American actress Winona Ryder has become a popular culture icon with her early performances in films like Beetlejuice as well as her recent works like the Netflix series Stranger Things. With several awards to her name, including a Golden Globe Award and has been nominated for two Academy Awards, Ryder has cemented her position as one of the film industry’s greats.
Born in Minnesota, Ryder made her film debut in the 1986 film Lucas. Alongside her ambitions to become an actor, Ryder has been involved in philanthropic work for the American Indian College Fund since her 20s, an organisation that sends low-income Native Americans to universities. Juggling both lines of work perfectly, she has gone on to work with some of cinemas biggest names while merging the big screen with that of TV and, more recently, major streaming series.
In an interview, Ryder said, “I’ve learned that it’s okay to be flawed, that life can be messy, that some days you glide and some days you fall, but most important, that there are no secret answers out there. When you finally accept that it’s okay not to have answers and it’s okay not to be perfect, you realise that feeling confused is a normal part of what it is to be a human being.”
She added, “I’m quite comfortable looking at myself in movies, probably because I’ve been doing it for so long, since I was a kid. So I sort of watched myself grow up and go through adolescence, like, basically on camera. And also, I’m such a film fanatic. I love movies so much. And there are a couple of movies I’ve made, that I don’t even realise I’m in them. And I think they’re so good. Like Age Of Innocence (1993), and The Crucible (1996) and Heathers (1989).”
Below, we’re picking out five of the best Winona Ryder films to watch on Netflix before you inevitably binge watch Stranger Things again.
Best Winona Ryder films to watch on Netflix
The Crucible (Nicholas Hytner – 1996)
Based on Arthur Miller’s brilliant play of the same name, The Crucible is an allegorical interpretation of the Salem witch trials which compares the witch-hunts to the attack on communism in the McCarthy era. Set in 1692, Ryder stars as one of the alleged witches Abigail who kills a rooster and drinks its blood, while wishing that Elizabeth (Joan Allen), the wife of John Proctor (Daniel Day-Lewis), dies.
“In a way, there is a biting irony in this film’s having been made by a Hollywood studio, something unimaginable in the fifties,” Miller wrote. “But there they are—Daniel Day-Lewis (John Proctor) scything his sea-bordered field, Joan Allen (Elizabeth) lying pregnant in the frigid jail, Winona Ryder (Abigail) stealing her minister-uncle’s money, majestic Paul Scofield (Judge Danforth) and his righteous empathy with the Devil-possessed children, and all of them looking as inevitable as rain.”
Available: Netflix UK
Girl, Interrupted (James Mangold – 1999)
Based on a 1993 autobiography about author Susanna Kaysen’s time in a psychiatric hospital in the ‘60s, Girl, Interrupted features Ryder as a directionless teenager who is rushed to Claymoore, a mental institution, after a supposed suicide attempt. Although her performance is overshadowed by Angelina Jolie’s rebellious sociopath, Mangold’s 1999 cinematic investigation of mental health is still counted among Ryder’s best works.
Ryder said, “I read the book Girl, Interrupted when I was twenty-one, and I sort of fell madly in love with it. I hadn’t read anything like that, something so brutally honest. And it’s also something that was cut with so much humour. I just found the characters so captivating, and so heart-breaking. And funny at the same time. So I just really fell in love with all the characters.”
Available: Netflix US
Beetlejuice (Tim Burton – 1988)
Michael Keaton is fantastic as the titular poltergeist in Burton’s 1988 whimsical and nightmarish film about the undead. It is funny yet menacing and boasts a stellar cast of top actors like Alec Baldwin, Geena Davis, Winona Ryder, and Keaton. The film is a manifestation of a vision that could only come from Tim Burton’s imagination.
“The things that interest me the most are the things that potentially won’t work,” Burton elaborated. “On Beetlejuice, I could tell every day what was going to work and what wasn’t. And that was very invigorating. Especially when you’re doing something this extreme.
“A lot of people have ragged on the story of Beetlejuice, but when I read it, I thought, ‘Wow! This is sort of interesting. It’s very random. It doesn’t follow what I would consider the Spielberg story structure.’ I guess I have to watch it more, because I’m intrigued by things that are perverse. Like, I was intrigued that there was no story.”
Available: All regions
Heathers (Michael Lehmann – 1989)
One of Ryder’s most beloved roles, this high-school drama stars Ryder as Veronica Sawyer who is part of an elitist clique where all the other girls are named Heather. She becomes enamoured with a rebellious student Dean (played by Christian Slater) but things take a dark turn when he kills one of the Heathers.
The film’s producer Denise Di Novi said: “Winona Ryder is so smart, very brave and unusual. She was this amazing 15-year-old if you can believe it. Winona got obsessed with the script.”
Available: All regions
The Age of Innocence (Martin Scorsese – 1993)
An adaptation of the 1920 novel of the same name by Edith Wharton, Martin Scorsese‘s historical drama is set in 1870s New York. It follows the courtship and marriage of Newland Archer (Day-Lewis), a wealthy New York society attorney, to May Welland (Ryder) before Archer finds himself caught up in unexpected romantic entanglements. The film won an Oscar for its costume design along with nominations for supporting actress for Ryder, adapted screenplay, score and art direction.
While talking about the setting, Scorsese said, “What has always stuck in my head is the brutality under the manners. People hide what they mean under the surface of language. In the subculture I was around when I grew up in Little Italy, when somebody was killed, there was a finality to it.”
He added, “It was usually done by the hands of a friend. And in a funny way, it was almost like ritualistic slaughter, a sacrifice. But New York society in the 1870s didn’t have that. It was so cold-blooded. I don’t know which is preferable. I grew up thinking in one way, but in my own private life the past 10 years, I’ve started to appreciate the ability to say a little in certain emotional situations and mean a lot.”
Available: All regions
