Entertainment
The Best Costume Drama Movies
List Rules
Vote for your personal favorite Costume drama films, regardless of how popular or successful they were at the box office.
The best costume drama movies ever made really make us believe we're in the film's time period with their great movie costumes. Many great costume drama films are streaming on Netflix or Amazon Prime. This list is ordered by popularity, so only the greatest movies about costume drama are at the top of the list. This list contains all the top costume dramas, like Joan of Arc or Madame Bovary, but if there are any great films you think we missed, please feel free to add them yourself.
The films on this list are the most famous costume drama movies of all time, so use it to find some movies that you haven't seen already if you're a fan of the genre.
This list answers the questions, "What are the best costume drama movies?" and "What is the greatest costume drama movie of all time?" and contains items like Cleopatra, The Bastard.
Various bits of information are included with these popular costume movies, such as who directed them, when they were released and who starred in the films. So from the latest, to the greatest costume drama movies, here is the full costume drama movies list, ordered from best to worst.
Ranked by
- 1Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, Leslie Howard
- Released: 1939
- Directed by: Victor Fleming
Presented as originally released in 1939. Includes themes and character depictions which may be offensive and problematic to contemporary audiences. Epic Civil War drama focuses on the life of ...more - 2Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush, Christopher Eccleston
- Released: 1998
- Directed by: Shekhar Kapur
Elizabeth Tudor (Cate Blanchett) becomes queen of a divided and dangerous England in 1558. She is roundly perceived as weak by threats from within and abroad, and she is strongly advised to marry by ...more - 3Keira Knightley, Matthew McFadyen, Judi Dench
- Released: 2005
- Directed by: Joe Wright
In this adaptation of Jane Austen's beloved novel, Elizabeth Bennet (Keira Knightley) lives with her mother, father and sisters in the English countryside. As the eldest, she faces mounting pressure ...more - 4Glenn Close, John Malkovich, Michelle Pfeiffer
- Released: 1988
- Directed by: Stephen Frears
The Marquise de Merteuil (Glenn Close) and the Vicomte de Valmont (John Malkovich) display the petty jealousies and jaded insouciance of life in France's royal court in the 18th century, casually ...more - 5F. Murray Abraham, Tom Hulce, Jeffrey Jones
- Released: 1984
- Directed by: Milos Forman
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Tom Hulce) is a remarkably talented young Viennese composer who unwittingly finds a fierce rival in the disciplined and determined Antonio Salieri (F. Murray Abraham). ...more - 6Audrey Hepburn, Rex Harrison, Stanley Holloway
- Released: 1964
- Directed by: George Cukor
In this beloved musical, pompous phonetics professor Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison) is so sure of his abilities that he takes it upon himself to transform a Cockney working-class girl into someone who ...more - 7Ryan O'Neal, Marisa Berenson, Patrick Magee
- Released: 1975
- Directed by: Stanley Kubrick
How does an Irish lad without prospects become part of 18th-century English nobility? For Barry Lyndon (Ryan O'Neal) the answer is: any way he can! His climb to wealth and privilege is the ...more - 8Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, Connie Nielsen
- Released: 2000
- Directed by: Ridley Scott
Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) takes power and strips rank from Maximus (Russell Crowe), one of the favored generals of his predecessor and father, Emperor Marcus Aurelius, the great stoical philosopher. ...more - 9Heath Ledger, Mark Addy, Rufus Sewell
- Released: 2001
- Directed by: Brian Helgeland
Peasant-born William Thatcher (Heath Ledger) begins a quest to change his stars, win the heart of an exceedingly fair maiden (Shanynn Sossamon) and rock his medieval world. With the help of friends ...more - 10Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Kate Winslet
- Released: 1995
- Directed by: Ang Lee
When Elinor Dashwood's (Emma Thompson) father dies, her family's finances are crippled. After the Dashwoods move to a cottage in Devonshire, Elinor's sister Marianne (Kate Winslet) is torn between ...more - 11Keira Knightley, Ralph Fiennes, Charlotte Rampling
- Released: 2008
- Directed by: Saul Dibb
Though adored by the people, the Duchess of Devonshire (Keira Knightley) is not content to sit as a pretty figurehead. Determined to be a major player in affairs of state, she rises to the forefront ...more - 12Charlton Heston, Yul Brynner, Edward G. Robinson
- Released: 1956
- Directed by: Cecil B. DeMille
Enjoying a life of ease in the court of Egypt's pharaoh, Moses (Charlton Heston) discovers his Hebrew heritage and, later, God's expectations of him. He dedicates himself to liberating his people ...more - 13Peter O'Toole, Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn
- Released: 1962
- Directed by: David Lean
Due to his knowledge of the native Bedouin tribes, British Lieutenant T.E. Lawrence (Peter O'Toole) is sent to Arabia to find Prince Faisal (Alec Guinness) and serve as a liaison between the Arabs ...more - 14Keira Knightley, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Jude Law
- Released: 2012
- Directed by: Joe Wright
Anna Karenina (Keira Knightley), the wife of a Russian imperial minister (Jude Law), creates a high-society scandal by an affair with Count Vronsky (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), a dashing cavalry officer ...more - 15Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane
- Released: 1997
- Directed by: James Cameron
James Cameron's "Titanic" is an epic, action-packed romance set against the ill-fated maiden voyage of the R.M.S. Titanic; the pride and joy of the White Star Line and, at the time, the largest ...more - 16Gary Oldman, Winona Ryder, Anthony Hopkins
- Released: 1992
- Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
Adaptation of Bram Stoker's classic vampire novel. Gary Oldman plays Dracula whose lonely soul is determined to reunite with his lost love, Mina (Winona Ryder). In Britain, Dracula begins a reign of ...more - 17Kirsten Dunst, Jason Schwartzman, Judy Davis
- Released: 2006
- Directed by: Sofia Coppola
An Austrian teenager (Kirsten Dunst) marries the Dauphin (Jason Schwartzman) of France and becomes that country's queen following the death of King Louis XV (Judy Davis) in 1774. Years later, after a ...more - 18Orlando Bloom, Eva Green, Jeremy Irons
- Released: 2005
- Directed by: Ridley Scott
Still in grief over his wife's sudden death, village blacksmith Balian (Orlando Bloom) joins his long-estranged father, Baron Godfrey (Liam Neeson), as a crusader on the road to Jerusalem. After a ...more - 19Joseph Fiennes, Gwyneth Paltrow, Geoffrey Rush
- Released: 1998
- Directed by: John Madden
"Shakespeare in Love" is a romantic comedy for the 1990s set in the 1590s. It imaginatively unfolds the witty, sexy and timeless tale behind the creation of the greatest love story ever told. A young ...more - 20Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh
- Released: 2019
- Directed by: Greta Gerwig
In the years after the Civil War, Jo March lives in New York and makes her living as a writer, while her sister Amy studies painting in Paris. Amy has a chance encounter with Theodore, a childhood ...more - 21Kenneth Branagh, Emma Thompson, Denzel Washington
- Released: 1993
- Directed by: Kenneth Branagh
In this Shakespearean farce, Hero (Kate Beckinsale) and her groom-to-be, Claudio (Robert Sean Leonard), team up with Claudio's commanding officer, Don Pedro (Denzel Washington), the week before their ...more - 22Tyrone Power, Norma Shearer, John Barrymore
- Released: 1938
- Directed by: W. S. Van Dyke, Julien Duvivier
Marie Antoinette is a 1938 film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by W. S. Van Dyke and starred Norma Shearer as Marie Antoinette. Based upon the 1932 biography of the ill-fated Queen ...more - 23Leonard Whiting, Olivia Hussey, Milo O'Shea
- Released: 1968
- Directed by: Franco Zeffirelli
In the Italian city of Verona, the Montague and the Capulet families are perpetually feuding. When Romeo (Leonard Whiting), a handsome young Montague, disregards convention by attending a Capulet ...more - 24Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison
- Released: 1963
- Directed by: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
"Cleopatra" is a lengthy, sprawling, spectacular love story, helmed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, depicting Cleopatra's manipulation of Julius Caesar and Marc Antony in her ill-fated attempt to save the ...more - 25Charlton Heston, Jack Hawkins, Stephen Boyd
- Released: 1959
- Directed by: William Wyler
Charlton Heston plays a Palestinian Jew who is battling the Roman empire at the time of Christ. His actions send him and his family into slavery, but an inspirational encounter with Jesus changes ...more
