Naming the best movies of all time is daunting for all of the reasons you might expect. There have been thousands of movies since motion pictures were first invented, and while not all of them are great, there are certainly plenty that fit the bill. A list like this can never even hope to be comprehensive, because seeing every movie is impossible in and of itself.
It’s also, at least to some extent, a question of taste. Even so, we’ve tried our best to find movies that fit the bill and will remind you exactly what movies can do at their very best. Without further ado, these are the best movies to stream right now.
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Titanic (1997)
194m
Genre
Drama, Romance
Stars
Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane
Directed by
James Cameron
Watch on Paramount+
There are some cynical people out there who believe that Titanic‘s over-sentimentality is its biggest weakness. The movie was a juggernaut upon its release, but does it still work almost 30 years later? Yes. Yes it does. The film’s story of a tragic love set aboard the ill-fated ship is brilliant precisely because it is heartbreaking in all the ways you might expect, but it manages to combine that heartbreak with a genuinely awe-inspiring hour in which the ship is slowly sinking. Every time you watch it, you’ll want to believe that the outcome can change, which is the hallmark of all great tragedy. Nobody does it like James Cameron.
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
228m
Genre
Adventure, History, War
Stars
Peter O'Toole, Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn
Directed by
David Lean
Watch on max
One of the great epics ever made, Lawrence of Arabia tells the story of T.E. Lawrence, a British lieutenant who is sent to retreat with an Arab prince during a war against the Turks. Although it details Lawrence’s exploits, Lawrence of Arabia truly works because of its incredible desert vistas and because the movie is so fascinated with Lawrence the man. Few movies have the kind of grandeur and sweep that this one contains, and even fewer have stood the test of time as well as this one has.
The Social Network (2010)
121m
Genre
Drama
Stars
Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, Armie Hammer
Directed by
David Fincher
Watch on Amazon
Although it’s not a new movie, The Social Network still feels like one of the best artifacts about living your life online. Telling the story of Facebook’s founding, the film follows a young Mark Zuckerberg as he comes up with the idea for the company and then eventually betrays his best friend in order to ensure that it continues to grow. Featuring startlingly great performances from Jesse Eisenberg and Andrew Garfield, one of the best scripts of Aaron Sorkin’s career, and David Fincher’s cold, calculated direction, The Social Network is profound and endlessly rewatchable.
Rear Window (1954)
115m
Genre
Thriller, Mystery
Stars
James Stewart, Grace Kelly, Wendell Corey
Directed by
Alfred Hitchcock
Watch on Amazon
Alfred Hitchcock made a number of all-time classics during his run of Hollywood dominance, but Rear Window might be the very best of the bunch. The movie follows a photographer who is recovering from a broken leg, and is therefore trapped in his apartment. When he begins to take an interest in looking through his neighbors’ windows, he starts to suspect that one of them murdered his wife. A movie about the act of watching, featuring career-best work from Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly, Rear Window is thrilling and meditative.
Do the Right Thing (1989)
Spike Lee’s primal scream about America’s foundational sins, Do the Right Thing is maybe the single best meditation on race in America that has ever been put to screen. The film is set on the hottest day of the year on a single block in Brooklyn. The block’s residents are primarily Black and Latino, and they frequent a pizza joint owned by a proud Italian and his bigoted kids. As tensions rise inside the community, we come to understand the way racism infuses everything that has happened in the film, and we appreciate just how long this problem has been around.
Citizen Kane (1941)
119m
Genre
Mystery, Drama
Stars
Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore
Directed by
Orson Welles
Watch on Amazon
Few movies live up to the hype when you actually see them for the first time, but Citizen Kane manages to do exactly that. The movie, which is widely regarded as one of the best films ever made, tells the story of the fictional Charles Foster Kane, a newspaper magnate who becomes one of the most powerful men in the world. Based on William Randolph Hearst’s actual story, Citizen Kane is really a movie about a man who has everything that money can be, but is still totally isolated from the world around him. It’s a brilliant, tragic, beautiful story anchored by Orson Welles’s impressive performance and his even better direction.
The Godfather (1972)
175m
Genre
Drama, Crime
Stars
Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan
Directed by
Francis Ford Coppola
Watch on Paramount+
Another movie that you probably expected to find on this list, it’s hard to find new things to say about The Godfather. This quintessential gangster movie tells the story of the Corleone family as power passes from the family’s patriarch to the son who never wanted that responsibility. Featuring outstanding performances from its entire ensemble, innumerable iconic scenes and sequences, and some of the best work of Francis Ford Coppola’s career, The Godfather is a journey into the heart of darkness, but it’s also a movie that has earned its reputation.
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
149m
Genre
Science Fiction, Mystery, Adventure
Stars
Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, William Sylvester
Directed by
Stanley Kubrick
Watch on max
One of the foundational sci-fi texts, 2001: A Space Odyssey is widely regarded as a masterpiece for a reason. The movie is split into four parts, and primarily tells the story of a mission to investigate an obelisk that has been discovered in our solar system. The structure has a number of strange properties, and the ship’s crew is also forced to deal with a rogue artificial intelligence system that seems to be malfunctioning. Directed by Stanley Kubrick, 2001: A Space Odyssey is the kind of great sci-fi movie that can be hard to wrap your head around, but that’s precisely the reason it needs to be on this list.
The Night of the Hunter (1955)
93m
Genre
Crime, Drama, Thriller
Stars
Billy Chapin, Robert Mitchum, Sally Jane Bruce
Directed by
Charles Laughton
Watch on Amazon
Telling the story of a serial killer who finds out about $10,000 in loot from his cellmate in prison, The Night of the Hunter chronicles this man as he ingratiates himself in his cellmate’s family in order to find the money. Those specifics anchor the movie’s plot, but Night of the Hunter is worth watching largely because of the atmosphere of dread that it manages to create from its very first moment. This is a fable about children being chased by the devil, and it feels as weighty as that description makes it sound.
