Few actors have the range that Rachel McAdams has. Who else could play Regina George, The Notebook a couple of years later, McAdams was hailed as Hollywood’s new “it girl.” So, here are Rachel McAdams’ 10 Best Movies, According To Rotten Tomatoes.
Red Eye (79%)
Wes Craven directed this psychological thriller as a response to widespread post-9/11 fears. It’s set on an airplane and has an absurdly convoluted terrorist plot. Cillian Murphy plays one of the terrorists, who corners Rachel McAdams’ hotel manager character on a plane and forces her to give his fellow terrorists access to the Presidential suite in her hotel, which will provide the perfect vantage point to assassinate a politician on a yacht...and they’ve kidnapped her family as leverage. A few of those steps probably didn’t need to be there. Despite the terrorists’ unnecessarily complex plan, compelling thriller that never loses the audience’s attention.
TIE: Disobedience (84%)
This nuanced romantic drama Disobedience is about a woman (Rachel Weisz) returning to the Orthodox Jewish community she grew up in after being shunned years earlier for being attracted to another girl (McAdams). The movie is about faith and sexuality and the complicated ideological relationship shared by the two. The muted palette used by cinematographer Danny Cohen received particular praise from critics, but it’s the lead performances of McAdams and Weisz that make the movie as strong as it is.
TIE: Mean Girls (84%)
Tina Fey wrote the script for the quintessential teen comedy based on a non-fiction book about the power structures in high school called Queen Bees and Wannabes. Lindsay Lohan stars as Cady, a new student who just moved back to America after spending her childhood in Africa. She compares her classmates and the groups they’re in to the animal kingdom.
Rachel McAdams plays the villain, Regina George, leader of “the Plastics” and the meanest of the titular mean girls. Regina is an all-time great movie villain, acting as the comedic alternative of a character like Darth Vader or Hannibal Lecter.
TIE: State of Play (84%)
This compelling political thriller was based on a six-part British miniseries with the same title and inspired by State of Play's script: Matthew Michael Carnahan (Lions for Lambs and The Kingdom), Tony Gilroy (the first four Bourne movies), and Billy Ray (Captain Phillips).
Game Night (85%)
Rachel McAdams starred alongside Jason Bateman in Game Night marks an all-too-rare gem.
A Most Wanted Man (87%)
This spy thriller adapted from the novel of the same name by the great John le Carré is notable for featuring as thought-provoking and smart as it is thrilling. Hoffman’s untimely ing was a tragedy for film buffs, but at least he left us with a doozy of a final onscreen appearance.
Doctor Strange (89%)
Scott Derrickson’s a more-or-less generic superhero origin story, checking off all the origin story clichés (a tragic accident, a one-dimensional love interest, a mentor’s death in the 11th hour etc.), but it has enough dazzling visual effects and trippy interdimensional sequences to make up for it.
Rachel McAdams wasn’t given much to work with as Christine Palmer, the love interest. As far as banal MCU romantic foils go, set to hit theaters in 2021, McAdams will be given more to do.
TIE: The Little Prince (93%)
This animated adaptation of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s children’s book of the same name, The Little Prince was a French production, but the voice actors recorded their lines in English. Such big stars as Jeff Bridges, Ricky Gervais, Paul Rudd, Marion Cotillard, James Franco, Benicio del Toro, Paul Giamatti, and of course, Rachel McAdams provided their voices for the film, so it’s inexplicable how it managed to slip under the mainstream radar. It only grossed around $97 million at the worldwide box office on its estimated budget of approximately $77.5 million, so it barely scraped a profit. The film has an interesting combination of computer animation and stop-motion animation that struck a chord with critics.
TIE: Midnight in Paris (93%)
Woody Allen’s later works have sort of a negative reputation. Not only has up there with his finest movies. Owen Wilson stars as a sort of West Coast proxy for Allen, a screenwriter working on his first novel. He travels to Paris with his fiancée, played with hilarious pretension by Rachel McAdams, and finds that at midnight, he’s transported back to the 1920s to rub shoulders with Hemingway, Picasso, and the Fitzgeralds.
Spotlight (97%)
This harrowing dramatization of the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation into the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal acts as both a sobering reminder of what the Church covered up and this tear-jerking look at a disgraceful social issue was given the Academy Award for Best Picture.
