Tilda Swinton has an incredible filmography that ranges from mainstream movies to art-house productions, and it’s not easy to select only her best without highlighting numerous films. Swinton has appeared in more than 60 movies since making her debut in Caravaggio in 1986. That same year, she starred in Joanna Hogg’s graduation student film Caprice. The two would work together again years later in Hogg’s semi-autobiographical featuresThe Souvenir and The Souvenir Part II, which are among the actress’s best movies.
Swinton is a unique actress, one whom critics appreciate in nearly any role she plays. Swinton nails likable characters as well as terrifying villains. Because of her versatility, it’s difficult to predict what kind of movie Swinton will star in next since she’s taken part in heavy dramas such as We Need to Talk About Kevin and Orlando but also blockbuster franchises including The Chronicles of Narnia and the MCU.
14 Three Thousand Years of Longing (2022)
Three Thousand Years of Longing offers a mystical mosaic of stories on the background of a peculiar romance between a lonely scholar, played by Tilda Swinton, and an ancient djinn. The film is vibrant and magical, floating through many different genres and gradually developing the chemistry between the main characters with the stories they tell each other. It’s one of George Miller’s best movies, highlighting his talent to deal with over-the-top narratives in a creative, self-contained way. Everything in the film seems exaggerated: the colors, the visual effects, the djinn’s suffering, the longing. It’s an effectively good way to fight off the monotony of everyday life transmitted by Swinton’s character.
13 The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button (2008)
After a succession of iconic crime thrillers, David Fincher left his comfort zone with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. The film is a melodramatic take on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story, which revolves around a man who is born old and only gets younger as time progresses.
While Benjamin Button’s story is beautiful, and the character is one of Brad Pitt’s most iconic roles, his arc wouldn’t be so touching if it wasn’t for the variety of enchanting characters he meets throughout his life. One of them is Elizabeth Abbott, brought to life by Tilda Swinton in an intimate, quiet role. Her romance with Benjamin is lovely, but the actress nails the role by establishing a certain distance between the character and the man she loves. This part of the movie efficiently conveys the message that love comes and goes in unexpected ways.
12 Burn After Reading (2008)
After the massive success of the drama No Country for Old Men, the Coen brothers returned to their black comedy style with Burn After Reading. The movie is centered around two gym employees who discover a disk containing secret information about the CIA, giving start to an unpredictable chain of hilarious events and surprising outbursts of violence in a seemingly non-violent movie. The great ensemble cast makes it a worthy experience, featuring George Clooney, Frances McDormand, and Tilda Swinton in comedic roles that verge on the dramatic and thrilling. It’s one of the best examples of the Coen brothers’ knack for not sticking with just one genre in their movies.
11 Orlando (1992)
Orlando is an interesting study of gender dynamics through the eyes of a fictional character created by Virginia Woolf who changes from a man to a woman throughout different centuries. Tilda Swinton’s performance as the title character is sharp and precise, effectively capturing Orlando’s wonder in the face of the changes his body and mind go through. Indeed, Orlando contains one of the best performances by a woman playing a man, and it’s great how it plays with words and time, initially taking place in the 1600s and following Orlando as he transcends into a unique being, always holding on to what makes him human to his core.
10 The Chronicles Of Narnia (2005, 2008, 2010)
Tilda Swinton is introduced in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as the main antagonist of the franchise: the White Witch, who is responsible for freezing the kingdom of Narnia in the Hundred Years Winter. The movies revolve around four siblings who discover a magical world inside their wardrobe and are swept up in a fantastical adventure to defeat the terrifying White Witch. Swinton’s performance is a franchise highlight, stealing the show whenever she’s onscreen. The presence of the witch bumps up the narrative with a mix of fear and awe, as Swinton brings a certain otherworldliness that makes the White Witch so scary.
9 The Souvenir (2009) & The Souvenir Part II (2021)
The Souvenir movies look purposefully old-fashioned, successfully capturing a time in the life of director Joanna Hogg that she so fiercely wants to grasp. The two are clearly as important to Tilda Swinton as they are to Hogg, who puts a lot of her own life experiences into the story. Since the actress and filmmaker are long-time friends, there certainly is a lot of Swinton’s real-life person in her character. The Souvenir follows the young Julie as she attempts to reconcile a turbulent relationship with her filmmaking studies. Swinton plays Julie’s mother in a solemn, intimate performance, speaking through gestures and expressions that which she can’t put into words.
8 Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)
Only Lovers Left Alive is one of the best Tilda Swinton horror movies, using the brutal reality of vampires to discuss the condition of eternal life and the despair that comes with an uneventful routine. Jim Jarmusch’s film is packed with clever allegories, starting with the name of the main couple, Adam and Eve, two vampire lovers whose passion has endured for centuries.
Swinton’s Eve is energetic and full of life, always fascinated by the changing world around her. On the other hand, Adam feels trapped in the monotony of the modern world, feeling that the best of his life has passed. The love that bonds the two characters is unique: they spent so much time together that life apart from each other wouldn’t exist. The chemistry between Swinton and Tom Hiddleston is charming and hypnotizing, carrying the narrative to surprising extremes between romance and horror.
7 We Need To Talk About Kevin (2011)
We Need to Talk About Kevin is a drama that verges on becoming a horror movie, gradually escalating suspense as the story gets closer to the truth about Eva, played by Tilda Swinton, and the horrifying tragedy orchestrated by her son Kevin. From the get-go the movie establishes a dreadful atmosphere of disaster, introducing Eva as the mother of a monster.
The story follows the troubled Kevin from his early childhood to adolescence, when the relationship between mother and son reaches a point of no return. We Need to Talk About Kevin delivers Swinton’s most haunting performance. Eva is quiet and seemingly impassible, with the responsibility of a brutal tragedy weighing upon her. Through her cold eyes, the audience tries to understand the extent to which Eva is to blame for the things Kevin has done.
6 A Bigger Splash (2015)
Alongside Timothée Chalamet, the star of Bones and All and Call Me By Your Name, Tilda Swinton has become one of Luca Guadagnino’s most loyal movie partners, starring in three of his films. While I Am Love and Suspiria offer iconic performances from the actress, it’s in A Bigger Splash that Swinton and Guadagnino seem to be totally in synch.
As is typical of his movies, A Bigger Splash revolves around an unforgettable getaway: Swinton plays Marianne, a famous rock star who sees her vacation with her boyfriend disrupted by the arrival of an old friend and his daughter. Swinton is the kind of actress who uses silence as an efficient performative tool, which comes in handy in a psychological drama as strong as A Bigger Splash. Marianne is overflowed with repressed emotions throughout the movie until they violently burst.
5 Adaptation (2002)
One of the best Charlie Kaufman movies, Adaptation delivers one of Tilda Swinton’s smaller roles, but it might be the most inventive film the actress ever starred in. That’s ironic because the movie is centered around a creative block. Nicolas Cage plays a screenwriter on the verge of a breakdown after being assigned to adapt the book The Orchid Thief.
A lot of the main character’s drama comes from Kaufman’s own real-life concerns, which makes Adaptation a perfect meta-film. The Orchid Thief is a real book and, just like Cage’s character, Kaufman was hired to adapt it but failed to come up with anything productive. Adaptation deals with all these frustrations in a hilarious, often over-the-top fashion, turning a case of writer’s block into a fascinating outburst of imagination.
4 Michael Clayton (2007)
Tilda Swinton swept every major Supporting Actress award back in 2008 for her performance in Michael Clayton, which won her an overdue Academy Award. One of Swinton’s highest-rated movies, it follows the title character (played by George Clooney), a “fixer” assigned by a law firm to handle the case of a litigator’s breakdown in the face of a corrupted client.
Michael Clayton is a great legal thriller that effectively deals with morality versus the danger of enraging powerful enemies. The film delves deep into both sides of the same coin, addressing the harrowing dilemma in an anxiety-inducing narrative. Clooney is great in a charged performance, but Swinton truly is the major highlight in terms of performance. Her character is an unstoppable force behind the biggest twists in the movie.
3 The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
The Grand Budapest Hotel highlights the best Wes Anderson trademarks with a sweet, nostalgic tragicomedy. The movie counts on a star-studded cast and a charming production design to give life to the Grand Budapest Hotel in its thriving years, led by the charismatic concierge M. Gustave and his eccentric partner, Zero.
Anderson manages to turn a simple story into a colorful spectacle, and while The Grand Budapest Hotel doesn’t seem to follow a concise storyline, it’s easy to fall in love with the quirky characters. Tilda Swinton is almost unrecognizable in her role as Madame D., an elderly lady whom M. Gustave had an affair with. Her presence in the film is hilarious but also tragic, which perfectly captures the contrasting elements of the narrative.
2 Snowpiercer (2013)
With Snowpiercer, his first English-speaking movie, Bong Joon-ho brought his talent for fictional stories that are socially conscious to wider audiences. Snowpiercer and Parasite are quite similar, and Bong also previously exposed the inadequacies of Korean society with movies such as Memories of Murder and The Host. This time, Bong’s recurring theme becomes a global-scale matter, with a harrowing conflict that applies to every human: class discrimination in a post-apocalyptic world.
Snowpiercer takes place in a desolated future, where the last human survivors reside in a perpetually moving train where social injustice reigns. In her most iconic villainous role, Tilda Swinton plays Mason, the minister who ensures the poor lives in the worst possible conditions while the rich lead a peaceful, relaxing life. Her punishment methods are terrifying and ignite a violent rebellion.
1 Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
Moonrise Kingdom delivers an array of hilarious characters and marked the beginning of Tilda Swinton’s partnership with Wes Anderson. The movie evokes the sensibility of growing up with the story of two teenagers who fall in love and run away to the wilderness, causing a chaotic chain of events when everyone in their town begins to look for them.
Moonrise Kingdom is moving and captivating with little effort. Its vibrant colors and cozy atmosphere ensures a lighthearted watch that never gets old. Swinton appears as the quirky embodiment of Social Services, a low-key antagonist whose purposefully dull personality clashes with the peculiar events of the movie, delivering some of the funniest scenes.