Margot Robbie names her five favourite movies of all time
Since finding stardom under the direction of Martin Scorsese in The Wolf of Wall Street, Margot Robbie has become one of the biggest names in Hollywood. Refusing to be typecast, she’s taken on a wide range of roles, from historical figures to Harley Quinn. Last year, her work seemed to culminate in Greta Gerwig’s record-breaking Barbie, which she produced and starred in.
Behind the scenes, Robbie founded LucyChap Entertainment to tell more women’s stories on-screen. The company has put out films such as I, Tonya, the ice skating biopic that won Robbie an Academy Award nomination and Emerald Fennell’s divisive Saltburn, and they’re set to take on Yorgos Lanthimos’ adaptation of the beloved book, My Year of Rest and Relaxation.
During a conversation with A.frame, Robbie explained her focus when filmmaking. “We get really excited by things that feel like they can hit the zeitgeist,” she said, “That they are big worlds created by visionary filmmakers who have something to say, where there’s a political edge and a lot of poppiness.” Perhaps expectedly, then, her five favourite films seem to follow that same pattern.
The earliest film to make her list comes from one of the most famous directors of all time: Stanley Kubrick. She suggested that he consistently achieved her dream of making “culture-shifting, big cinema,” but deemed 1964’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb as her personal favourite.
Robbie also included films with some of her favourite leading female characters, including Maude from Harold and Maude and Uma Thurman’s The Bride. The latter she describes as a “sick female character”. In 2019, Robbie turned her long-time Tarantino fandom into a collaborative relationship with the director when she penned him a letter and wound up starring in Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood.
Robbie also shares her love for Cabaret and Cry-Baby, the latter of which she has adored since childhood. Together, the list seems to demonstrate her penchant for films that sit somewhere between camp and cultural commentary, as well as her love for a female lead.
Perhaps surprisingly, all of the directors included were men, a reaffirmation of just how male-dominated the industry has always been behind the camera. Hopefully, between Robbie’s efforts and all the other women pushing towards a more inclusive Hollywood, that fact is slowly changing.
Find the full list of films below.
Margot Robbie’s favourite movies:
- Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964)
- Harold and Maude (Hal Ashby, 1971)
- Cabaret (Bob Fosse, 1972)
- Cry-Baby (John Waters, 1990)
- Kill BIll: Volume 1 (Quentin Tarantino, 2003)
