miles.
Years after The Matrix but before John Wick, Keanu Reeves sat in the director’s chair for his gritty martial arts thriller Man of Tai Chi. Tiger Chen stars as a Tai Chi practitioner whose mastery over the seemingly delicate style lands him on the radar of Donaka Mark (Reeves), a ruthless promoter of illegal underground fight clubs. While Reeves is fascinating as a formidable martial arts villain, it’s his solid grasp as a first-time director which makes Man of Tai Chi truly worthy of recognition.
From director Richard Linklater and boasting immaculate use of rotoscope animation, A Scanner Darkly is a star-studded sci-fi gem from the 2000s that needs to be seen to be believed. Based on Philip K. Dick’s novel, A Scanner Darkly takes place in a near-future United States to follow an undercover officer (played by Keanu Reeves) who struggles to separate his physical reality from his mind-melting hallucinations. Winona Ryder, Robert Downey Jr., and Woody Harrelson co-star in this trippy feature that ominously anticipated a paranoid nation split apart by fascist police states.
Undercover feds meet extreme sports in this ’90s action classic from director Kathryn Bigelow. In Point Break, Keanu Reeves plays an undercover FBI agent who embeds himself into a group of daredevil bank robbers; over time, Reeves' character develops a complex bond with its charismatic leader, played by Patrick Swayze. Beyond its memorable set pieces and masculine melodrama is the chemistry between Swayne and Reeves, whose characters you might believe would be best friends if not for the circumstances they find each other. In a movie all about adrenaline junkies, it’s this bit of poetry which makes Point Break a real thrill.
John Wick is on the run, and he’s fighting like hell to stop running. In the third John Wick movie, again directed by franchise co-creator Chad Stahelski, Keanu Reeves suits up once more as his famous assassin who is now exiled from New York. Besieged by hitmen everywhere he turns, John Wick escapes to Casablanca to recruit a fellow assassin, Sofia (Halle Berry), to help him meet the elusive figure known as “The Elder” who can put an end to his excommunicado status. John Wick: Chapter 3 turns the dial up from its predecessors, elevating John Wick into more than just slick action movies but genre-bending revenge epics.
Shakespeare’s most chillaxing play about love, secrets, and mischief comes to life in this scenic and sunkissed adaptation from director Kenneth Branagh. Among the movie’s ensemble cast is Keanu Reeves, who leads as the main antagonist Don John who conspires to ruin everyone’s fun. Brimming with stars like Denzel Washington, Kate Beckinsale, Emma Thompson, Richard Briers, Michael Keaton, and more, Much Ado About Nothing is a whole lot of something, yet another handsome Shakespeare production from Branagh, a filmmaker who knows The Bard better than most.
A gothic romantic epic that can appeal to fans of Dark Souls and Bloodbourne, Bram Stoker’s seminal horror novel is given life by master director Francis Ford Coppola. Keanu Reeves stars as Jonathan Harker, a solicitor from London who is dispatched to Transylvania to close a real-estate deal with the elusive Count Dracula (Gary Oldman). What Jonathan doesn’t know is that his beloved Mina (Winona Ryder) may be the reincarnation of Dracula’s long-deceased wife. Macabre and magnificent in equal measure, Bram Stoker’s Dracula is a true ’90s goth classic with a serious bite.
Keanu Reeves has never been bigger than when he voiced the four-inch-tall Duke Caboom inDisneyandPixar’s Toy Story 4. In this emotional sequel to the Toy Story series, Woody (Tom Hanks) is separated from his fellow toys after he tries to rescue the existentially-panicked Forky (Tony Hale). Upon reuniting with his old flame Bo Peep (Annie Potts), Woody must decide how he wants to spend the rest of his plastic life. Reeves' Duke Caboom — an enthusiastic stunt motorcyclist, from Canada — is a supporting player who aids Woody in his journey home.
Based on Christopher Hampton’s 1985 play, which is itself based on the classic 1782 French novel, the boredom and pettiness of 18th-century aristocrats casually ruin young love. While Glenn Close and John Malkovich take center stage as the movie’s scheming Marquise de Merteuil and Vicomte de Valmont, a young, pre-fame Keanu Reeves appears in a supporting role as a music teacher who has genuine feelings for a beautiful young woman Cécile (Uma Thurman). Sadly for Reeves' character, he is merely a pawn in a complicated game of deception.
Party on, dudes! In this cult classic from 1989, Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter play dimwitted high school rockers Bill S. Preston and Theodore Logan. The two dudes are desperate to pass their history class and avoid being enrolled in military school. With the help of a time traveler, played by the legendary George Carlin, Bill and Ted embark on a most excellent adventure through time to collect the world’s greatest historical figures to help them give the greatest history presentation San Dimas High School has ever seen. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure is a bodacious movie about the virtues of friendship.
In a Hollywood landscape dominated by cash-grab sequels and remakes, The Matrix Resurrections argues you can’t just replicate the original. In this extravagant legacy sequel directed by Lana Wachowski, Keanu Reeves and Carrie Ann-Moss return as Neo and Trinity, who find themselves deep in The Matrix and rediscover their history together as revolutionaries. Besides its elaborate symbolism and metaphor for nostalgia and memory, The Matrix Resurrections simply kicks butt as a handsome, mind-bending action tentpole that is no mere reboot.
On paper, a movie about a runaway bus with a bomb strapped to it sounds, well, not that cinematic. But with the megawatt chemistry between Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, plus rock-solid direction from Jan de Bont, Speed races to the top in the canon of ’90s action blockbusters. In Speed, Reeves plays an LAPD officer who tries to stop a terrorist who’s planted a bomb on a random city bus; if the bus slows down past 50 miles per hour, it’s boom time in the City of Angels. Speed is a high-octane action movie that epitomized the best the ’90s had to offer, and that includes the powers of its stars.
All good things come to an end. In John Wick: Chapter 4, Keanu Reeves' iconic assassin endures the fight of his lifetime when he wages war with The High Table, the ruling body of underworld killers. Standing in John Wick’s road to resolution are equally colorful killers, like the blind master Caine (Donnie Yen), rotund gangster Killa (Scott Adkins), and “Mr. Nobody” (Shamier Anderson), a nameless tracker with his own agenda for getting Wick. Whether John Wick lives or dies, he’ll be free, and John Wick: Chapter 4 marks his finest, bloodiest hour yet.
Free your mind. At the end of the 20th century and at the dawn of the new millennium, the Wachowskis roundhouse kicked moviegoers with a genre-bending masterpiece that combined the styles of Hong Kong action with Japanese science fiction. In The Matrix, Keanu Reeves stars as a computer programmer who discovers reality is a falsehood, and that the real world is a ravaged place ruled by machines. Recruited by the enigmatic Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), Reeves' Neo learns to harness his destiny as “The One.” The Matrix is simply one of the greatest movies of all time that, like The Matrix itself, needs to be seen to be believed.
Eric Francisco is a freelance entertainment journalist and graduate of Rutgers University. If a movie or TV show has superheroes, spaceships, kung fu, or John Cena, he’s your guy to make sense of it. A former senior writer at Inverse, his byline has also appeared at Vulture, The Daily Beast, Observer, and The Mary Sue. You can find him screaming at Devils hockey games or dodging enemy fire in Call of Duty: Warzone.
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