20 Best Jessica Chastain Movies
From 'Ava' to 'Zero Dark Thirty,' Moviefone counts down the 20 best films of Jessica Chastain's acclaimed career.
Jessica Chastain attends the Governors Ball following the 84th Annual Academy Awards® from Hollywood, CA February 26, 2012. Photo: Heather Ikei / ©A.M.P.A.S. Copyright: ©A.M.P.A.S.
Jessica Chastain is one of the most talented and acclaimed actresses working today.
She first gained attention for her breakout role as Celia Foote in 'The Help,' which earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She would go on to be nominated for Best Actress for 'Zero Dark Thirty' and 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye,' finally winning the award for the latter performance.
Chastain has also as in such popular films as 'Interstellar,' 'The Martian,' 'Crimson Peak,' 'The Huntsman: Winter's War,' 'Miss Sloane,' 'Molly's Game,' 'Dark Phoenix,' 'It Chapter Two,' 'The 355,' and 'The Good Nurse.'
Her new movie, 'Memory,' which also stars Peter Sarsgaard, opens in theaters in limited release on December 22nd before opening wide on January 5th.
In honor of the new film, Moviefone is counting down the 20 best movies of Jessica Chastain's impressive career, including her latest.
Let's begin!
20. 'Dark Phoenix' (2019)
(L to R) Sophie Turner as Jean Grey / Phoenix and Jessica Chastain as Vuk in 'Dark Phoenix.' Photo: 20th Century Fox.
The X-Men face their most formidable and powerful foe when one of their own, Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), starts to spiral out of control. During a rescue mission in outer space, Jean is nearly killed when she's hit by a mysterious cosmic force. Once she returns home, this force not only makes her infinitely more powerful, but far more unstable. The X-Men must now band together to save her soul and battle aliens that want to use Grey's new abilities to rule the galaxy.
19. 'The Huntsman: Winter's War' (2016)
As two evil sisters (Charlize Theron and Emily Blunt) prepare to conquer the land, two renegades—Eric the Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth), who aided Snow White in defeating Ravenna in 'Snow White and the Huntsman', and his forbidden lover, Sara (Chastain)—set out to stop them.
18. 'Armageddon Time' (2022)
From acclaimed filmmaker James Gray, 'Armageddon Time' is a deeply personal story on the strength of family, the complexity of friendship and the generational pursuit of the American Dream. The film features an all-star cast including Anthony Hopkins, Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong.
Armageddon Time
17. 'Ava' (2020)
A black ops assassin (Chastain) is forced to fight for her own survival after a job goes dangerously wrong.
16. 'Texas Killing Fields' (2011)
In the Texas bayous, a local homicide detective (Sam Worthington) teams up with a cop from New York City (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) to investigate a series of unsolved murders.
15. 'Memory' (2023)
(L to R) Peter Sarsgaard and Jessica Chastain in 'Memory.' Photo: Ketchup Entertainment.
Sylvia (Chastain) is a social worker who leads a simple and structured life. This is blown open when Saul (Peter Sarsgaard) follows her home from their high school reunion. Their surprise encounter will profoundly impact both of them as they open the door to the past.
14. 'Crimson Peak' (2015)
In the aftermath of a family tragedy, an aspiring author (Mia Wasikowska) is torn between love for her childhood friend (Charlie Hunnam) and the temptation of a mysterious outsider (Tom Hiddleston). Trying to escape the ghosts of her past, she is swept away to a house that breathes, bleeds… and remembers.
13. 'It Chapter Two' (2019)
27 years after overcoming the malevolent supernatural entity Pennywise, the former members of the Losers' Club, who have grown up and moved away from Derry, are brought back together by a devastating phone call.
12. 'The 355' (2022)
A group of top female agents from American (Chastain), British (Lupita Nyong'o), Chinese (Fan Bingbing), Colombian (Penelope Cruz), and German (Diane Kruger) government agencies are drawn together to try and stop an organization from acquiring a deadly weapon to send the world into chaos.
11. 'The Tree of Life' (2011)
The impressionistic story of a Texas family in the 1950s. The film follows the life journey of the eldest son, Jack (Sean Penn), through the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years as he tries to reconcile a complicated relationship with his father (Brad Pitt). Jack finds himself a lost soul in the modern world, seeking answers to the origins and meaning of life while questioning the existence of faith.
10. 'The Good Nurse' (2022)
(L to R) Eddie Redmayne as Charles "Charlie" Cullen, and Jessica Chastain as Amy Loughren in Netflix's 'The Good Nurse.'
Suspicious that her colleague (Eddie Redmayne) is responsible for a series of mysterious patient deaths, a nurse (Chastain) risks her own life to uncover the truth.
9. 'Molly's Game' (2017)
Molly Bloom (Chastain), a young skier and former Olympic hopeful becomes a successful entrepreneur (and a target of an FBI investigation) when she establishes a high-stakes, international poker game.
8. 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye' (2021)
From the 1960's to the 1980's, evangelist Jim Baker (Andrew Garfield) and his ambitious wife, Tammy Faye (Chastain), rose from humble beginnings to to build an empire based on big-time evangelical Christianity--only for the couple to fall from grace because of some all-too-human sins.
The Eyes of Tammy Faye
7. 'A Most Violent Year' (2014)
A thriller set in New York City during the winter of 1981, statistically one of the most violent years in the city's history, and centered on the lives of an immigrant (Oscar Isaac) and his family trying to expand their business and capitalize on opportunities as the rampant violence, decay, and corruption of the day drag them in and threaten to destroy all they have built.
A Most Violent Year
6. 'Lawless' (2012)
In 1931, the Bondurant brothers of Franklin County, Virginia, run a multipurpose backwoods establishment that hides their true business — bootlegging. Middle brother Forrest (Tom Hardy) is the brain of the operation; older Howard (Jason Clarke) is the brawn, and younger Jack (Shia LaBeouf), the lookout. Though the local police have taken bribes and left the brothers alone, a violent war erupts when a sadistic lawman from Chicago arrives and tries to shut down the Bondurants operation.
5.'Miss Sloane' (2016)
Jessica Chastain as Madeline "Elizabeth" Sloane in 'Miss Sloane.' Photo: Relativity EuropaCorp Distribution.
An ambitious lobbyist (Chastain) faces off against the powerful gun lobby in an attempt to pass gun control legislation.
4. 'The Help' (2011)
Aibileen Clark (Viola Davis) is a middle-aged African-American maid who has spent her life raising white children and has recently lost her only son; Minny Jackson (Octavia Spencer) is an African-American maid who has often offended her employers despite her family's struggles with money and her desperate need for jobs; and Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan (Emma Stone) is a young white woman who has recently moved back home after graduating college to find out her childhood maid has mysteriously disappeared. These three stories intertwine to explain how life in Jackson, Mississippi revolves around "the help"; yet they are always kept at a certain distance because of racial lines.
3. 'Interstellar' (2014)
The adventures of a group of explorers who make use of a newly discovered wormhole to surpass the limitations on human space travel and conquer the vast distances involved in an interstellar voyage.
Interstellar
2. 'The Martian' (2015)
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.
1. 'Zero Dark Thirty' (2012)
Jessica Chastain as Maya Harris in 'Zero Dark Thirty.' Photo: Sony Pictures Releasing.
A chronicle of the decade-long hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden after the September 2001 attacks, and his death at the hands of the Navy S.E.A.L. Team 6 in May, 2011.
