It almost seems like Julia Roberts has always been a movie star, shining bright even among the biggest actors and actresses in the world. It’s almost impossible to imagine Hollywood without one of its most successful and skilled talents. Ever since she popped on the scene in movies like Mystic Pizza and Steel Magnolias in the late 1980s, Roberts has been a ubiquitous part of the world of movies. It’s hard to overstate just how bankable a star Roberts became in the ‘90s and early 2000s, earning millions of dollars for each role and helping movies earn hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office. Though she has slowed down as she has aged, she remains a power to be reckoned with and now, as we prepare for the release of her newest movie Ticket To Paradise, a romantic comedy with George Clooney, we have ranked her the top ten movies of her long and storied career.
10. Closer (2004)
This 2004 drama follows the story of a doomed “love square” which features such beautiful people as Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Clive Owen and, of course, Roberts. Directed by Mike Nichols, this is a story of deception, where each lie spins into a dozen more and everyone is chasing their tail. The shift from its original form as a play to the screen is a bit of a bumpy transition but the movie is worth the price of admission simply for seeing all these talented actors share the screen.
9. Ocean’s Twelve (2007)
Okay so this one is a bit complicated. Sure, Roberts is but a side player in this sprawling ensemble heist film but, notably, she is one of the twelve, something that wasn’t true in Ocean’s Eleven. Even more important, is one scene specifically within the movie in which, as part of a complicated plan, Roberts plays Tess Ocean pretending to be a pregnant Julia Roberts to fool a real-life Bruce Willis. It is purposefully convoluted but no less hilarious to see this huge movie star essentially winking toward the audience. This may not be her most nuanced or essential performance, but hell if it isn’t a lot of fun.
8. Charlie Wilson’s War (2007)
Roberts once again works with famed director Mike Nichols in what is his last film on 2007’s Charlie Wilson’s War, a biographical drama about congressman Charlie Wilson and a convoluted plot involving the CIA and the Soviet-Afghan War. Here Roberts stars opposite Tom Hanks as Joanne Herring, a political activist and love interest of Wilson’s who brings a newfound focus to the congressman’s life.
7. August: Osage County (2013)
It is for this role that Roberts earned her fourth Academy Award nomination. She plays Barbara Weston-Fordham, a member of a sprawling family with, let’s say, some issues. Also starring here are the likes of Meryl Streep, Sam Sheppard, Ewan McGregor, Julliette Lewis, Chris Cooper, and Benedict Cumberbatch. Written by Tracey Letts, and based on his 2007 play of the same name, August: Osage County is a chamber piece about a dysfunctional family on the brink of falling completely apart. It is not a movie one would describe as fun or easy to watch but it is worth it for the performances alone, all of which are fantastic.
6. Mystic Pizza (1988)
Mystic Pizza, by its very nature, is a minor movie. There is nothing inherently epic about the story of three young women over a summer in Mystic, Connecticut. Which is part of the reason this movie is so impressive, becoming something more nuanced than it has any right to be. Roberts plays Daisy, a young woman who falls head over heels with a man who we eventually learn deserves none of that attention. Thankfully, Daisy learns that too. Mystic Pizza is notable for the way it centers not only Daisy, but here two girl friends Jojo and Kat, rather than the men in their lives. Also notable, is how big of a deal this was for Roberts who, to that point, had bounced around anonymous television roles. This was the movie that put her on the map and, incidentally, gained her the attention of those involved in Steel Magnolias, making it an extremely fortuitous movie in her career.
5. Steel Magnolias (1989)
If Mystic Pizza introduced Julia Roberts to the world, Steel Magnolias was when everyone truly fell in love with this soon-to-be massive movie star. It’s significant to point out just how well Roberts holds her own here with an absolutely star-studded cast of actresses. Sally Field, Shirley MacLaine, Dolly Parton, Olympia Dukakis, and Daryl Hannah all star alongside Roberts in this, an adaptation of the Robert Harling play of the same name, which tells of a group of women who become friends amid a marriage and the preparation therein. It’s notable that two of Robert’s first breakout roles heavily featured women who acted independently of men, something that made her a very new kind of movie star to be sure. Roberts received her first Academy Award nomination for the role, further announcing her stardom.
4. Notting Hill (1999)
Julia Roberts playing one of the biggest movie stars in the world might sound a little on the nose, but it works in this yet another top-notch romantic comedy from the gifted actress. Here she stars opposite Hugh Grant, himself one of the greatest romantic leads of his generation. They play Anna and William respectively, a couple who have no less than three “meet cutes” sprinkled throughout the movie, each more serendipitous than the last. This, like many romantic comedies, is a movie that coasts on its witty dialogue and the endless charm of its leads. Like so many of Roberts’ films, Notting Hill was an absolute smash hit, becoming, at the time, the highest grossing romantic comedy of all time.
3. My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997)
My Best Friend’s Wedding is, for a very specific reason, a movie that could only be made in a pre-2000s era. In it, Roberts’ character Julianne and her ex-boyfriend/current best friend Michael (Dermot Mulroney) make a pact that if they are unmarried at 28 years old they will marry each other. In today’s day and age, it is patently ridiculous to act as if 28 is an age when you must give up on being single and marry for convenience, and yet that is the conceit for this 1997 romantic comedy. The agreement goes about as well you might expect because, of course, Michael finds someone right as they are about to turn 28 and Julianne comes to the conclusion that she was in love with him the whole time. Even worse, she is the maid of honor. Even even worse, the woman Michael is marrying is a 20-year-old Cameron Diaz. So, as you might expect, she begins to undermine the whole affair, sabotaging the wedding in an attempt to get Michael back. Aside from simply putting Diaz and Roberts on screen together, an accomplishment in and of itself, My Best Friend’s Wedding is one of the most accomplished romantic comedies of all time and a great showcase for Roberts.
2. Erin Brockovich (2000)
Erin Brockovich is notable for earning Roberts her first and only Oscar in the Best Actress category at the 2001 Academy Awards. In the movie, she plays the real life activist who battled against Pacific Gas and Electric Company, an organization accused of perpetrating the Hinkley groundwater contamination incident. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, this movie marked a bit of a new direction for Roberts, away from romantic comedies and toward more serious fare. She is predictably excellent here, inhabiting the real-life part and making it wholly her own.
1. Pretty Woman (1990)
By now, you likely know the story of Pretty Woman even if you’ve never actually seen the movie. It is the kind of film that so permeated the culture as to become ubiquitous, referenced again and again in all sorts of venues. But for those who might not be entirely familiar, the story goes like this: Roberts plays Vivian Ward, a prostitute in Hollywood who is hired as an escort by a wealthy businessman named Edward Lewis (Richard Gere). The two, as you might imagine, quickly realize they are not so different as the situation might suggest, making for a steamy and charming love affair. It is hard to overstate how big of a deal this movie was when it was released, becoming the third highest grossing movie of 1990 behind only Ghost and Home Alone. Roberts also earned her second Academy Award nomination, this time for Best Actress.