Moviefone’s 25 best movies of the first 25 years of the 21st Century.
Not only is 2025 coming to an end soon, but with it the first 25 years of the 21st century!
While the last 25 years have seen the rise of Marvel Studios and the fall of big screen comedies, it has also seen advances in filmmaking technology, seminal movies from groundbreaking directors and new and returning movie stars alike.
Release Date: Apr 26, 2019
Run Time: 3 hr 1 min
Budget: $356,000,000
As we leave behind the first quester of this century, Moviefone is counting down the 25 best movies of the first 25 years of the 21st century!
Let’s begin!
Related Article: Moviefone’s 25 Best Movies of 2025: The Definitive Ranking
Timothée Chalamet in ‘A Complete Unkown’. Photo by Macall Polay, Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures. © 2024 Searchlight Pictures All Rights Reserved.
Set in the influential New York music scene of the early 60s, ‘A Complete Unknown’ follows 19-year-old Minnesota musician Bob Dylan‘s (Timothée Chalamet) meteoric rise as a folk singer to concert halls and the top of the charts – his songs and mystique becoming a worldwide sensation – culminating in his groundbreaking electric rock and roll performance at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965.
“The ballad of a true original.”
Release Date: Dec 25, 2024
Run Time: 2 hr 20 min
Budget: $65,000,000
Christian Bale in ‘The Big Short’. Photo: Paramount Pictures.
The men who made millions from a global economic meltdown.
Release Date: Dec 23, 2015
Run Time: 2 hr 11 min
Budget: $28,000,000
(L to R) Christian Bale, Amy Adams, and Bradley Cooper in ‘American Hustle.’ Photo: Sony Pictures.
A conman (Christian Bale) and his seductive partner (Amy Adams) are forced to work for a wild FBI agent (Bradley Cooper), who pushes them into a world of Jersey power-brokers and the Mafia.
“Everyone hustles to survive.”
Release Date: Dec 20, 2013
Run Time: 2 hr 18 min
Budget: $40,000,000
(L to R) Leonardo DiCaprio and Jack Nicholson in ‘The Departed’. Photo: Warner Bros.
To take down South Boston’s Irish Mafia, the police send in one of their own to infiltrate the underworld, not realizing the syndicate has done likewise. While an undercover cop (DiCaprio) curries favor with the mob kingpin (Jack Nicholson), a career criminal (Matt Damon) rises through the police ranks. But both sides soon discover there’s a mole among them.
“Cops or criminals. When you’re facing a loaded gun, what’s the difference?”
Release Date: Oct 5, 2006
Run Time: 2 hr 31 min
Budget: $90,000,000
Oscar Isaac in ‘Inside Llewyn Davis.’ Photo: CBS Films.
In Greenwich Village in the early 1960s, gifted but volatile folk musician Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac) struggles with money, relationships, and his uncertain future.
Release Date: Dec 10, 2013
Run Time: 1 hr 45 min
Budget: $11,000,000
Matt Damon in ‘The Martian’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is presumed dead after a fierce storm and left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on the hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive.
“Help is only 140 million miles away”
Release Date: Oct 2, 2015
Run Time: 2 hr 21 min
Budget: $108,000,000
(L to R) Ben Foster and Chris Pine star in ‘Hell or High Water’. Photo: Lionsgate.
A divorced dad (Chris Pine) and his ex-con brother (Ben Foster) resort to a desperate scheme in order to save their family’s farm in West Texas.
“Blood always follows money.”
Release Date: Aug 26, 2016
Run Time: 1 hr 42 min
Budget: $12,000,000
Benicio del Toro in ‘Sicario’. Photo: Lionsgate.
An idealistic FBI agent (Emily Blunt) is enlisted by a government task force to aid in the escalating war against drugs at the border area between the U.S. and Mexico.
“The border is just another line to cross.”
Release Date: Oct 2, 2015
Run Time: 2 hr 2 min
Budget: $30,000,000
17. ‘Beirut‘ (2018)
Jon Hamm in ‘Beirut.’ Photo: Bleecker Street.
In 1980s Beirut, Mason Skiles (Jon Hamm) is a former US diplomat who is called back into service to save a colleague from the group that is possibly responsible for his own family’s death. Meanwhile a CIA field agent (Rosamund Pike) who is working under cover at the American embassy is tasked with keeping Mason alive and ensuring that the mission is a success.
“Beirut, 1982: The Paris of the Middle East Was Burning”
Release Date: Apr 11, 2018
Run Time: 1 hr 49 min
(L to R) Colin Farrell and Charlie Hunnam in ‘The Gentlemen’. Photo: STXfilms.
American expat Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey) has built a highly profitable marijuana empire in London. When word gets out that he’s looking to cash out of the business forever it triggers plots, schemes, bribery and blackmail in an attempt to steal his domain out from under him.
Release Date: Jan 24, 2020
Run Time: 1 hr 53 min
Budget: $22,000,000
Rooney Mara stars in ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’. Photo: Sony Pictures Releasing.
Disgraced journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) investigates the disappearance of a weary patriarch’s niece from 40 years ago. He is aided by the pierced, tattooed, punk computer hacker named Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara). As they work together in the investigation, Blomkvist and Salander uncover immense corruption beyond anything they have ever imagined.
“What is hidden in snow, comes forth in the thaw.”
Release Date: Dec 14, 2011
Run Time: 2 hr 38 min
Budget: $90,000,000
Joaquin Phoenix in ‘Inherent Vice.’ Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures.
In Los Angeles at the turn of the 1970s, drug-fueled detective Larry “Doc” Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix) investigates the disappearance of an ex-girlfriend (Katherine Waterson).
“Love usually leads to trouble.”
Release Date: Jan 9, 2015
Run Time: 2 hr 29 min
Budget: $20,000,000
Keanu Reeves in ‘John Wick’. Photo: David Lee for Lionsgate.
Ex-hitman John Wick (Keanu Reeves) comes out of retirement to track down the gangsters that took everything from him.
Release Date: Oct 24, 2014
Run Time: 1 hr 41 min
Budget: $20,000,000
(L to R) Val Kilmer and Robert Downey Jr. in ‘Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.’ Photo: Warner Bros.
A petty thief posing as an actor (Robert Downey Jr.) is brought to Los Angeles for an unlikely audition and finds himself in the middle of a murder investigation along with his high school dream girl (Michelle Monaghan) and a detective (Val Kilmer) who’s been training him for his upcoming role.
“Sex. Murder. Mystery. Welcome to the party.”
Release Date: Nov 11, 2005
Run Time: 1 hr 42 min
Budget: $15,000,000
(L to R) Rachel Weisz and Ralph Finnes in ‘The Constant Gardner’. Photo: Universal Pictures.
Justin Quayle (Ralph Finnes) is a low-level British diplomat who has always gone about his work very quietly, not causing any problems. But after his radical wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz) is killed he becomes determined to find out why, thrusting himself into the middle of a very dangerous conspiracy.
Release Date: Aug 31, 2005
Run Time: 2 hr 9 min
Budget: $25,000,000
Daniel Craig stars in ‘Layer Cake’. Photo: Columbia Pictures.
When a seemingly straight-forward drug deal goes awry, XXXX (Daniel Craig) has to break his die-hard rules and turn up the heat, not only to outwit the old regime and come out on top, but to save his own skin.
“The art of good business is being a good middleman.”
Release Date: May 13, 2005
Run Time: 1 hr 45 min
Budget: $6,500,000
A scene from the documentary ‘The Battered Bastards of Baseball’. Photo: Netflix.
Hollywood veteran Bing Russell creates the only independent baseball team in the country—alarming the baseball establishment and sparking the meteoric rise of the 1970s Portland Mavericks.
“They put balls back in the game.”
Release Date: Jul 11, 2014
Run Time: 1 hr 20 min
Christoph Waltz in ‘Inglourious Basterds.’ Photo: The Weinstein Company.
In Nazi-occupied France during World War II, a group of Jewish-American soldiers known as “The Basterds” are chosen specifically to spread fear throughout the Third Reich by scalping and brutally killing Nazis. The Basterds, lead by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) soon cross paths with a French-Jewish teenage girl (Mélanie Laurent), who runs a movie theater in Paris which is targeted by the soldiers.
“Once upon a time in Nazi occupied France…”
Release Date: Aug 21, 2009
Run Time: 2 hr 33 min
Budget: $70,000,000
Brad Pitt in ‘Moneyball’. Photo: Sony Pictures Releasing.
The story of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane’s (Brad Pitt) successful attempt to put together a baseball team on a budget, by employing computer-generated analysis to draft his players.
“What are you really worth?”
Release Date: Sep 23, 2011
Run Time: 2 hr 14 min
Budget: $50,000,000
Denzel Washington in ‘Man on Fire’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.
Jaded ex-CIA operative John Creasy (Denzel Washington) reluctantly accepts a job as the bodyguard for a 10-year-old girl (Dakota Fanning) in Mexico City. They clash at first, but eventually bond, and when she’s kidnapped he’s consumed by fury and will stop at nothing to save her life.
“Creasy’s art is death, and he is about to paint his masterpiece.”
Release Date: Apr 23, 2004
Run Time: 2 hr 26 min
Budget: $70,000,000
Daniel Day-Lewis in ‘There Will Be Blood’. Photo: Paramount Vantage.
Ruthless silver miner, turned oil prospector, Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day Lewis), moves to oil-rich California. Using his son to project a trustworthy, family-man image, Plainview cons local landowners into selling him their valuable properties for a pittance. However, local preacher Eli Sunday (Paul Dano) suspects Plainview’s motives and intentions, starting a slow-burning feud that threatens both their lives.
“There will be greed. There will be vengeance.”
Release Date: Jan 25, 2008
Run Time: 2 hr 38 min
Budget: $25,000,000
(L to R) Luke Wilson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Gene Hackman, Ben Stiller, Anjelica Huston and Danny Glover in ‘The Royal Tenenbaums’. Photo: Buena Vista Pictures.
Royal Tenenbaum (Gene Hackman) and his wife Etheline (Anjelica Huston) had three children and then they separated. All three children are extraordinary — all geniuses. Virtually all memory of the brilliance of the young Tenenbaums was subsequently erased by two decades of betrayal, failure, and disaster. Most of this was generally considered to be their father’s fault. “The Royal Tenenbaums” is the story of the family’s sudden, unexpected reunion one recent winter.
“Family isn’t a word … It’s a sentence.”
Release Date: Jan 2, 2002
Run Time: 1 hr 50 min
Budget: $21,000,000
(L to R) Heath Ledger and Christian Bale in ‘The Dark Knight’. Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures.
Batman (Christian Bale) raises the stakes in his war on crime. With the help of Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), Batman sets out to dismantle the remaining criminal organizations that plague the streets. The partnership proves to be effective, but they soon find themselves prey to a reign of chaos unleashed by a rising criminal mastermind known to the terrified citizens of Gotham as the Joker (Heath Ledger).
“Welcome to a world without rules.”
Release Date: Jul 18, 2008
Run Time: 2 hr 32 min
Budget: $185,000,000
(L to R) Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio star in ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.’ Photo: Sony Pictures Releasing.
Los Angeles, 1969. TV star Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio), a struggling actor specializing in westerns, and stuntman Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), his best friend, try to survive in a constantly changing movie industry. Dalton is the neighbor of the young and promising actress and model Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie), who has just married the prestigious Polish director Roman Polanski (Rafał Zawierucha).
“In this town, it can all change… Like that.”
Release Date: Jul 26, 2019
Run Time: 2 hr 42 min
Budget: $95,000,000
1. ‘Drive‘ (2011)
Ryan Gosling in ‘Drive.’ Photo: Richard Foreman Jr.
Driver (Ryan Gosling) is a skilled Hollywood stuntman who moonlights as a getaway driver for criminals. Though he projects an icy exterior, lately he’s been warming up to a pretty neighbor named Irene (Carey Mulligan) and her young son, Benicio (Kaden Leos). When Irene’s husband (Oscar Isaac) gets out of jail, he enlists Driver’s help in a million-dollar heist. The job goes horribly wrong, and Driver must risk his life to protect Irene and Benicio from the vengeful masterminds behind the robbery.
“There are no clean getaways.”
Release Date: Sep 16, 2011
Run Time: 1 hr 40 min
Budget: $15,000,000