Anthony Mackie's 9 Best Movies

 

Actor Anthony Mackie's 20-year Hollywood career includes roles in eight television shows and a whopping 55 feature films (with another on the way this year). Back in 2004, legendary writer/director Spike Lee himself anointed Mackie the next big thing after casting him as the lead in his movie She Hate Me. The New Orleans-native's star has been on the rise ever since. While Mackie has yet to headline an MCU movie, he finally starred in his very own limited series as his Marvel character, Sam "the Falcon" Wilson, in 2021. In the meanwhile, let's take a moment to look back at the work he's done so far.

9. The Banker

Anthony Mackie reunites with his MCU co-star, Samuel L. Jackson in this decidedly more down-to-earth film. Based on a true story, The Banker follows Bernard Garrett (Mackie) and his partner, Joe Morris, as they become wealthy purchasing real estate, and later, two banks in extremely racist 1950s Los Angeles and Texas, using a white man as a front.

8. Ant-Man

In Ant-Man, Mackie's former USAF pararescueman Sam "Falcon" Wilson comes face-to-face with future Avenger Scott Lang when the latter breaks into the group's base of operations in upstate New York.

7. The Hate U Give

The Hate U Give delves into multi-generational issues such as code-switching and murder-by-cop. Specifically, the film features a fatal shooting of an unarmed African-American male by a white police officer. Unlike the relatively recent spate of police murders captured on video, there is only one eyewitness -- aside from the cop. The remainder of the films explore the effects that the shootings have on the witnesses.

In Hate, the witness, Starr Carter, was a childhood friend of the victim, Khalil Harris. The two are pulled over for failure to signal a lane change on an empty street when Khalil drives Starr home from a house party. After Khalil is ordered out of the car, he's shot to death by the officer.

What follows is Starr's struggle to come to terms with the death of her friend, her efforts to achieve justice for Khalil while remaining anonymous, and her continued fight to be accepted by her predominantly African-American community without being solely defined by her ethnicity at her predominantly white high school. Despite Starr's wish to blend in and be a "normal" teenager, the seed of social activism planted in her by her father begins to grow.

In a departure from his usual roles, Mackie portrays King, a violent local gang leader and stepfather to Starr's half-brother, Seven. Interestingly enough, The Hate U Give's title is derived from the acronym that rapper and actor Tupac Shakur gave to the social movement and hip-hop group that he founded -- Thug Life. Mackie actually portrayed Shakur in the 2009 biopic of superstar rapper Christopher "Biggie" Wallace, Notorious.

6. Real Steel

In Real Steel, robot boxing has eclipsed human fighting sports by the year 2020. Former boxer Charlie Kenton and his son, Max, train discarded sparring-bot Atom, who displays both a talent for beating more advanced opponents and a die-hard loyalty to Max. Mackie portrays Finn, a friend of Charlie's who wagers on the fights. When shady businessman Ricky, who had Charlie beat down over a bet, attempts to duck out without covering his losses, Finn teaches him to think twice before ever welching again.

5. Outside the Wire

Outside the Wire offers a fresh take on the familiar "rogue AI" story, all the while questioning the wisdom of military reliance on detached warfare, such as the use of drones in combat. Star Anthony Mackie's casting is fitting, given his cinematic history as Sam Wilson, the right-hand man of Steve "Captain America" Rogers in five MCU movies. This time around, Mackie is the super-soldier and the captain as a U.S. Marine in the not-too-distant future. 

4. The Age of Ultron

Proving that Mackie's Sam "the Falcon" Wilson and Steve "Captain America" Rogers are not just teammates but actual friends as well, the former spends the bulk of his time in The Age of Ultron as the latter's wingman at a party thrown by Tony Stark as opposed to on a battlefield.

3. The Winter Soldier

Mackie's Sam Wilson makes his cinematic debut in The Winter Soldier when he befriends Steve Rogers and the two bond over the fact that they've both seen combat as members of the U.S. military. When we meet him, Sam has put his USAF career behind him and become a counselor for other veterans who find it difficult adjusting to civilian life. Wilson, who quickly becomes the man who Steve Rogers trusts more than anyone in the world, uses his pararescueman training and experimental wings to take the fight to a new threat from land to air in the battle against a woefully corrupted S.H.I.E.L.D. He's instrumental in destroying the agency's three new helicarriers, which were designed to kill hundreds of American civilian targets at once. After exposing double agents within the organization's ranks and foiling their plan to turn the U.S. into fascist state, Wilson and Rogers embark on a mission to root out any remaining HYDRA members as well as the Winter Soldier.

2. Civil War

Reprising his role as Sam "the Falcon" Wilson, who's become a full-fledged Avenger and assisted Captain Rogers in tracking down  notorious assassin James "the Winter Soldier" Barnes, Mackie winds up an enemy of the state and in the crosshairs of Tony Stark after violating the controversial Sokovia Accords. He also recruits Scott "Ant-Man" Lang into the fold.

1. Infinity War

After having been broken out of a federal prison by Steve Rogers, Mackie's Sam Wilson, the aforementioned Captain America and former assassin Natasha Romanoff, have been conducting covert missions and acting independently of the Avengers. However, when an intergalactic warlord's pursuit of mass murder in the name of saving the universe brings the battle to Earth, Wilson and the others make a last stand against an alien army in the African kingdom of Wakanda. Sadly, the heroes lose and Wilson, one of the casualties, is wiped from existence.

Originally Posted 3/19/21