Ben Kingsley is an English actor on the big and small screens. His career has spanned five decades and has seen him appear in some fantastic movies.
The outstanding level of Kingsley’s talent has also seen him nominated for four Academy Awards, with the star winning on one occasion.
In this piece, we’ll rank Kingsley’s 22 best films, starting with the finest and working down. Be warned, his list of credits is so brilliant that some genuinely fabulous movies miss out here.
1 – Schindler’s List (1993, directed by Steven Spielberg)
Schindler’s List is an epic historical drama movie based on Australian novelist Thomas Keneally’s 1982 novel Schindler’s Ark. It focuses on the eponymous Oskar Schindler, a German industrialist who saved over one thousand predominantly Polish-Jewish refugees during World War II’s Holocaust by employing them in his factories.
It stars Liam Neeson as Schindler with a top-notch supporting cast that includes Ralph Fiennes, Caroline Goodall, Jonathan Sagall, Embeth Davidtz, and Kingsley, who superbly plays Holocaust survivor Itzhak Stern. It received 12 Academy Award nominations and won seven, including Best Picture and Best Director. Schindler’s List is a must-see masterpiece that combines the undoubted horror of the Holocaust with Spielberg’s trademark tender touch. It’s brilliantly performed and directed, visually stunning, highly emotional, and sometimes utterly terrifying.
2 – Gandhi (1982, directed by Richard Attenborough)
Gandhi is an epic biographical movie chronicling the life of the leader of an Indian independence movement against the British Empire during the 20th century, Mahatma Gandhi, from 1893 until his assassination in 1948.
Kingsley stars in the eponymous role in this one and is perfect. His astonishing performance won him his only Academy Award as he beat Dustin Hoffman, Jack Lemmon, Paul Newman, and Peter O’Toole to the Best Actor gong. The excellent supporting cast includes Candice Bergen, Edward Fox, John Gielgud, Trevor Howard, John Mills, Martin Sheen, and Rohini Hattangadi. Gandhi received 11 Academy Award nominations and won eight, including Best Picture and Best Director. It’s another must-see film that’s intelligent, emotional, profound, and wonderfully old-fashioned.
3 – Searching for Bobby Fischer (1993, directed by Steven Zaillian)
Searching for Bobby Fischer (known as Innocent Moves in the United Kingdom) is a drama movie based on the life of chess prodigy Joshua Waitzkin. It’s adapted from the 1988 book by Joshua’s father, Fred Waitzkin, called Searching for Bobby Fischer: The Father of a Prodigy Observes the World of Chess. The film chronicles Joshua’s efforts to harden himself to be more like unlikable chess champion Fischer.
It stars Joe Mantegna as Fred, Max Pomeranc as Joshua, Laurence Fishburne, Joan Allen, and Kingsley, who plays Bruce Pandolfini, Joshua’s chess tutor. The whole cast is excellent, and Kingsley is as astute as ever. Searching for Bobby Fischer is an insightful, sensitive, and fascinating film that can be enjoyed as much by people who have no interest in chess as those who love the game.
4 – Dave (1993, directed by Ivan Reitman)
Dave is a political comedy movie about the eponymous Dave Kovic, who looks uncannily like the United States president and gets recruited by the Secret Service to become a momentary stand-in for him.
Its excellent cast includes Kevin Kline as Dave, Sigourney Weaver, Frank Langella, Kevin Dunn, Ving Rhames, Charles Grodin, Laura Linney, and Kingsley, who plays Vice President Gary Nance with apt authority and humor. Dave is charming, earnest, subtly funny, refreshing, and aided by a fantastic performance from Kline and his supporting ensemble.
5 – Hugo (2011, directed by Martin Scorsese)
Hugo is an adventure drama movie based on Brian Selznick’s 2007 children’s historical fiction book “The Invention of Hugo Cabret.” It’s about the eponymous boy who lives alone in Paris’ Gare Montparnasse railway station in the 1930s and gets entangled in a mystery involving his late father’s automaton and pioneering filmmaker Georges Méliès.
Its ensemble cast includes Asa Butterfield as Hugo, Sacha Baron Cohen, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Jude Law, and Kingsley, who is brilliant as toy shop owner Georges Méliès, AKA Papa Georges. Hugo is a dazzling, extravagant, and elegant film that’s incredibly personal and teeming with charm and joy. It’s unlike anything else Scorsese has ever made but is right up with his best offerings.
6 – The Jungle Book (2016, directed by Jon Favreau)
The Jungle Book is an adventure drama based on Rudyard Kipling’s eponymous 1894 collective works and a live-action/CGI remake of Walt Disney’s 1967 animated feature movie. It’s about an orphaned human boy named Mowgli who, aided by his animal guardians, embarks on a journey of self-discovery while the evil Bengal tiger Shere Khan pursues him.
Neel Sethi plays Mowgli, and voice and motion capture performances come from Bill Murray, Idris Elba, Lupita Nyong’o, Scarlett Johansson, Giancarlo Esposito, Christopher Walken, and Kingsley, who elegantly portrays Bagheera, a black panther who is Mowgli’s mentor and protector. The Jungle Book is a lovely, exciting, spectacular, and thoroughly fun film with incredible CGI augmented by a fantastic voice cast. It compares well to the original movie, although comparisons are pointless, given how fresh this one feels.
7 – Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021, directed by Destin Daniel Cretton)
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a superhero movie and the 25th installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s an origin story for the eponymous character, AKA Shaun, who gets forced to confront his past when his father, the Ten Rings terrorist organization leader, draws him and his sister into the search for a mythical village.
Simi Liu plays the eponymous character with fabulous support from Awkwafina, Meng’er Zhang, Fala Chen, Florian Munteanu, Benedict Wong, Yuen Wah, Michelle Yeoh, Tony Leung, and Kingsley, who hilariously reprises his role as Trevor Slattery from 2013’s Iron Man 3 and the 2014 short film All Hail the King. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is an exciting, colorful, extravagant, action-packed, and funny film that smoothly melds several genres.
8 – TransSiberian (2008, directed by Brad Anderson)
TransSiberian is a psychological thriller that follows an American couple from Beijing to Moscow on the Trans-Siberian Railway. It becomes a thrilling trail of deception and murder when they meet an enigmatic pair of fellow travelers.
It stars Woody Harrelson, Emily Mortimer, Kate Mara, Eduardo Noriega, Thomas Kretschmann, and Kingsley, who plays a narcotics officer called Ilya Grinko in a typically intense fashion. TransSiberian is a taut, fast-paced, suspenseful, dark, absorbing, and atmospheric film brilliantly performed by its talented and experienced cast, most of whom play highly fleshed-out characters.
9 – Sexy Beast (2000, directed by Jonathan Glazer)
Sexy Beast is a British crime movie about a retired criminal who gets visited in Spain by a feared sociopathic gangster and former associate who demands that he participates in a bank robbery.
Ray Winstone plays Gary “Gal” Dove, the retired con, and Kingsley plays Don Logan, the violent sociopath who visits him. Both men are fantastic – Kingsley is electrifying – and ably supported by Ian McShane, Amanda Redman, Cavan Kendall, and James Fox. Sexy Beast is one of the best British gangster films ever made. It’s teeming with style and swagger and is visceral and captivating from beginning to end.
10. Betrayal (1983, directed by David Jones)
Betrayal is a drama movie and an adaptation of Harold Pinter’s 1978 play. The plot chronicles a seven-year extramarital affair between a literary agent and his best friend’s wife and unfolds in reverse-chronological order in nine sequences.
Jeremy Irons plays Jerry, the literary agent, and Patricia Hodge plays Emma, his best friend’s wife. Kingsley plays Robert, Jerry’s best friend whose wife cheats on him. All three stars give stunning performances. Betrayal is absorbing, moving, and funny, and the reverse order in which it plays out is far more than just a gimmick; it’s essential to the film’s genius. It received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
11. Bugsy (1991, directed by Barry Levinson)
Bugsy is a biographical crime drama based on the life of American mobster Ben “Bugsy” Siegel, how he started his gangster career in Las Vegas, and his relationship with his wife, the starlet and outfit courier Virginia Hill.
Warren Beatty plays Siegel, and Annette Bening plays Hill. The impressive supporting cast includes Harvey Keitel, Elliott Gould, Joe Mantegna, Bebe Neuwirth, and Kingsley, who plays Meyer Lansky, one of Siegel’s criminal partners. It’s a fantastic ensemble, and Beatty, Keitel, and Kingsley all received Academy Award nominations for their powerful and magnetic performances. Bugsy received ten nominations, winning two for Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design. It’s brilliantly written, passionate, stylish, exuberant, insightful, and entertaining from start to finish.
12 – The Walk (2015, directed by Robert Zemeckis)
The Walk is a 3D biographical drama movie based on the story of 24-year-old French high-wire artist Philippe Petit’s daring tightrope walk between the World Trade Center’s iconic Twin Towers in August of 1974.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as Petit, with support from Charlotte Le Bon as fellow street performer Annie Allix and Kingsley as Papa Rudy, one of the pioneers of tightrope walking whom Petit asks for advice. He’s terrific, but Gordon-Levitt is exceptional and charming in the lead role. The Walk is an absorbing visual feast full of thrills with a stunning climactic sequence. Your stomach will turn watching the eponymous walk, as some cinematography in the film makes you feel like you’re there.
13 – Photographing Fairies (1997, directed by Nick Willing)
Photographing Fairies is a British fantasy movie based on Steve Szilagyi’s 1992 novel. Inspired by the Cottingley Fairies hoax, it follows a photographer obsessed with two British girls’ claims that they encountered and took photographs of fairies at the bottom of their aunt’s garden.
Toby Stephens stars as Charles Castle, the photographer, and Kingsley is exceptional as Nicholas Templeton, a Christian minister and the British girls’ father. Frances Barber, Emily Woof, Philip Davis, and Rachel Shelley round off the superb cast. Photographing Fairies is an intelligent, refreshing, and appropriately gorgeously filmed movie with a lot of heart.
14 – Death and the Maiden (1994, directed by Roman Polanski)
Death and the Maiden is a mystery drama movie based on Ariel Dorfman’s 1990 play. It’s about a political activist who believes the guest her husband brings home is a man who was part of her country’s old corrupt government regime and sexually abused and tortured her for weeks while she was blindfolded.
The three core cast members are Sigourney Weaver as activist Paulina Escobar, Stuart Wilson as her lawyer husband Gerardo Escobar, and Kingsley as Roberto Miranda, the doctor Gerardo brings home. Death and the Maiden is a claustrophobic and tense film that could have been a dull toil, given the mundane setting. However, with expert direction and three seasoned performances, it’s brilliant.
15 – Turtle Diary (1985, directed by John Irvin)
Turtle Diary is a British romantic comedy-drama adapted from Russell Hoban’s 1975 novel. It’s about a man and woman who feel the sea turtles at London Zoo are unnaturally confined in their tanks, prompting them to plan to steal two of them and free them into the ocean, forming a bond as they do so.
It stars Glenda Jackson as Neaera Duncan, a children’s author, and Kingsley as William Snow, a bookstore attendant. They’re both brilliant, with nuanced performances and excellent chemistry. The supporting cast includes Richard Johnson, Michael Gambon, Nigel Hawthorne, and Harold Pinter. Turtle Diary is engaging, funny, exquisitely acted, and tells a lovely little story.
16 – Maurice (1987, directed by James Ivory)
Maurice is a British romantic drama based on E. M. Forster’s 1971 novel. It’s about the eponymous Maurice Hall and chronicles his time at university, turbulent relationships, struggles to fit into society, and eventual coming together with his life partner.
James Wilby stars as the eponymous character, and the stellar supporting cast includes Hugh Grant, Rupert Graves, Denholm Elliott, Simon Callow, and Kingsley, who expertly plays a doctor named Lasker-Jones, who attempts to “cure” Maurice’s homosexual longings using hypnosis. Maurice is powerful, sensitive, enlightening, intelligent, and wonderfully acted. It received a nomination for Best Costume Design at the Academy Awards.
17 – Sneakers (1992, directed by Phil Alden Robinson)
Sneakers is a thriller movie about a security professional who finds his past returning to haunt him when he and his specialist team get tasked with recovering a mysterious “black box.”
Robert Redford leads the cast as Martin Bishop. The exquisite supporting cast includes Dan Aykroyd, Mary McDonnell, River Phoenix, Sidney Poitier, David Strathairn, and Kingsley, who does a decent job as Cosmo, a computer hacker. Sneakers is a film with witty humor, some excellent performances, and a great script, but it has a thin plot and fails to build up much suspense. It’s worth watching for the talented ensemble.
18 – Testimony (1998, directed by Tony Palmer)
Testimony is a British independent musical drama movie based on the memoirs of the Russian composer and pianist Dmitri Shostakovich as dictated in Solomon Volkov’s 1979 book. It tells the story of Shostakovich and his life and career during Stalin’s rule.
Kingsley plays the lead role of Shostakovich and does fabulously, as you’d expect. He has top support from Terence Rigby, Ronald Pickup, John Shrapnel, and Liza Goddard, who all do solid jobs. Testimony is an ambitious film with suitably fabulous music. It’s visually intriguing, highly dramatic, and a terrifying look into what life was like in the Soviet Union under the rule of Stalin. Its major flaw is that it’s very slowly paced.
19 – Journey to Mecca (2009, directed by Bruce Neibaur)
Journey to Mecca is an IMAX dramatized feature-length documentary movie chronicling the first Muslim pilgrimage made by the Islamic scholar Ibn Battuta, in 1325, from his native Morocco to Mecca for the Hajj.
It stars a largely unknown cast of Arabic actors: Chems-Eddine Zinoune, Hassam Ghancy, Nabil Elouahabi, and Nadim Sawalha. They all do great jobs. Kingsley narrates this one in an authoritative and informative fashion. Journey to Mecca is unusual but highly entertaining. It’s powerful and appropriately moody, and it contains some stunning footage.
20 – A Birder’s Guide to Everything (2013, directed by Rob Meyer)
A Birder’s Guide to Everything is an independent adventure comedy-drama movie about teenage birdwatchers who go on a road trip to find the supposedly extinct Labrador duck on the eve of one of their father’s weddings.
Its talented cast includes Kodi Smit-McPhee, Katie Chang, Alex Wolff, James Le Gros, Daniela Lavender, and Kingsley, who brilliantly plays the cantankerous writer and birding legend Lawrence Konrad. A Birder’s Guide to Everything is a pleasant, intelligent, funny, and eye-opening film among the finest coming-of-age offerings in recent years. It’s like an avian Stand by Me.
21 – Iron Man 3 (2013, directed by Shane Black)
Iron Man 3 is a superhero movie, a sequel to 2008’s Iron Man and 2010’s Iron Man 2, and the seventh installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It follows the eponymous Tony Stark as he struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder and panic attacks following his experiences in 2012’s The Avengers while a terrorist wages war on the United States.
Robert Downey Jr. is again fantastic as Stark, and the supporting cast includes Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Rebecca Hall, William Sadler, Jon Favreau, and Kingsley, who delightfully plays the hapless actor Trevor Slattery, oblivious to the horrific actions carried out in his image. Iron Man 3 is the most underrated film in the MCU. While it doesn’t live up to Iron Man’s greatness, it has excellent action, top performances, and plenty of humor while notably darker than its predecessors, which was a welcome change. It received a nomination for Best Visual Effects at the Academy Awards.
22 – Jules (2023, directed by Marc Turtletaub)
Jules is a sci-fi comedy movie about a man living a quiet life of mundane routine in a small western Pennsylvania town whose life gets turned upside down when a UFO crash lands in his backyard, and he befriends the alien on board, naming him “Jules.”
Kingsley plays Milton, the main character, with a mainly little-known but talented supporting cast. The Englishman is great and very funny as the man who befriends the alien. Jules is a quirky little film that’s poignant, engaging, heartfelt, and amusing. It’s not the kind of role Kingsley usually takes, but it suits him to a T.
