Last Action Hero

Last Action Hero (1993) is an action-comedy from director John McTiernan — watch it online on iFILM. Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Jack Slater, an indestructible movie cop, and also himself. Twelve-year-old Danny Madigan gets a magic ticket from an old projectionist and tumbles straight through the screen into Slater's latest blockbuster.

Inside the movie, the rules are different. Villains explode on cue. Good guys don't bleed. Danny can't die because the credits haven't rolled yet. Then the polished, one-eyed assassin Benedict — played with cold glee by Charles Dance — grabs the ticket and steps out into the real world. Suddenly Slater can be shot. And Benedict figures out fast that in reality, murder has no cinematic consequences.

Columbia Pictures spent 85 million dollars on a film that mocks action movies while delivering exactly that. Ian McKellen, Sharon Stone and Schwarzenegger as Hamlet all turn up in cameos. McTiernan had just made Die Hard and The Hunt for Red October — he knew the genre inside out. Stream Last Action Hero (1993) online on iFILM.