Coburn was a capable, rough-hewn leading man, whose toothy grin and lanky physique made him a perfect tough guy in numerous leading and supporting roles in westerns and action films, such as The Magnificent Seven, Hell Is for Heroes, The Great Escape, Charade, Our Man Flint, In Like Flint, Duck, You Sucker!, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, and Cross of Iron. Coburn provided the voice of Mr. Waternoose in the Pixar film Monsters, Inc. In 2002, he received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries nomination for producing The Mists of Avalon.
During the late 1960s and early 1970s, Coburn cultivated an image synonymous with “cool” and, along with such contemporaries as Lee Marvin, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson and Clint Eastwood, became one of the prominent “tough-guy” actors of his day.