I Think These Are the Seven Greatest Modern Best Picture Winners

Throughout history, complaints have been lodged that the Best Picture Oscar goes to underwhelming movies like Green Book, Driving Miss Daisy, A Beautiful Mind, The Broadway Melody, and countless other titles. It’s true that the Best Picture Oscar can end up in the hands of underwhelming features destined to be otherwise forgotten. Still, sometimes, all-time classics and the tastes of the Academy beautifully intersect. The Oscars have sometimes got it oh so right in rewarding Best Picture and not just with beloved classics like Wings, Casablanca, and The Godfather. The 21st century has seen some superb motion pictures receive the Best Picture Oscar, with the increasingly diverse and global voting base for the Oscars ensuring that the last decade of Best Picture winners especially has seen more pleasant victories than Crash or The English Patient-level disappointing wins.

For me, the following seven movies are the greatest 21st-century Best Picture Oscar winners. Even without their glowing award season status, all seven would stand out as impressive movies worth remembering for all of time.

The Shape of Water

Other filmmakers would’ve taken the concept of a woman falling in love with a fish-monster and used it for easy, mocking punchlines, but not director Guillermo del Toro. His 2017 classic The Shape of Water captures the romantic bond between Ellsa Esposito (Sally Hawkins) and “The Amphibian Man” (Doug Jones) with sincerity and heart. Everything in this production, from del Toro and Vanessa Taylor’s sharp screenwriting to Dan Laustsen’s cinematography to Alexandre Desplat’s transportive score, fearlessly encapsulates the feeling of being swept off your feet by romantic infatuation.

The irresistible romantic air of The Shape of Water is complemented by dazzling visuals and richly human performances from maestros like Hawkins and Richard Jenkins. Storytelling material that could’ve been shallow in other hands is an opportunity for del Toro to really excel as a sensuous artist.

Nomadland

Chloe Zhao’s intimate filmmaking on Nomadland is so extraordinary that she can make a simple faux pas like the accidental shattering of precious mementos something that makes your heart leap right into your throat. The saga of Fern (Frances McDormand) deciding to live as an American nomad in the wake of the 2008 recession is made up of tiny moments like that, such as Fern and her pals charmingly checking out an RV. All the while, Nomadland’s striking imagery and absorbing atmosphere invited viewers to contemplate what’s “meaningful” in American society, where material possessions often rule. Zhao’s deeply personal gaze makes that exploration so compelling that of course even the tiniest setbacks for Fern become gasp-worthy moments.

Everything Everywhere All at Once

“Miracles happen,” as a famous Princess Diaries song once observed. Everything Everywhere All at Once is one of those modern miracles. The saga of laundromat owner Evelyn (Michelle Yeoh) discovering the multiverse masterfully blends so many tones and filmmaking styles, with artistic influences ranging from pro-wrestling to Wong Kar-wai manifesting throughout its run time. All of it coalesces into a phenomenally entertaining and moving odyssey that can even wring tears out of scenes involving hot dog fingers. Endlessly detailed performances from Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, and Stephanie Hsu make this artistic feat seem effortless. Everything Everywhere All at Once really is one of those “miracles” in modern cinema.

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No Country for Old Men

Uncertainty and petrifying terror over the future, these are the two elements permeating every frame of No Country for Old Men. Well, that and filmmaking mastery. Joel and Ethan Coen have made many Western-inspired features and have similarly delivered numerous classics in their careers. However, blending their sensibilities with Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men novel resulted in one of their greatest triumphs. This is a haunting feature in which not even bloodthirsty killer Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) is immune to unforeseen random setbacks.

The same unpredictable chaos informing The Big Lebowski or Fargo manifests in more tragic forms in the searingly stirring No Country for Old Men. No wonder the Coens are so at home in this narrative while the duo’s gift for commanding great performances is also clear in Old Men‘s outstanding turns from Bardem, Tommy Lee Jones, and Josh Brolin.

Moonlight

Moonlight deserves to be known for more than just losing the Best Picture Oscar to La La Land for a few seconds. Barry Jenkins’ second directorial effort is a masterpiece, one of the 21st century’s greatest movies that’s far more than its award-season exploits. The story of Chiron over three different portions of his life is riddled with tremendously evocative visuals as well as emotionally captivating glimpses into how conventional American society punishes male vulnerability.

Among its endless virtues, it’s especially impressive how Moonlight makes the three different Chiron performers feel subtly parallel to one another. They’re each embodying basically a whole other person, yet Trevante Rhodes, for instance, imbues flickers of Alex R. Hibbert’s work as the youngest Chiron into the man’s adult form. It’s an impressive acting feat you won’t see every day, which nicely crystallizes how distinctively masterful Moonlight is.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

You really can encapsulate The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King’s outstanding nature by just how many unforgettable quotes it’s embedded into the world’s everyday vocabulary, from, “But I can carry you!” to, “I am no man!” to, “Never though I’d die fighting side by side with an elf.” Peter Jackson’s capper to his Middle-earth trilogy is still so staggering in its scope, even with decades of further blockbusters trying to recapture King’s magic. Those subsequent tentpoles, though, don’t have the beating humanity of Return of the King. Absorbing intimate moments with Samwise Gamgee, Aragorn, Gollum, and other Middle-earth inhabitants are just as transfixing as any large-scale action sequence.

Parasite

We must lose never sight of one truth about Parasite: this is a ridiculously fun movie to watch. Director Bong Joon-ho’s searing take on capitalism and class disparity works on many levels, but it also excels as just a dynamite thriller punctuated with hysterical bits of dark humor. Its remarkable camerawork, pacing, and idiosyncratic symbolism (among many other artistic virtues) all help to make this such a fantastically entertaining feature.

Functioning so well on that level just makes Parasite’s emotional gut-punch of an ending hit all the more devastatingly, while the balance of social commentary with great twists is outstandingly impressive. Parasite’s also jam-packed with deeply memorable performances, with Song Kang-ho and Cho Yeo-jeong especially standing out in a murderer’s row of tremendous actors. There’s really no corner of Parasite that fails to enthrall. No wonder it’s the best 21st century Best Picture Oscar winner and also one of the greatest movies to ever take home this reward.

What’s your favorite Best Picture winner? Let us know in the comments below!