Kurt Russell is the sort of iconic Hollywood star that is quite rare in the modern era, and his seven-decade career is defined by a handful of excellent movies. Getting his start in the early ’60s as a child actor, Russell didn’t take long to become a burgeoning young star in live-action films for Disney.

Unlike many of his child actor contemporaries, Russell had no trouble transitioning to more mature roles, and his popularity as a youth translated into continued success as an adult. What makes Russell such an appealing star is that he is more than capable of playing an everyman, an action hero, or a humorous rogue.

Instead of being typecast, Russell has reinvented himself on numerous occasions, and he’s still a H๏τ commodity even in the 2020s. Despite his versatility and continuing evolution, there are still some films that will forever be linked to Russell, and those movies define who he is as a performer. They may not be his best, but they are unmistakably quintessential.

The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1969)

Just a few years after stealing hearts alongside Elvis Presley in It Happened at the World’s Fair, Kurt Russell became a bona fide child star in The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes. The underrated live-action Disney movie is hardly great cinema, but the corny comedy was a perfect platform for Russell to impress audiences as a teen.

The 1969 film is perhaps most important for ostensibly launching the film career of Russell, and it even became a series with two sequels throughout the ’70s. Dexter Riley was Russell’s first major character, and he brought the same charm and wit to the part that he would to his latter parts too.

Escape From New York (1981)

After the 1970s further established Kurt Russell as a rising young star, John Carpenter’s Escape From New York was his big debut as a mature actor. The exaggeratedly-macho Snake Plissken was the perfect part for Russell, and he was convincingly tough while leaning into the movie’s subtle tongue-in-cheek tone. The action/sci-fi film was also Russell’s second collaboration with John Carpenter.

Unlike most of Carpenter’s work with Russell, Escape From New York was a box office success. This further elevated the actor’s prestige, and his first experimental steps into mature roles was met with a positive response from critics. Russell would return many years later to play Plissken again in Escape From L.A.

The Thing (1982)

Upon release, The Thing was something of a flop that baffled critics and didn’t recoup its money. However, the John Carpenter/Kurt Russell film is now celebrated as one of the best sci-fi horrors of all time, and it’s been rediscovered as a defining Russell movie. There’s nothing sly about the film, and it is simply nightmarish from start to finish.

Though the film did little for Kurt Russell’s career at that time, it has helped elevate his reputation in retrospect. Despite having his fair share of mᴀssive hits, movies like The Thing prove that Russell’s filmography is strong even if the movies themselves were unnoticed at first. It also checked off another genre that Russell was adept at.

Big Trouble In Little China (1986)

If Kurt Russell was great at action, and he was great at comedy, then Big Trouble in Little China was the perfect blend of the two. The John Carpenter flick features boundless imagination and a lot of over-the-top martial arts action, and it features one of Kurt Russell’s best characters too.

Jack Burton is a lovable goofball, and he’s the polar opposite of Snake Plissken or Russell’s other heroic parts. While Big Trouble in Little China flopped hard at the box office, it quickly became a cult classic that is still being discovered today. For Russell, it showed that he had a sense of humor, and could be quite funny.

Overboard (1987)

Kurt Russell didn’t star in too many conventional comedies once he graduated to mature roles, but Overboard was a great platform for his funny bone. Starring alongside his real-life partner, Goldie Hawn, Russell was able to be his usual charming self in a low-stakes movie. Though it got middling reviews, it’s a relic of a bygone era of comedy.

As such, there are certainly parts of Overboard that haven’t aged well, but it’s yet another example of Kurt Russell’s ability to sell a movie. Despite being guilty of a lot of romantic comedy clichés, he has such strong chemistry with Hawn that everything is forgivable. After years of serious roles, Overboard was a nice change of pace.

Tango & Cash (1989)

One great quality of an actor is their ability to share the screen, and Kurt Russell was the perfect partner for Sylvester Stallone in Tango & Cash. The action comedy is about polar opposite cops who must work together, and Russell was perfectly in his element as the loose-canon Cash.

The ’80s buddy cop movie got poor reviews, but was a financial success, due to Stallone and Russell. While it might not necessarily be fondly remembered today, it represented the end of an era for Russell and was one of his last action comedy parts. It also showed how he could elevate a lackluster film and make it worth watching.

Backdraft (1991)

Though Kurt Russell had been in plenty of action films by 1991, all of his roles were a bit tongue-in-cheek or were downright comedic. Backdraft allowed him to ᴀssume a completely serious role, and he continued his box office success as a major draw. The firefighter drama featured an all-star cast, but Russell got top billing.

The movie itself is a wonderful spectacle of practical effects with a strong story, though it’s usually overshadowed by more bombastic ’90s action films. Though Russell would go on to have an extremely successful decade, Backdraft deserves credit for being the starting point of a new era for the veteran actor.

Tombstone (1993)

Westerns were having a moment in the 1990s, and it was due in large part to 1993’s Tombstone. Russell stars as legendary Wild West icon, Wyatt Earp, and he was perfectly cast to lead the modern film with a classic feel. After decades of self-serious westerns that skewered tropes, Tombstone was a breath of fresh air.

Russell’s performance in Tombstone set the tone for the rest of the decade. He plays it straight, but he also leans into the slightly exaggerated tone of the film for a heightened sense of excitement. There’s a reason that Tombstone is considered a must-see western, and Kurt Russell has something to do with it.

Bone Tomahawk (2015)

Several decades after he helped revolutionize westerns in Tombstone, Kurt Russell returned to the genre with yet another groundbreaking film. Bone Tomahawk brought a touch of horror to the classic genre, and smartly cast Russell in the lead role. The low-budget film went places others wouldn’t, and is still shocking a decade later.

Russell elevates the film with his charisma, but the rest of the small cast is strong too. It’s a gory and frightening thrill ride, and its unflinching nature was something unique for Russell’s career at that point. Though he had mostly returned to tongue-in-cheek roles, Bone Tomahawk brought the serious version of Kurt Russell back into the spotlight.