The 32 greatest Anne Hathaway movies
Oct. 30, 2024She’s been Jane Austen and assistants, Catwoman and con artists
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Anne Hathaway is one of the most recognized and successful Hollywood stars of all time, with Oscar and Golden Globe trophies under her belt and over $6 billion grossed at the box office. Not bad for a girl from New Jersey. But of all of Anne Hathaway’s movies, what are actually the greatest of her career?
Intentionally named after Shakespeare’s wife, Anne Hathaway was born in Brooklyn before her family moved to New Jersey. After being exposed to acting at an early age – her mother, Kate McCauley, was a stage actress – Hathaway caught the acting bug, and spent her formative years performing and studying theater.
Just three days after a performance at Carnegie Hall, Hathaway was cast in her first TV role on Get Real, a short-lived teen comedy that also starred Debrah Farentino and a young Jesse Eisenberg. While filming her cinematic debut The Princess Diaries, Hathaway missed her first semester in college. In retrospect, she maybe didn’t miss out on much.
In recognition of Anne Hathaway’s continuing success, these are her 32 greatest movies.
Let’s be clear about something for a second: Serenity, from writer/director Steven Knight, is not a good movie. But its plot twist is so baffling and ridiculous that it needs to be seen to be believed. On the surface, Serenity follows a moody boat captain (Matthew McConaughey) who is approached by his ex-wife, played by Anne Hathaway, to kill her abusive new husband. Maybe if Serenity followed that story in straightforward fashion, it would be halfway watchable. But Serenity is not actually that movie, and instead has a sharp left turn that veers into absurdity. Ironically, that makes it worthwhile viewing if only to test one’s limits for incredulity.
It’s a remake of a remake, and honestly degradation theory is proven correct. But for Anne Hathaway die-hards, Chris Addison’s The Hustle doesn’t feel like it’s cheating you from your precious time. Anne Hathaway stars in The Hustle as Josephine, a glamorous British con artist who primarily targets the world’s wealthiest men. After meeting Penny (Rebel Wilson), Josephine hatches up a scheme to take on the ultimate score: conning a French tech billionaire. The Hustle is a tad bankrupt compared to the other movies it’s based on – 1988’s Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and 1964’s Bedtime Story – but that doesn’t stop Anne Hathaway from stealing hearts.
A few years after her breakout role in the original Princess Diaries, Anne Hathaway returned to her throne in this charming sequel. Now a full-fledged princess of Genovia, Hathaway’s Mia Thermopolis must now embark on the mostDisneyplot of all: getting married. The sequel sees Mia navigate between her royal responsibilities and a budding romance with Lord Nicholas Deveraeaux, a charming noble bachelor played by Chris Pine. Royal Engagement may not be as regal as its predecessor, but it’s still quite a ball.
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Anne Hathaway is just one of many major stars who crowd this ensemble crowd-pleaser with interconnected storylines. (Among her co-stars: Taylor Swift!) But Hathaway’s subplot is as delicious as a box of chocolates, with the A-list actress playing an office receptionist with a side hustle as a phone sex operator to pay off student loans. Her character is also romantically involved with a mailroom clerk, played by Topher Grace. Valentine’s Day has as much depth as a department store greeting card, but if romance has you feeling down, the movie is an admirable pick-me-up.
You can thank (or blame) Bridezillas for Bride Wars. At the height of the reality show’s popularity, Anne Hathaway co-starred with Kate Hudson in the 2009 comedy Bride Wars, the second-to-last film directed by the late Gary Winick. The stars play lifelong childhood friends who enter a bitter and destructive rivalry when they accidentally plan their dream weddings on the same date. Hathaway’s character Emma, a meek schoolteacher, shoulders most of the movie’s emotional core as she learns to be more assertive towards the film’s end. Bride Wars is all nonsense and no brains, but it'’s still a good time if wedding season has left you weary.
Mark your calendars for July 15. Because in the romantic drama One Day, July 15 takes on special importance for two people who find out how much timing really matters in love. Anne Hathaway co-stars with Jim Sturgess as two young people who meet and spend one night together on July 15, 1988. On every July 15 for the next 20 years afterwards, the two weave in and out of each other’s romantic lives, their mutual attraction undeniable but everything else keeps them from being together. One Day is sappy and sentimental, and may not come off as deep as the book it’s based on. But for hopeless romantics, One Day is good to last the year.
I dreamed a dream of time gone by…While Tom Hooper’s cinematic version of the blockbuster Broadway musical inspires a polarizing response even to this day, Anne Hathaway is simply astonishing in her performance as Fantine, Les Mis' female lead. While Fantine dies less than halfway through the story (spoilers?), Hathaway asserts her presence in her rendition of Fantine’s signature song “I Dreamed a Dream.” Whether it’s due to Hathaway’s performance or Tom Hooper’s questionable camera movements and framing, Les Misérables will leave you dizzy.
Fun fact: Anne Hathaway’s mother was an actress, and after seeing her portray Fantine in a national tour of Les Misérables, Hathaway heard her calling to become an actress too.
Trad wives meet troubled lives in this picturesque thriller. Set in early 1960s suburbia, Anne Hathaway stars as Alice, a housewife whose idyllic life is shattered when her son falls to his death. Jessica Chastain co-stars as Céline, Alice’s best friend and neighbor. Their relationship is tested when, amid grief, Alice starts getting strangely close to Céline’s son and becomes a disruptive presence in their home next door. Mothers' Instinct might only look the part of a meaty psychological thriller, but Hathaway and Chastain are unstoppable in their maternal battle of wills.
Anne Hathaway is world famous as one of Hollywood’s most beautiful actresses. But in Robert Zemeckis' The Witches –an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s 1983 novel and remake of the 1990 movie – the A-lister plays the dead-eyed monstrosity known as the Grand High Witch. In Zemeckis' film version, a young boy becomes the target of the Grand High Witch, who has arrived at a lavish hotel with her coven. In her creepy performance, Hathaway teeters between camp creature and sinister serpent, a cartoonish Scandinavian accent that is at once hilarious and off-putting.
In this jukebox send-up of classic fairy tales, Anne Hathaway stars as Ella, a girl from the kingdom of Lamia who is endowed by her fairy godmother a “gift” – or rather, a curse – in which she must obey any order given to her. After her widower father marries a cruel socialite, Ella begins a quest to get rid of the spell for good. Ella Enchanted has abundant color and a featherweight storybook vibe that appeals to kids, but its clever riffs over fairy tale tropes (à la Shrek) and Ella’s unique condition make it a solid watch for adults. Anne Hathaway is especially spellbinding as the movie’s remarkably resourceful lead heroine.
Rom-com auteur Nancy Meyers helms this surprisingly tender movie about friendship that transcends age and experience. After his wife dies, a 70-year-old former executive (Robert De Niro) returns to the workforce to cure retirement boredom; he lands an internship at a hip Brooklyn startup run by its girl-boss CEO, played by Anne Hathaway. In a role reversal from her own mid-aughts hit The Devil Wears Prada, Hathaway plays a boss who “mentors” an underling, but The Intern is all about people learning from each other. Hathaway and De Niro make a strong onscreen pair, their heavyweight bonafides carrying a movie that feels light as a breeze.
It may not be a royal flush like its male-centric originator Ocean’s Eleven, but Ocean’s 8 (directed by Gary Ross) offers up its own heist thrills with a dynamite ensemble. This spin-off/sequel centers on Debbie Ocean (Sandra Bullock), sister of George Clooney’s Danny Ocean who organizes her own heist to steal a $150 million necklace during the Met Gala. Anne Hathaway plays A-list movie star Daphne Kluger, who is unwittingly manipulated by Ocean and her crew into helping them. Hathaway is basically playing a more exaggerated version of her own self-image, and Ocean’s 8 leans into that to deliver an unexpected twist to the plot.
Jane Austen is without question one of the most influential authors of all time. Her senses and sensibilities as a writer have given countless generations of female readers the language to understand society’s (often burdensome) norms towards women. In 2007, Anne Hathaway breathed life into Austen in Becoming Jane, a 2007 romantic biopic loosely based on Jon Hunter Spence’s biography Becoming Jane Austen. While the movie takes huge liberties from historical fact – in particular how close exactly Jane Austen was to her supposed suitor, Thomas Lefroy (played by James McAvoy in the film) – Hathaway asserts her leading lady chops. It is also one of the first movies Hathaway would professionally perform with a questionable British accent.
Havoc’s status as a straight-to-DVD movie betrays how much of a maturing actress Anne Hathaway was showing herself to be. In this unflinching drama from director Barbara Kopple, Anne Hathaway plays a white teenager from a privileged, upper class background who gets involved with Mexican gangs. Essentially a movie about the garishness of slum tourism, Havoc sees Hathaway breaking free from her wholesome image (established from films like The Princess Diaries and Ella Enchanted) to exhibit serious range.
A clunky twist ending shouldn’t take away from how mystifying the rest of Passengers feels. In this late-aughts mystery, Anne Hathaway stars as a psychotherapist, Claire, who is tasked with interviewing survivors of a plane crash. One of her patients, Eric (Patrick Wilson) is unusually chipper, which compels Claire to meet with him one-on-one. As a forbidden romance between doctor and patient starts to bloom, Claire gets close to the truth of what really happened. While Passengers doesn’t land the plane, so to speak, it’s a moody movie that takes audiences for an unexpected ride.
The 2008 comedy Get Smart lives up to the hilarious hijinks of the original Mel Brooks TV series from the 1960s, with Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway leading as the movie’s protagonists. Hathaway is Agent 99, a skilled spy for the top secret agency CONTROL who is partnered with the bumbling but impossibly lucky Maxwell Smart (Carell). The two team up to take down KAOS, a rival terrorist organization. Get Smart isn’t terribly, well, smart, but it cleverly modernizes Brooks' original vision of a spy-fi satire that dresses down James Bond.
In James Gray’s semi-autobiographical drama, a young Jewish-American boy named Paul (Banks Repeta) becomes friends with a Black American classmate (Jaylin Webb), which creates unforeseen problems in 1980 Queens. Anne Hathaway co-stars as Esther, Paul’s mother, who brings some emotional weight to the movie’s story of generational differences and societal change. While the movie is based on Gray’s own childhood, the movie eschews mawkishness and sappy nostalgia for a vibe that is a touch more grounded and real.
In the movie that crowned Anne Hathaway as new Hollywood royalty, the Disney family comedy The Princess Diaries sees Hathaway as Mia Thermopolis, a clumsy and shy high school teenager who discovers she is heir to the throne of Genovia. Across a crowd-pleasing journey, mentored by her Queen regent grandmother (Julie Andrews) and her loyal head of security (Héctor Elizondo), Mia learns to be a worthy princess without losing her priceless self. The Princess Diaries is a note-perfect all-ages affair that foreshadows Hathaway’s greatness to come.
Anne Hathaway rides backseat to Mark Ruffalo in Dark Waters, a riveting legal thriller from director Todd Haynes which dramatizes the case by real-life attorney Robert Bilott against chemical giant DuPont. Hathaway portrays Sarah Bilott, Robert’s wife who is deeply rooted in her Catholic beliefs. Hathaway doesn’t have much to do in the movie besides add personal stakes to Robert’s obsession with DuPont, but she is nevertheless engaging even in a meager supporting role. Add this one to Mark Ruffalo’s signature canon of “They knew!” conspiracy movies.
It is up for debate which actress is truly the greatest Catwoman, but Anne Hathaway is without a doubt a serious contender. In Christopher Nolan’s final movie in his Batman trilogy, Hathaway suits up as the lethally gorgeous Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman, who antagonizes and then aids Batman (Christian Bale) in his mission to save Gotham City from the terrorist Bane (Tom Hardy). As elegant and graceful as a cheetah targeting its prey, Hathaway’s performance is just one of many reasons that make The Dark Knight Rises a cerebral blockbuster.
While Anne Hathaway’s screen time in Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain is miniscule, her multidimensional performance cements the movie’s biggest heartbreaks. In this forbidden gay romance between two Wyoming cowboys (played by Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal), Hathaway has a supporting role as Lureen, a beautiful equestrian who marries Jack (Gyllenhaal) while harboring suspicions about his true love. Late in the movie, Hathaway steals the show in a steely and distant phone call to Ledger’s character. Never mind how she sounds; look into her eyes and you’ll see depths of pain, resentment, and maybe even understanding.
In one of Anne Hathaway’s greatest performances of her career, the actress plays Kym, a recovering addict who temporarily leaves rehab to attend her sister’s wedding. Kym feels she is the black sheep of the family, and harbors immense guilt for the death of her brother Ethan. Through immersive direction by Jonathan Demme – who shot in a handheld vérité style, and encouraged background extras and musicians to act spontaneously regardless of where the camera was – Rachel Getting Married places audiences into the uncomfortable yet familiar dynamics of family. Hathaway is at the center of it all even when her character Kym doesn’t want the attention.
Set in 1960s Massachusetts, Thomasin McKenzie plays Eileen, a lonely young woman who works at a correctional facility for troubled adolescent boys. Eileen’s quiet world is rocked by the arrival of Rebecca, a glamorous counselor played by Anne Hathaway. As if she’s stepped out of an old movie and walks on air, Rebecca mystifies Eileen until their budding friendship takes a dark turn. Eileen is quiet but suspenseful, brimming with red-hot psychological tension in a bitterly cold environment.
“Anne Hathaway controls Godzilla” is a hell of a logline, isn’t it? In this riveting black comedy that stomps over gender politics, Anne Hathaway plays an alcoholic writer who moves back home and reconnects with an old friend (Jason Sudeikis). In a strange twist of fate, Hathaway learns she is psychically connected to a towering kaiju in South Korea. In this effective fusion of tokusatsu movies and magical realism, Colossal struts in its message of female agency – how men can make women feel small, and how monstrous alter egos can become one’s strength.
“Love is the one thing we’re capable of perceiving that transcends dimensions of time and space.” Christopher Nolan’s science fiction drama Interstellar is many things: a mesmerizing journey into deep cosmos, a pseudo post-apocalyptic disaster thriller, a wide-eyed exploration of love. It’s also an Anne Hathaway movie, and it’s one of her best. While Matthew McConaughey is at the forefront as its main protagonist, Hathaway plays a significant role as the calculating Dr. Brand, who despite her composed exterior is someone deep in the throes of love and has launched herself to space in order to live up to it.
Eric Francisco is a freelance entertainment journalist and graduate of Rutgers University. If a movie or TV show has superheroes, spaceships, kung fu, or John Cena, he’s your guy to make sense of it. A former senior writer at Inverse, his byline has also appeared at Vulture, The Daily Beast, Observer, and The Mary Sue. You can find him screaming at Devils hockey games or dodging enemy fire in Call of Duty: Warzone.
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