The 10 Best Guy Ritchie Movie Heroes, Ranked

With a penchant for style, gritty yet enjoyable narratives, and an impeccable ability to create fascinating characters, Guy Ritchie has established himself as one of the most defined and reputable filmmakers of the 21st century thus far. While he has some set tropes that are mainstays in his movies, his filmography has quite an impressive range, spanning from grimy crime-comedies to lavish action flicks, period mysteries, and even fantasy. As such, the director’s protagonists tend to vary quite dramatically from film to film.

Ritchie’s early works are defined by their snappy, street-savvy characters, but his more recent films have focused on everything from vengeful fathers to movie stars turned spies. With some of Hollywood’s biggest names occupying the starring roles in his films, Guy Ritchie’s best movie heroes are a testament to the storyteller’s innate gift for conjuring up compelling characters in engrossing narratives.

10 Jake Green (Jason Statham)

‘Revolver’ (2005)

A return to his usual setting following the disastrous reception of 2002’s Swept Away, Revolver saw Guy Ritchie substituting his trademark comedy for gritty action. It follows Jake Green (Jason Statham), a criminal who served seven years for a crime he didn’t commit and seeks out his egomaniacal boss, Dorothy Macha (Ray Liotta), upon release. When Macha refuses, however, Green wages a vendetta against the crime lord to square his ledger.

Granted, Revolver is far from Ritchie’s best movie, and much of its acclaim is directed squarely at Liotta, whose Macha is among Ritchie’s best villains. Still, Jake Green was an ample platform for Statham to showcase his capabilities in more action-packed movies. A pivotal role in the action star’s career, Revolver’s Jake Green sneaks into Guy Ritchie’s best-ever movie heroes as an adequate and earnest action lead.

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9 King Arthur (Charlie Hunnam)

‘King Arthur: Legend of the Sword’ (2017)

The Arthurian legend has been put on screen countless times, and while Guy Ritchie’s interpretation flaunts a unique sense of style and dark fantasy pizzazz, few will deny that it certainly has some flaws. Fortunately, one area where it does excel is with its titular hero. Charlie Hunnam walks a delicate line between the honorable knight of the Arthurian tales and the street-smart scoundrels Ritchie usually presents.

Subverting much of the original story, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword follows Arthur as he retrieves the legendary sword Excalibur, discovers his lineage, and learns that his scheming uncle, King Vortigern (Jude Law), had his father killed to usurp the throne. Part revenge thriller and part fantasy epic, the film sometimes struggles to juggle all of its ambitions elegantly. Alas, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword conjures up a stirring journey for Arthur, which is easy to be engulfed by thanks to Hunnam’s committed approach.

8 H (Jason Statham)

‘Wrath of Man’ (2021)

Perhaps standing as Guy Ritchie’s greatest and truest antihero, H (Jason Statham) thrives as Wrath of Man’s gritty main character. The somewhat sprawling revenge thriller focuses on a mysterious man who starts working for a security company as an armored truck guard. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that H is hellbent on finding the armed robbers responsible for executing his son during a heist and has reason to believe his new place of employment can get him close to the culprits.

While it is thinly plotted and doesn’t feature a huge amount in the area of emotional might, Wrath of Man is effective as an action revenge film capable of making audiences care just enough about the central vendetta to be immersed. Statham imbues the character with his signature rugged coarseness to make for a grounded action protagonist. Out for bloody revenge and featuring one of Statham’s most stoic portrayals, H is a fascinating avenger and one of the best heroes of Ritchie’s filmography.

7 Eddy (Nick Moran)

‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’ (1998)

Marking Guy Ritchie’s feature film debut, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels has become a cult classic crime-comedy following events that transpire in the London underbelly. Eddy (Nick Moran) is a poker maestro who finds himself in debt to a ruthless thug when he loses to him in a rigged game. With the help of his friends, Eddy hatches a scheme to come up with the money that involves sticking up a band of robbers with a daring plan to hit nearby marijuana dealers.

Like many of Ritchie’s best characters, Eddy can hardly be viewed as admirable or heroic; still, he has a savviness that makes him compelling to watch. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’ interesting and fun tone ensures audiences are engrossed in the brilliant and busy narrative, with Eddy making for a fine lead character who gets by on his wit and the dare of his friends.

6 Master Sgt. John Kinley (Jake Gyllenhaal)

‘Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant’ (2022)

Jake Gyllenhaal stars as Master Sgt. John Kinley and the film follows the bond he develops with the local interpreter who saved his life. Desperate to repay Ahmed (Dar Salim), Kinley works tirelessly to locate the translator and his family to get them out of Afghanistan, but things worsen when the Taliban targets them, and the U.S. military goes back on their promise to secure their passage to America.

A meshing of action violence and war drama with a character-driven plot that focuses on notions of heroism and honor, Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant was something of a sleeper hit for the director. It is Ritchie’s highest-rated picture on Rotten Tomatoes, not too bad for a director twenty-five years into his career. Kinley is an intriguing hero, a soldier who has to struggle against the army to achieve what he knows is right. It’s a classic Ritchie hero—a man facing institutional adversities, and Gyllenhaal shines in the role.

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5 Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill)

‘The Man From U.N.C.L.E.’ (2015)

Quite possibly the most underrated film of Ritchie’s career so far, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. excels as a dashing foray into major action cinema, utilizing stylistic flourishes and a strong cast. Based on the eponymous 60s spy show, it follows the difficult collaboration between a CIA agent, a KGB operative, and the daughter of a nuclear scientist as they strive to prevent a criminal organization from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Much like how the film was overlooked upon release, Napoleon Solo marks one of the most underappreciated roles of Henry Cavill’s career thus far. A military man who was arrested during WWII for stealing and selling invaluable art pieces, Solo was recruited to the CIA on account of his skill set. In The Man from U.N.C.L.E., he uses his charm and smarts to his advantage, making for a charismatic and capable movie herowho is infectiously fun to watch even if he isn’t the deepest figure ever put to screen.

4 One Two (Gerard Butler)

‘RocknRolla’ (2008)

While RocknRolla is probably the weakest of Ritchie’s comedy forays into the London underbelly, the film still flaunts many of the director’s greatest strengths, particularly his penchant for excellent characters. As an international real estate fraud worth millions catches the interest of the city’s crooks, different criminal factions enter the fold to try to get their hands on some of the money.

One Two (Gerard Butler), a street-savvy hustler, tries to play all sides in order to come out on top, making for a chaotic yet compelling hero. For all its pitfalls, RocknRolla is an incredibly fun film, and Butler’s portrayal of One Two has plenty to do with that. Like many of Ritchie’s best heroes, his quick wit and composure under pressure define him. Butler handles the part well, standing out among an all-star cast that includes Tom Hardy and Idris Elba.

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3 Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey)

‘The Gentlemen’ (2019)

2019’s The Gentlemen represents a rewarding return to the cockney crime-comedy caper that made Ritchie an international star early in his career. It focuses on a typically dodgy Tichie protagonist, Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey), an American drug dealer in England whose plans to sell his marijuana empire are thwarted when his operation falls under attack.

Commanding and calculating with an ever-present poise, Pearson is an adept and street-savvy dealer defined by his smarts, charisma, and underlying ruthlessness. Pearson has a certain pop that is only enhanced by the film’s unusual narrative structure, made all the more compelling by Ritchie’s trademark dialogue and his attention-grabbing sense of style. The Gentlemen still stands as one of Ritchie’s most popular movies, even earning a Netflix original spin-off series, and is largely thanks to McConaughey’s sheer charm.

2 Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey Jr.)

‘Sherlock Holmes’ (2009) & ‘Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows’ (2011)

There are few characters in the history of storytelling as renowned and esteemed as Arthur Conan Doyle’s masterful yet offbeat sleuth, Sherlock Holmes. While there have been many different takes on the character, particularly in recent decades, Robert Downey Jr.’s portrayal in Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is unique and completely arresting.

While Downey Jr. maintains the character’s quirkiness and intensity, Ritchie imbues Holmes with a noticeable splash of his singular comedic instincts and character design. He’s a fast-talking, quirky, no-nonsense detective who would be as comfortable in modern-day Belgravia as he was in 1890’s Bohemia. Bolstered by a deeply enjoyable performance from Downey Jr., this take on Sherlock Holmes has gradually developed a fanbase, with many hoping a third film will soon be on the way.

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1 Turkish (Jason Statham)

‘Snatch’ (2000)

In the eyes of many, Snatch still stands as Ritchie’s greatest picture. The sprawling crime-comedy focuses on several figures of the London underbelly, a highly sought-after stolen diamond, and a series of rigged underground boxing matches. While it is difficult to pinpoint just one standout protagonist and harder still to identify any character as heroic in the traditional sense, Jason Statham’s Turkish marks what is undoubtedly one of Ritchie’s greatest characters.

A small-time fight promoter, his story unfurls as he finds himself in Brick Top’s (Alan Ford) debt and struggles to convince Mickey O’Neil (Brad Pitt), a bare-knuckle boxing champion, to throw a fight. An endearing mixture of calculated street smarts, strained morality, and self-minded desperation, Turkish is an intriguing, compelling, and magnetic audience surrogate in a world of violence and deceit. Snatch is among Statham’s best gangster movies, and he elevates Turkish to be among the best the genre has seen this century.

NEXT: The 13 Best Jason Statham Action Movies, Ranked