The Best Reviewed Movies Of Each Year Since 2000 – According To Rotten Tomatoes

The best-reviewed films of each year since 2000 on Rotten Tomatoes include superheroes, hobbits and a whopping six animated features. The review-aggregation website has become one of the prime sources of film criticism in the 21st Century, and while its simple thumbs-up or thumbs-down collection method has led some to doubt about the Tomatometer’s accuracy – especially since several movies out there show great discrepancies between critic ratings and user ratings (including recent films such as Zack Snyder’s Justice League and Rian Johnson’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi) – it usually allows the cream to rise to the top.

With that in mind, here are the biggest hitters on the site since the turn of the century: the movies with the highest score for each calendar year.

2000 – Chicken Run

Score: 97%

The highest-rated movie of the first year of the millennium was Peter Lord and Nick Park’s 2000 stop-motion animated film, Chicken Run, starring Julia Sawalha, Mel Gibson, Miranda Richardson, and more. Chicken Run was enormously successful, not only becoming the top-rated movie of the year but also the highest-grossing stop-motion animated film ever to release (a record it still holds), grossing $224.8 million at the worldwide box office.

While the film wasn’t nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Academy Awards, critics praised its acting and animation, as well as immense quotability.

2001 – Monsters, Inc.

Score: 96%

Pete Docter’s Monsters, Inc. took audiences by surprise when it released in 2001 and truly established Pixar Animation as a force to be reckoned with. The movie featured voice work from Billy Crystal, John Goodman, and Steve Buscemi, and it had been in various stages of development since 1996 – one year after Pixar launched their first animated movie. Monsters, Inc. was well-received by general audiences across the board (even the parents loved the movie), and earned an Oscar nomination for Best Animated feature (but lost out to Shrek).

While Pixar routinely makes sequels for their animated films, they decided to take a different step with the Monsters series and made a prequel instead. Monsters University released in 2013 to critical and commercial success, proving that these characters are as everlasting as their movies.

2002 – The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

Score: 95%

As the second installment in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Two Towers became one of the most anticipated films of its year due to the incredible success of The Fellowship of the Ring the year prior. And it delivered, being a great movie by itself as well as within the wide franchise.

In addition to its reviews, The Two Towers became the highest-grossing film of the year, beating, Spider-Man, Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets at the worldwide box office. The movie was also nominated for six Academy Awards (the fewest in the trilogy) including for Best Picture.
2003 – Finding Nemo
7. finding nemo animators take class The Best Reviewed Movies Of Each Year Since 2000 According To Rotten Tomatoes

Score: 99%

Andrew Stanton’s Finding Nemo, which tells the story of a father and his newfound but forgetful friend searching for his lost son across the Pacific Ocean, released in 2003 and quickly became a fan-favorite even in the lauded pantheon of Pixar, with nearly unanimous rave reviews.

In fact, Finding Nemo was so successful that it surpassed 1994’s The Lion King to become the highest-grossing animated film of all-time – with $867.9 million under its belt – a record it held until Shrek 2 toppled it the following year. A highly-successful sequel, Finding Dory, released in 2016 to overwhelming critical acclaim.

2004 – The Incredibles

Score: 97%

Brad Bird followed-up on his beloved but commercially unsuccessful animated film, The Iron Giant with his first Pixar movie: The Incredibles. The film follows a family of superheroes, the Parr family, and features voice acting from Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, Samuel L. Jackson, and more. It garnered Bird his first two Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay and Best Animated Feature, of which he won for the latter.

The Incredibles is not only one of the most-favorited animated movies out there but also one of the most beloved superhero movies overall. We’ll just have to wait and see if Bird can capture lightning twice when Incredibles 2 hits theaters later this year.

2005 – Murderball

Score: 98%

Unlike most movies that achieve critical acclaim and earn the right to be labeled the highest-rated film of the year, Murderball differentiates itself from the crowd by being a documentary, one that centers on the rivalry between the American and Canadian wheelchair rugby teams leading up to the 2004 Paralympic Games.

Coming from directing duo Henry Alex Rubin and Dana Adam Shapiro, the critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes said the film is “an entertaining and gripping documentary that shows being confined to a wheelchair doesn’t mean the fun has to end.” It’s no surprise that Murderball went on to win the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.

2006 – The Queen

Score: 97%

Historical films and period dramas that depict real-life events in a fictionalized manner, if done properly, tend to earn substantial praise, and Stephen Frear’s The Queen is a prime example. The film – starring Helen Mirren as Queen Elizabeth II from a script by Peter Morgan (who later went on to create Netflix’s The Crown) – recounts the British Royal Family’s response to the death of Princess Diana in 1997.

2007 – Ratatouille

Score: 96%

Ratatouille is the second Pixar film and third animated film from director Brad Bird, who took over for co-director Jan Pinkava in 2005 following the overwhelming success of The Incredibles. In addition to penning the screenplay, Bird also reworked the story – about an anthropomorphic rat aiding a restaurant’s garbage boy (and rightful heir) in becoming a chef and saving the restaurant from imminent closure – alongside Pinkava and Jim Capobianco.

That the film was such a hit with critics is particularly humorous given how the subplot involving a vicious restaurant critic (played by Peter O’Toole) humbled by the titular dish.

2008 – The Dark Knight

The second installment in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight shook the superhero movie genre to its core and became the gold standard for all comic book movies in the years since. Written by Christopher and Jonathan Nolan and starring Christian Bale as Batman, the film was nominated for eight Academy Awards, of which it won for two. Most famously, Heath Ledger posthumously won for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of the Joker, following his death in January 2008. The fact that The Dark Knight wasn’t nominated for Best Picture, however, caused quite an uproar and even forced the Academy to alter their rules the following year, increasing the number of nominees from five to 10.

2009 – Up

Score: 98%

Up‘s opening sequence is often credited as being one of the best opening scenes of all-time – and one of the saddest. But that’s only a small part of what makes the animated feature so special, which presents a joyous, uplifting look at life, death and moving on.

Up became the second animated movie ever to be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards – the first being 1991’s Beauty and the Beast – in addition to receiving a further four nominations. Plus, it garnered over $735 million at the worldwide box office. Suffice to say, Up was yet another resounding success for Pixar.

2010 - Toy Story 3

Score: 99%

Pixar Animation burst onto the scene with Toy Story in 1995, which not only became a resounding success but also cemented them as a staunch contender in the animated field. A sequel, Toy Story 2, released in 1999, with the third installment, Toy Story 3, hitting theaters in 2010. That film earned unanimous praise from critics and audiences alike, and it topped Shrek 2 to become the highest-grossing animated film ever released (until 2013’s Frozen).

Film critics hailed Toy Story 3 as a “deftly blending comedy” with “adventure and honest emotion.” The only mar on its legacy is that while Toy Story 3 was meant to be the concluding chapter in Pixar’s flagship series, but they’re bringing back Buzz and Woody for another go-around, Toy Story 4, coming in 2019.

2011 – Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2

Score: 96%

The release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 – directed by David Yates from a script by Steve Kloves based on the novel of the same name by J.K. Rowling, and starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint – was an event of a lifetime that broke virtually every major box office record. After all, it was the final installment in Warner Bros.’ Harry Potter series that began a decade prior, which itself became one of the most beloved and commercially successful franchises in cinema history.

Critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes praises the cast’s superb acting and the film’s outstanding visuals, while also calling it “a satisfying – and suitably magical – conclusion” to the Harry Potter series. What’s interesting is that the series also popularized the concept of splitting a final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, into two films – although considering how much material needed to be covered, Harry Potter got away with doing it… properly.

2012 – Argo

Score: 96%

Ben Affleck’s third directing gig, following critically-acclaimed films Gone Baby Gone and The Town, was 2012’s Argo, which told a relatively fictionalized account of the Canadian Caper during the Iran Hostage Crisis in the late 1970s.

Also starring Affleck – alongside Bryan Cranston, John Goodman, Alan Arkin, and more – the became an astounding critical and commercial success. It won three Academy Awards from out of seven nominations, including Best Picture, although was controversial for lacking a Best Director nomination for Affleck.

2013 – Gravity

Score: 96%

Alfonso Cuarón followed up his success with movies such as Children of Men and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by directing what is considered one of the most visually-stunning space films ever made: Gravity. Based on an original script from himself and his son, Jonás Cuarón, critics called the film “an eerie, tense sci-fi thriller that’s masterfully directed and visually stunning.”

Thanks to the critical praise and the presence of Sandra Bullock and George Clooney, Gravity became an enormous box office success, grossing $723.2 million worldwide against an estimated production budget of merely $100 million. Despite the low cost, the film’s effects were so impressive one reporter was convinced that Cuarón actually filmed the movie in space.

2014 – Boyhood

Score: 97%

Richard Linklater followed up 2013’s Before Midnight, the third installment in his Before trilogy, with the coming-of-age film, Boyhood, starring Ellar Coltrane, Patricia Arquette, and Ethan Hawke. The movie charts the childhood of a Texan child from six years old to eighteen, exploring the ebbs and flows of his life in a divorced home. Aside from the story, what makes Boyhood so special is that Linklater did something that was considered inconceivable: film a movie in real-time over the course of almost a decade.

That behind-the-scenes factor is part of why it was so praised when it finally released to the general public in 2014, earning it overwhelmingly positive reviews and several major awards.

2015 – Mad Max: Fury Road

Score: 97%

George Miller’s iconic Mad Max franchise laid dormant ever since Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, starring Mel Gibson as the titular character, hit theaters in 1985. The acclaimed filmmaker managed to successfully reboot the franchise thirty years later, however, with the fourth installment in the series, Mad Max: Fury Road, starring Tom Hardy as Max Rockatansky and Charlize Theron as Imperator Furiosa.

The movie achieved unanimous critical acclaim – with the Rotten Tomatoes consensus citing the film’s “exhilarating action” and “surprising amount of narrative heft” – and did better than a reboot of a cult hit had any right to do at the box office. To cap off its success, the film became a major awards frontrunner, winning the most Oscars of that year. Not bad from a highly troubled production.

2016 – Moonlight

Score: 98%

Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight was one of the most-talked-about movies in 2016, and rightfully so. The film, starring Trevante Rhodes, Naomie Harris, and Mahershala Ali, released to overwhelming critical praise, with everything, from script to performances to direction, getting top marks from critics.

The film ended up winning the Oscar for Best Picture (after a rather spectacular mix-up with La La Land, of course), marking out a bunch of firsts: it was the first time the award had gone to a film with an all-black cast or one with an LGBT subject matter.

2017 – Get Out

Score: 99%

Jordan Peele took the industry by surprise in 2017 with his directorial debut, Get Out, starring Daniel Kaluuya as a black man lured into a trap by his white girlfriend. The horror film released in a politically-charged climate that not-so-subtly addressed present-day social issues in a wildly entertaining way, seeing it hit with all corners of the audience.

It was, in no uncertain terms, an astounding critical and commercial success, grossing $254.3 million against an estimated production budget of $4.5 million and going on to be nominated for multiple awards. Only time will tell, though, if it ends up being nominated for Best Picture, let alone taking the top prize.