Last Updated on September 6, 2024
John Travolta is a highly acclaimed actor and singer, twice nominated for an Academy Award. He first grabbed the public’s attention when he began appearing on 1970s sitcoms.
Travolta soon graduated to smash hits movies that made him a firm favorite at the box office. If you love this actor’s work, then you are in the right place! We have gathered a variety of drama, romance, and action movies for you to enjoy.
1. She’s So Lovely (1997)
Eddie and Maureen Quinn’s marriage and lives are in turmoil. His mind is on rocky grounds and Maureen refuses to give up drinking and smoking, even though she is pregnant. One night she is assaulted by a lustful neighbor and pushed over the edge, Eddie shoots someone and is sent to a psychiatric unit for 10 years.
Once released, he finds that Maureen is married to another man (played by John Travolta) and has three children, one of which is his own daughter. Maureen’s life is now stable and happy but Eddie’s return threatens the safety of her entire family.
2. Look Who’s Talking (1989)
When a pregnant woman climbs into the back of taxi driver James Ubriacco’s car, he realizes that she’s in labor. James (played by John Travolta) inadvertently witnesses her son Mikey’s birth and their lives become intertwined.
The movie, which is best known for Mikey’s voice-over (done by Bruce Willis), follows the rocky road that Mollie and James walk to find each other. They have to overcome a string of suitors who court Mollie, deal with the baby’s selfish biological father and also face their own fears to realize that they are already a family.
3. Hairspray (2007)
This movie is a great film to watch if you love musicals, retro movies and comedy that also deals with important topics. In the case of Hairspray, the story follows Tracy Turnblad who, in 1962, is a teenager obsessed with a dancing show on TV. When the show needs a replacement dancer, Tracy’s desire to join is hampered by those who dislike her because she is overweight and because she is against segregation.
Tracy succeeds to join but face a new challenge when she decides to enter the Miss Teenage Hairspray pageant. The movie also deals with a racially divided neighborhood, a younger generation who wants something better, and body shaming. John Travolta, surprisingly, does a sterling job playing the role of Tracy’s mother who is ashamed about her own obesity.
4. Michael (1996)
When a woman writes to the National Mirror, a tabloid that deals mainly in unexplained phenomena, she claims that she is living with an angel called Michael. The tabloid sends three staff members to investigate her story. They decided to take him back to Chicago and he reveals that it is his mission on earth to bring two of them, Frank and Dorothy, together as a couple.
But things go wrong when Michael uses up his power to save a dog. The angel rapidly begins to deteriorate and they race to take him to see the sights he desperately wants to see. Michael also never gives up on making Frank and Dorothy fall in love.
5. Face/Off (1997)
When FBI Agent Sean Archer survives an assassination attempt that kills his young son, his obsessive 6-year manhunt finally runs down the killer, a sociopath called Castor Troy.
During the capture, Troy is knocked into a coma but not before revealing that he has planted a bomb in Los Angeles. Desperate to find the device, Archer agrees to an experimental surgery where he swaps faces with Troy. While Archer infiltrates the assassin’s gang to find the bomb, Troy wakes up and forces the surgeons to give him Archer’s face.
Since Troy killed everyone who knew about the surgery, Archer struggles to convince his family and colleagues where the real danger lies – with the imposter living in Archer’s home and office.
6. Pulp Fiction (1994)
This cinematic classic follows several people in the life of gangster Marsellus Wallace. John Travolta and Samuel L Jackson play a pair of hitmen, Vincent Vega and Jules Winnfield, employed by Wallace and although he excels at his job Jules is having second thoughts about his life of crime.
Throughout the story, Jules and his partner run into the other main characters; Wallace’s bored wife (Uma Thurman) who overdoses on their watch and the wily man Wallace ordered them to kill, Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis). As their lives merge, the results are violent, heartwarming, and life-changing.
7. The Fanatic (2019)
Moose is an autistic street performer on Hollywood Boulevard but his main love is movies. He develops an unhealthy obsession with Hunter Dunbar, an action and horror film star. When Moose learns that Dunbar is hosting an autograph session, he purchases an expensive jacket for the star to sign but is offhandedly dismissed when Dunbar leaves.
Driven by intense feelings, Moose tracks down the star at his home and starts to harass him for an autograph. After several visits, Dunbar’s repeated rejections culminate in a bloody clash that changes both of their lives forever.
8. Swordfish (2001)
Hacker Stanley Jobson’s life is falling apart. He has a criminal record for cyber crimes, his ex-wife is suing for full custody of their only child and he lives in a dilapidated trailer. His life changes when he meets Gabriel Shear (played by Travolta), a volatile anti-terrorist leader who offers Stanley millions to design a program that will steal a fortune from the government.
When Stanley refuses, he is forced into the seemingly inescapable world of Shear who turns out to be a dangerous and masterful manipulator who is willing to kill anyone who gets in his way.
9. Broken Arrow (1996)
One night Major Vic “Deak” Deakins and Captain Riley Hale are assigned to a flying exercise. As part of the test, they pilot a stealth bomber carrying two nuclear bombs. Deakins wants to hold the weapons for ransom but after he fails to kill Hale in the cockpit, he forcefully ejects his partner from the plane.
After staging a crash, Deakins uses his own recovery team to find the weapons which he had also dropped from the plane during the flight. Hale has to survive the arid Utah landscape and his former friend’s determination to prevent Deakins from activating the bombs.
10. A Civil Action (1998)
Based on a true event that took place in Woburn, Massachusetts in the 1980s, Travolta plays a high-flying attorney, Jan Schlichtmann, who is approached by a group of concerned citizens. They believe that their children and neighbors are being killed by environmental poisoning, more specifically the dumping of an industrial solvent in the town’s water supply.
Jan gets sucked into a case that threatens to ruin him financially and professionally. But as he digs deeper and realizes the extent of the corruption and devastation being wreaked on the town’s people, he refuses to give up.
