Not many actors can headline, or be a part of an ensemble in, multiple consecutive movies that prove to be critically beloved, commercially successful, or both. It takes a performer who never delivers anything less than their best. It also takes a performer who knows how to pick their projects. Those are the types of performers that follow, those who, at one point in their career or another, had win after win after win. However, we left off cameos and movies where the actor played themself. Those didn’t count as additions to winning streaks or conclusions to winning streaks. So, what did count? The idea was to have five or more movies in a row that found a certain degree of success, in terms of either reviewer appreciation or financial returns.
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Some came close, like Jennifer Lawrence, who had X-Men: First Class, The Hunger Games, and Silver Linings Playbook. That run was ended by House at the End of the Street, which made money, but it’s hard to call it a win. Then she had The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, American Hustle, and X-Men: Days of Future Past, but that trio was followed by the critical and commercial flop Serena.
7) Will Smith
Between Jim Carrey and Will Smith, it’s hard to say who took off more impressively in the ’90s. Carrey had three successes in one year via Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, and Dumb and Dumber, but Smith immediately announced himself as someone who could go from leading a sitcom to leading some absolutely gargantuan major motion pictures.
Six Degrees of Separation earned Smith some very positive reviews in 1993, but it was 1995’s Bad Boys that established him as a true leading man. Then, in 1996, Independence Day became the highest grossing film of the year. The following year, Men in Black would have been the same had it not been for Titanic. It even beat The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Smith then followed those up with Enemy of the State, which again showed his range as an actor, netted him some solid reviews, and as a whole the project grossed nearly three times its hefty $90 million price tag. This streak was undone in a major way by Wild Wild West, but it was still a massive few years for Smith.
6) Jason Statham
Between 2015 and 2021, Jason Statham had roles in Furious 7, Spy, Mechanic: Resurrection, The Fate of the Furious, The Meg, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw, Wrath of Man, F9. All of them performed well at the box office and over half of them received an admirable level of praise from critics.
That line-up shows not only that Statham is a name that can attract prospective viewers, but also that he knows how to be in a team just as well as he knows how to be a leading man. In fact, people like him so much they seem to turn out more for his leading man vehicles than for his ensemble pieces, as Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre ended up being the project that ended such a magnificent run. Following that, Fast X also fell short of expectations, though that had less to do with Statham and more to do with people feeling burnt out on that particular franchise.
5) Kate Winslet
Little Children, The Holiday, The Reader, Revolutionary Road, Carnage, and Contagion. These were all films that received love, to varying degrees, from critics. They were also what constituted the segment of Kate Winslet’s career that ran from the latter half of 2006 to 2011.
Unfortunately, this run of wonderful films was ended by a movie of substantially different quality. Specifically, Movie 43, for which Winslet won zero Oscars. She was not alone in that. She’s also probably not alone in wishing she had never signed on for it. But, all credit due Winslet, she didn’t deliver a phoned-in performance even for that deeply unfunny slog of an anthology film.
4) Meryl Streep
Meryl Streep came close to a full winning streak a few times earlier in her career, but the most obvious one started in 2008 with Mamma Mia!, which she followed up with Doubt the same year (for which she received a Best Actress nomination). Then, in 2009, she had Julie & Julia (another Best Actress nomination), Fantastic Mr. Fox, and It’s Complicated.
In 2011 she had The Iron Lady, which wasn’t loved critically, but she did win the Academy Award for it. In 2012 she co-led the box office hit Hope Springs, which she followed up with another Academy Award-nominated performance in the fantastic August: Osage County in 2013. However, with The Giver, the streak ended (though she did get a Best Supporting Actress nomination for Into the Woods the same year).
3) Leonardo DiCaprio
Leonardo DiCaprio has actually had three winning streaks. The first was Gangs of New York, Catch Me If You Can, The Aviator, and The Departed, and it was ended by Blood Diamond. The second was Revolutionary Road, Shutter Island, and Inception, which was ended by J. Edgar. Then, immediately after J. Edgar, he had Django Unchained, The Great Gatsby, The Wolf of Wall Street, The Revenant, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
Now, as for that last winning streak, it depends on how you look at Don’t Look Up. That Adam McKay movie may very well be the most divisive entry on DiCaprio’s filmography thus far. And while its standing has increased since its 2021 release, there is still an argument to be made it killed his third winning streak. If you don’t see it that way, we understand, and you can include it, Killers of the Flower Moon, and One Battle After Another, meaning this streak is ongoing.
2) Dwayne Johnson
Few actors have been as consistently appealing as leading stars than Dwayne Johnson. Ever since The Scorpion King back in 2002, he has found himself above the title on posters more and more frequently. And, almost as frequently, the movies that feature him prominently are successes.
However, he’s only had one true winning streak, and that was from 2014 to 2017. Specifically, with Hercules, Furious 7, San Andreas, Central Intelligence, Moana, and The Fate of the Furious. It was ended by Baywatch which, like Fate, was released in 2017. But the end of the streak was short-lived, as he followed up that regrettable, bland comedy with a bonafide hit in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle. And, while Jumanji nearly kicked off another winning streak, it’s very difficult to call Skyscraper a success in any regard. Were it not for Skyscraper, though, he’d have Jumanji, Rampage, Fighting with My Family, Hobbs & Shaw, and Jumanji: The Next Level all in a row.
1) Tom Hanks
If you were asked to think of the most beloved movie star of all time, there’s a better than good chance that Tom Hanks would be the first individual to pop into your mind. But he’s not just a lovable personality, as Hanks has also proved to be consistent box office gold.
From 1992 to 2002 he starred in A League of Their Own, Sleepless in Seattle, Philadelphia, Forrest Gump, Apollo 13, Toy Story, That Thing You Do!, Saving Private Ryan, You’ve Got Mail, Toy Story 2, The Green Mile, Cast Away, Road to Perdition, and Catch Me If You Can. There wasn’t a single failure in the bunch. For a full decade. It’s hard to imagine that streak of successes ever being topped.
It was ended by The Ladykillers, a movie which most people have forgotten about. But if that Coen brothers movie (their worst) hadn’t happened the winning streak would have continued with The Terminal and The Polar Express in 2004, The Da Vinci Code in 2006, the underrated Charlie Wilson’s War (a critical success if not a commercial one) in 2007, The Great Buck Howard and Angels & Demons in 2009, and Toy Story 3 in 2010.
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