The best Kevin Costner movies, according to fans
Here's 10 top picks for your watchlist.
Two-time Oscar winner Kevin Costner can currently be seen riding on horseback through cinemas in Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1, so what better time to check out his ten top-rated movies on IMDb?
Interestingly, Costner's debut appearance on the silver screen was theatrically delayed by five years, with Sizzle Beach USA's distributors Troma Entertainment holding onto it before the rising star hit the big leagues in 1986.
Now 43 years into his career, this Hollywood Walk of Famer has been enjoying a rich vein of renewed popularity since 2018 thanks to his role as John Dutton in the Western series Yellowstone, but certain generations will be more familiar with the likes of Waterworld, The Bodyguard, and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves - the latter co-starring Alan Rickman as Sheriff of Nottingham.
According to the fan-dictated scores on IMDb, though, it's a whole other crop of flicks that make Costner so watchable.
Dances with Wolves - 8.0 rating
Released in 1990 to the tune of 12 Oscar nominations — winning seven, including Best Picture and Best Director — the epic Michael Blake adaptation Dances with Wolves marked Costner's first time in the director's chair.
In it, the actor also played Union Army lieutenant John J. Dunbar, who travels to the American frontier in search of a military post only to encounter a Native American subculture known as Lakota.
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Dances with Wolves is only one of four Westerns to take home the Best Picture statuette, succeeding 1931's Cimarron, and preceding 1992's Unforgiven and 2007's No Country for Old Men.
JFK - 8.0
Oliver Stone's thrilling ensemble examination into John F. Kennedy's assassination arrived in 1990, with Costner taking on the part of real-life district attorney Jim Garrison.
Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Oldman, Kevin Bacon, Joe Pesci, Laurie Metcalf, Sissy Spacek, Donald Sutherland, John Candy, Martin Sheen, Vincent D'Onofrio, Jack Lemmon and John Larroquette made up its enviable cast.
The Untouchables - 7.8
Unfolding during Prohibition-era Chicago, Brian De Palma's The Untouchables had Costner's agent Eliot Ness attempting to take down Robert De Niro's Al Capone with the help of a crack police squad.
Sean Connery won Best Supporting Actor for his role as veteran officer Jim Malone, while the music came from legendary composer Ennio Morricone.
Field of Dreams - 7.5
Considered to be something of a low-key classic, this 1989 sports fantasy brought novelist WP Kinsella's novel Shoeless Joe to magical life.
Ray Kinsella (Costner) substitutes his own cornfield for a baseball field and somehow manages to attract the ghost of sporting legend Shoeless Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta). James Earl Jones of Star Wars and The Lion King fame appeared as Terence Mann, while Field of Dreams marked Burt Lancaster's final movie job, too.
A Perfect World - 7.5
Celebrating its 30th anniversary last year, A Perfect World had Clint Eastwood calling 'ACTION!' for the seventeenth time in his career. Our subject portrays escaped prisoner Butch Haynes in this one, who takes a youngster named Buzz hostage and is hunted down by Eastwood's Texas ranger Red.
In a parallel universe, Steven Spielberg would've directed it instead of making Jurassic Park.
Open Range - 7.3
Labelled a 'revisionist' Western — just like the aforementioned Coen brothers beauty — 2003's Open Range boasts one of cinema's great gunfight sequences.
Robert Duvall headlines as cattle rancher Boss Spearman, with Costner's Charley and Abraham Benrubi's Mose flanking him. When one of them doesn't return from a village, the other two realise he's in danger and go after those responsible for abducting him.
Michael Gambon, who sadly passed away less than a year ago, chews scenery as the despicable Denton Baxter.
Mr. Brooks - 7.3
Floating in the psychological thriller genre, Mr. Brooks centers on the titular businessman serial killer, who after being blackmailed is forced to welcome a protégé played by Dane Cook, all while contending with an evil alter-ego.
William Hurt and Demi Moore add solid support.
Thirteen Days - 7.3
Thirteen Days is a dramatisation of the infamous Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, rendered through the perspective of America's political top dogs.
Alongside Costner's White House assistant Kenneth P. O'Donnell is Bruce Greenwood as president JFK.
Silverado - 7.2
Close to 40 years old now, Silverado comes from Star Wars co-writer Lawrence Kasdan; directing Scott Glenn, Kevin Kline, Danny Glover, and Costner as a bunch of misfits seeking their fortune in a troubled town.
No Way Out - 7.1
From director Ronald Donaldson, suspense thriller No Way Out pits Costner against the mighty Gene Hackman.
Their characters Navy lieutenant Tom Farrell and Defence Secretary David Brice are romantically linked to the same woman, but when she ends up dead, the former becomes a suspect.
Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 is in cinemas now.
