20 Oscar-winning movies to watch on Amazon Prime Video

The Hurt Locker

Kathryn Bigelow became the first ever female winner of the best director gong at the Oscars with The Hurt Locker. Set during the Iraq war, the film goes out of its way to show the psychological impact of armed combat upon soldiers, following Jeremy Renner's former US army ranger who makes the jump to the bomb disposal unit. Watch on Amazon

Moonlight

Proud owner of the best picture Oscar – and the most awkward moment at an awards show. Barry Jenkins' beautiful independent drama tells the story of a young man's life through three periods of his life, played, with incredible heart and vulnerability, by three relatively unknown actors. Mahershala Ali took home the best supporting actor award for a short-but-sweet turn as mentor Juan. Watch on Amazon

Amour

Austrian director Michael Haneke took home the best foreign film Oscar in 2013 for Amour, his heartbreaking depiction of love and sickness in old age. The film focuses on an elderly couple Anne and Georges, whose devotion to one another is severely tested when Anne suffers a stroke which leaves her paralysed on one side of her body. Watch on Amazon

Room

Brie Larson’s measured performance as a young mother locked away underground by a sexual predator earned her the Oscar for best actress in 2016, and Lenny Abrahamson was unlucky not to bag the best director award for a deeply affecting adaptation of Emma Donoghue's Fritzel-inspired novel of the same name. Watch on Amazon

Apocalypse Now

Francis Ford Coppola followed up The Godfather parts 1 & 2 with this war epic, which starred Marlon Brando and Martin Sheen as soldiers on a mission to assassinate a renegade colonel in Cambodia. Vitorrio Storraro's breathtaking shots of south-east Asia were deemed worthy of the best cinematography trophy. Watch on Amazon

Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

While the awards didn’t quite start to flow in the headline-grabbing categories until the Two Towers, Peter Jackson’s cinematic introduction to Middle Earth still took home four statues including best cinematography and best original score. The Fellowship of the Ring doesn't have the glamorous battle scenes of the Two Towers or The Return of the King, but an extended stay in the immersive environment of the Shire alone gives this film infinite re-watchability. Watch on Amazon

Chinatown

Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway were robbed of Oscars by Art Carney and Ellen Burstyn at the 1975 Academy Awards, despite powerful performances in this sleek detective film from Roman Polanski. The film did however, bag a best original screenplay award. Watch on Amazon

Lost in Translation

A rare low-key gem that wowed Oscar voters: Sofia Coppola's romance took home best adapted screenplay in 2004, and she would have surely taken home the best director statue if it wasn't for the overwhelming dominance of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson put in stellar performances as a couple of lost souls who find themselves, and each other, in Tokyo. Watch on Amazon

The Deer Hunter

After tackling the difficult subject of the Vietnam War while the wounds were still fresh, Michael Cimino's drama was rewarded handsomely. It took home a whopping five awards including best picture, best director and best supporting actor for Christopher Walken at the Oscars in 1979. Watch on Amazon

Arrival

Denis Villeneuve's breathtaking extra-terrestrial drama exists on the same intellectual plane as Christopher Nolan's Interstellar - and quite rightly bagged the Oscar for best Sound Editing in 2017. Watch on Amazon

GoodFellas

Inexplicably beaten to the best picture gong in 1991 by Dances With Wolves, Martin Scorsese’s gangster classic saw some compensation with Joe Pesci taking home the supporting actor award for his role as a funny guy. Watch on Amazon

Interstellar

Christopher Nolan takes viewers on a journey through time and space in this epic sci-fi drama, which stars Matthew McConaughey as a desperate father who travels through a wormhole in search of a new home for humanity. It took home the award for best visual effects, undoubtedly thanks to that mind-blowing sequence at the climax. Watch on Amazon

Silence of the Lambs

Jonathan Demme's adaptation of Thomas Harris' crime novel swept the board at the 1992 Academy Awards, taking home best picture and best director, and both Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster took home acting awards for their turns as the cannibalistic murder and FBI detective at the heart of the story. Watch on Amazon

No Country for Old Men

The Coen Brothers' neo-noir western swept the board in 2008, winning best picture, best director and best adapted screenplay. There was also a best supporting actor win for Javier Bardem's chilling performance as hitman Anton Chigurh. Watch on Amazon

Manchester by the Sea

Kenneth Lonergan’s melancholic masterpiece was awarded best original screenplay earlier this year, while Casey Affleck took home the best actor statue for his moving performance as a lowly Bostonian haunted by a trauma in his past. The film finds Affleck in isolation, reluctant to re-immerse himself in society when his brother dies, leaving a teenage son in his care.
Available on Amazon

Rango

Fresh off of directing the first three Pirates of The Carribean films (nobody's perfect), Gore Verbinsky enlisted his pal Jonny Depp for this sharp animated western about a pet chameleon who finds himself stranded in the Mojave desert, which picked up the award for best animated feature in 2012. Watch on Amazon

A Beautiful Mind

If ever there was a film built to win an Oscar, or, ideally, an armful of them, it was Ron Howard’s A Beautiful Mind - a biopic which tracks brilliant mathematician John Nash's (Russell Crowe) struggles with paranoid schizophrenic disorder. It had the desired effect, winning best picture, best director and best adapted screenplay. Watch on Amazon

Inception

While Leo DiCaprio would have to wait another few years to bag his first statue, Christopher Nolan's dream invasion drama won big in the behind-the-scenes categories, taking home five awards in 2011 including best cinematography, best visual effects and best sound mixing. Watch on Netflix

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Kate Winslet and Jim Carrey star as a couple whose relationship goes sour, leading them both to undertake an experimental procedure to erase one another from memory. It's strikingly original: heartbreaking and romantic at turns. Deservedly took home the award for best original screenplay in 2005. Watch on Amazon

Training Day

Denzel Washington is at his brutal best here as a shady narcotics officer on an odyssey through the criminal underworld in Los Angeles. He won his second best actor Oscar - after 1989's Glory - at the ceremony in 2002. Watch on Amazon