The 5 Best Ethan Hawke Movies, Ranked — and Our No. 1 Pick Is a '90s Classic

Ethan Hawke gave one of the most sinister performances of his career in 2021’s The Black Phone, and he’s reprising his role as The Grabber later this week in Black Phone 2.

Hawke made his big-screen debut as a child actor 40 years ago in debut in Explorers, and he’s gone on to become one of the best actors of his generation.

To mark the release of Black Phone 2, Watch With Us has put together our picks for the five best Ethan Hawke movies.

It’s an eclectic group of titles, including a handful of classics.

5. ‘Gattaca’ (1997)

Gattaca presents a vision of the future that is defined by genetic engineering in humans. Ordinary people like Vincent Freeman (Hawke) just can’t get ahead in this world, while Vincent’s brother, Anton (Loren Dean), had the freedom to follow his own path as a genetically engineered child.

To change his own fate and achieve his dream of space travel, Vincent strikes a deal with a disabled swimming champion, Jerome Eugene Morrow (Jude Law), to use his genetic material to hide his true identity. It works like a charm until someone murders the head of Gattaca a week before launch. Anton is leading the investigation for the police, and he’s already found his brother’s eyebrow near the crime scene. If Vincent can’t stay ahead of Anton, then he won’t just be exposed as a fraud — he’ll be arrested for murder.

Gattaca is available to rent or buy on Prime Video.

4. ‘Training Day’ (2001)

Denzel Washington is an overwhelming force of nature in Training Day, the film that finally netted him an Oscar for Best Actor. However, Hawke was also Oscar-nominated for his performance as LAPD Officer Jake Hoyt. To earn a place working alongside Detective Alonzo Harris (Washington), Hoyt goes on a one-day evaluation ride-along with the senior officer.

Harris shows Hoyt a seedier side of Los Angeles, and a horrifying glimpse of police corruption inside the department. Even among dirty cops, Harris stands out as the dirtiest one of them all. And he’ll do anything to maintain the power he commands on the streets, even if people like Hoyt ultimately have to pay the price for his greed and ambition.

Training Day is streaming on Netflix.

3. ‘Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead’ (2007)

Legendary director Sidney Lumet had one last great crime thriller in him, and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead was hailed as one of his best before he passed away in 2011. The story is presented in a non-linear fashion, and it revolves around two brothers, Henry ‘Hank’ Hanson (Hawke) and Andrew ‘Andy’ Hanson (Philip Seymour Hoffman).

The Hanson brothers have their differences, but both are in dire need of money they can’t legally get. Andy hatches a scheme to rob their parents’ jewelry store and let the incident be a bloodless crime to be settled by the insurance company. Their plans go wildly off the rails, leaving someone close to them dead and the walls closing in on both brothers as their sins catch up with them.

Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is streaming on Prime Video.

2. ‘First Reformed’ (2017)

Hawke gave one of his best performances in First Reformed, a tense drama that follows his character, Reverend Ernst Toller, through a spiritual crisis. At the request of his parishioner, Mary Mensana (Amanda Seyfried), Toller attempts to help her husband, Michael Mensana (Philip Ettinger), overcome his reluctance about raising their unborn child.

When Michael commits suicide, Toller attempts to spare Mary any hardship by taking her husband’s laptop. But upon going through Michael’s materials, Toller becomes radicalized by his environmental causes. And he might be willing to take the extreme steps that Michael never got around to.

First Reformed is available to rent or buy on Prime Video.

1. ‘Before Sunrise’ (1995)

Director Richard Linklater‘s Before trilogy could have easily taken three of the five slots on this list. But it’s better to just go with the first movie, Before Sunrise. It’s the story of a beautiful romantic connection that develops between two strangers, Jesse (Hawke) and Céline (Julie Delpy), during a single night in Vienna.

This film is very conversationally driven, but the characters are so well-realized that the audience spends the movie rooting for them to get together as a couple rather than parting for good at the end of the night. This could have very easily been a standalone story, but Hawke and Delpy both returned for the sequels that charted the course of Jesse and Céline’s lives together and apart

Before Sunrise is available to rent or buy on Prime Video.

Led by Senior Editor and experienced critic Jason Struss, Watch With Us’ team of writers and editors sees almost every movie and TV show from the distant past to the present to determine what’s worth your time and money. Our countless hours of multimedia consumption — combined with years of experience in the entertainment industry — help us determine the best movies and TV shows you should be streaming right now.    To be considered “the best,” these films and series can be visually engaging, intellectually stimulating or simply just fun to watch, but the one trait they must have is that they are all, in some way, entertaining. We then check which platform they are streaming on and how you can access them as a subscriber. No algorithm nonsense or paid endorsements here — our recommendations are based purely on our love and interest for the films and shows we love.