25 Best Meryl Streep Movies Ranked Including 'The Devil Wears Prada 2'
From 'Kramer vs. Kramer' to 'The Iron Lady', Moviefone counts down the 25 best movies of Meryl Streep's award-winning career, including her latest.
Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly in 20th Century Studios' 'The Devil Wears Prada 2'. Photo by Macall Polay. © 2026 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved.
Meryl Streep is the GOAT of American acting!
She is widely regarded as one of the greatest living actresses and holds the record for the most Oscar nominations of any actor, with 21 across the Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress categories.
Streep has appeared in some of the most critically acclaimed films of all time including 'The Deer Hunter', 'Kramer vs. Kramer', 'Sophie's Choice', and 'August: Osage County', as well as fan favorite movies like 'Defending Your Life', 'Death Becomes Her', the 'Mamma Mia!' series, and of course, 'The Devil Wears Prada'.
Streep's new movie, which is the long-awaited sequel, 'The Devil Wears Prada 2', also starring Anne Hathaway and Emily Blunt, opens in theaters on May 1st.
In honor of the new film, Moviefone is counting down the top 25 movies of Meryl Streep's iconic career, including her latest.
Let's begin!
Related Article: Movie Review: 'The Devil Wears Prada 2'
25. 'She-Devil' (1989)
(L to R) Meryl Streep, Ed Begley Jr. and Roseanne Barr in 'Postcards from the Edge.' Photo: Columbia Pictures.
A cunning and resourceful housewife (Roseanne Barr) vows revenge on her husband (Ed Begley Jr.) when he begins an affair with a wealthy romance novelist (Streep).
24. 'Out of Africa' (1985)
Tells the life story of Danish author Karen Blixen (Streep), who at the beginning of the 20th century moved to Africa to build a new life for herself. The film is based on her 1937 autobiographical novel.
23. 'Julie & Julia' (2009)
Julia Child (Streep) and Julie Powell (Amy Adams) – both of whom wrote memoirs – find their lives intertwined. Though separated by time and space, both women are at loose ends... until they discover that with the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible.
22. 'Florence Foster Jenkins' (2016)
The story of Florence Foster Jenkins (Streep), a New York heiress, who dreamed of becoming an opera singer, despite having a terrible singing voice.
21. 'The Hours' (2002))
The story of three women (Streep, Julianne Moore and Nicole Kidman) searching for more potent, meaningful lives. Each is alive at a different time and place, all are linked by their yearnings and their fears. Their stories intertwine, and finally come together in a surprising, transcendent moment of shared recognition.
20. 'Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again' (2018)
The cast of 'Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again'. Photo: Universal Pictures.
Five years after meeting her three fathers, Sophie Sheridan (Amanda Seyfried) prepares to open her mother’s hotel. In 1979, young Donna Sheridan (Lily James) meets the men who each could be Sophie’s biological father.
19. 'The Bridges of Madison County' (1995)
Photographer Robert Kincaid (Clint Eastwood) wanders into the life of housewife Francesca Johnson (Streep) for four days in the 1960s.
18. 'Doubt' (2008)
In 1964 Bronx, two Catholic school nuns (Streep and Amy Adams) question the new priest's (Philip Seymour Hoffman) ambiguous relationship with a troubled African-American student (Joseph Foster).
17. 'It's Complicated' (2009)
Ten years after their divorce, Jane (Streep) and Jake Adler (Alec Baldwin) unite for their son's college graduation and unexpectedly end up sleeping together. But Jake is married, and Jane is embarking on a new romance with her architect (Steve Martin). Now, she has to sort out her life—just when she thought she had it all figured out.
16. 'Death Becomes Her' (1992)
Madeline (Streep) is married to Ernest (Bruce Willis), who was once her arch-rival Helen's fiancé. After recovering from a mental breakdown, Helen (Goldie Hawn) vows to kill Madeline and steal back Ernest. Unfortunately for everyone, the introduction of a magic potion causes things to be a great deal more complicated than a mere murder plot.
15. 'The Devil Wears Prada 2' (2026)
(L to R) Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly and Stanley Tucci as Nigel Kipling in 20th Century Studios' 'The Devil Wears Prada 2'. Photo by Macall Polay. © 2026 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved.
As Miranda Priestly (Streep) nears retirement, she reunites with Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) to face off against her former assistant turned rival: Emily Charlton (Emily Blunt).
14. 'Evil Angels' (1988)
Better known as 'A Cry in the Dark', the movie is based on the true story of Lindy Chamberlain (Streep) who, during a family camping trip to Ayers Rock in central Australia, claimed she witnessed a dingo take her baby daughter, Azaria, from their tent. Azaria's body was never found and, after investigations and two public inquests, she is charged with murder.
13. 'The River Wild' (1994)
Gail (Streep) and Tom Hartman (David Strathaim) are struggling to stay together and decide to take a white-water rafting holiday adventure in Montana for their son Roarke's (Joseph Mazzello) 10th birthday, only to meet up with a pair of mysterious men whose desperation grows, turning their vacation into a nightmare.
12. 'Silkwood' (1983)
Like most of the people in her town, Karen Silkwood (Streep) works at the local nuclear plant producing highly radioactive plutonium. Exposed one day to a lethal dose of radiation, Karen faces the blank walls of corporate indifference and denial. As her illness increases, her protest grows louder and she becomes an obvious danger to the powers that be.
11. 'Adaptation.' (2002)
Charlie Kaufman (Nicholas Cage) is a confused L.A. screenwriter overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy, sexual frustration, self-loathing, and by the screenwriting ambitions of his freeloading twin brother Donald (also Nicholas Cage). While struggling to adapt "The Orchid Thief," by Susan Orlean (Streep), Kaufman's life spins from pathetic to bizarre. The lives of Kaufman and Orlean's book, become strangely intertwined as each one's search for passion collides with the others'.
10. 'The Post' (2018)
(L to R) Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks in 'The Post.' Photo: 20th Century Fox.
A cover-up that spanned four U.S. Presidents pushed the country's first female newspaper publisher (Streep) and a hard-driving editor (Tom Hanks) to join an unprecedented battle between journalist and government. Inspired by true events.
9. 'Fantastic Mr. Fox' (2009)
The Fantastic Mr. Fox (George Clooney), bored with his current life, plans a heist against the three local farmers. The farmers, tired of sharing their chickens with the sly fox, seek revenge against him and his family.
8. 'The Deer Hunter' (1978)
Three steelworkers (Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken and John Savage) enlist in the army and are sent to Vietnam, one leaving behind a rushed marriage, the others a shared love. What they encounter during the war changes their lives forever.
7. 'Defending Your Life' (1991)
Is there love after death? After he dies suddenly, the hapless advertising executive Daniel Miller (Albert Brooks) finds himself in Judgment City, a gleaming way station where the newly deceased must prove they lived a life of sufficient courage to advance in their journey through the universe. As the self-doubting Daniel struggles to make his case, a budding relationship with the uninhibited Julia (Streep) offers him a chance to finally feel alive.
6. 'Kramer vs. Kramer' (1979)
Ted Kramer (Dustin Hoffman) is a career man for whom his work comes before his family. His wife Joanna (Streep) cannot take this anymore, so she decides to leave him. Ted is now faced with the tasks of housekeeping and taking care of himself and their young son Billy (Justin Henry).
5. 'Postcards from the Edge' (1990)
(L to R) Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine in 'Postcards from the Edge.' Photo: Columbia Pictures.
A substance-addicted actress (Streep) tries to look on the bright side even as she's forced to move back in with her mother (Shirley MacLaine) to avoid unemployment.
4. 'Sophie's Choice' (1983)
Stingo (Peter MacNicol), a young writer, moves to Brooklyn in 1947 to begin work on his first novel. As he becomes friendly with Sophie (Streep) and her lover Nathan (Kevin Kline), he learns that she is a Holocaust survivor. Flashbacks reveal her harrowing story, from pre-war prosperity to Auschwitz. In the present, Sophie and Nathan's relationship increasingly unravels as Stingo grows closer to Sophie and Nathan's fragile mental state becomes ever more apparent.
3. 'Mamma Mia!' (2008)
A spirited young bride-to-be (Amanda Seyfried) living with her single mother (Streep) on a small Greek island secretly invites three of her mother's ex-boyfriends (Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, and Stellan Skarsgård) in hope of finding her biological father to walk her down the aisle.
2. 'The Iron Lady' (2012)
A look at the life of Margaret Thatcher (Streep), the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, with a focus on the price she paid for power.
1. 'The Devil Wears Prada' (2006)
Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly in 2006's 'The Devil Wears Prada .'
A young woman from the Midwest (Anne Hathaway) gets more than she bargained for when she moves to New York to become a writer and ends up as the assistant to the tyrannical, larger-than-life editor-in-chief (Streep) of a major fashion magazine.
