Best Casey Affleck Movies, Ranked (2024)

Casey and Ben Affleck have become staples in the movie and television worlds, even though their paths may technically be quite diverging in the long run. When Casey Affleck was 18, he moved to Los Angeles to be with his brother Ben and his friend Matt Damon and pursue an acting career, but that initial plan was short-lived. After brief stints in New York City and Washington D.C., Affleck dropped out of Columbia University and tried to make it as an actor. In the beginning, this was very difficult and many of Affleck’s early roles were not considered successful, but he persevered to become the loved actor the world knows today.

After appearing in Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven and the subsequent films, he finally achieved his breakthrough performance with The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. In recent years, he has starred in movies like Manchester by the Sea and A Ghost Story, solidifying his status as one of Hollywood’s premier actors. While he has collaborated with his brother and Damon, he achieved something separate on his own as well, and viewers can now catch him in Christopher Nolan's upcoming Oppenheimer. These are Casey Affleck’s best movies.

7 Gone Baby Gone

Released in 2007, Gone Baby Gone was Ben Affleck’s directorial debut. The crime thriller stars Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan in the leading roles as Boston investigators searching for an abducted girl. They are hired by the girl’s mother, who is not what she seems to be originally, and the mother might be complicit in the reason why the girl was kidnapped. Gone Baby Gone lives in the genre of neo-noir and is thrilling with each turn it takes, creating a movie that questions morals and what it means to have a home physically and mentally.

6 Our Friend

Affleck stars with Dakota Johnson in Our Friend before she hit her recent renaissance with the adaptation of Persuasion. Told through a series of flashbacks, the story opens with a mother and father prepping to tell their children that the mother’s ovarian cancer is terminal. The movie tells the story of how they met with their best friend (Jason Segel) and the struggles that they faced throughout the years, whether it is potential infidelity or a mental health crisis. While the narrative would be expected to become a love triangle, the movie defies that expectation, instead creating something more wholesome—a notion magnified by the three actors’ performances.

Related: Ben Affleck's Best Movies of the 2000s, Ranked

5 Ocean’s Eleven

The original entry to the Ocean’s franchise, Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven was released more than two decades ago in 2001. With an all-star cast that includes George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon, the success of this movie launched an entire franchise that currently consists of four movies. Two friends decide to create a heist plan to steal $160 million from a casino owner, but, as it turns out, one of the friend’s ex-wives is now the casino owner’s girlfriend. Ocean’s Eleven might not be deep, but it is entertaining.

4 The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford

Some may say the era of the Western movie may be over in the 2000s, but The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford is an epic revisionist that tries to find a new spot for Westerns in entertainment. Brad Pitt stars as Jesse James, while Affleck is Robert Ford. While the title may give away one of the biggest plot points of the movie, this movie is all about the journey of getting to that point. As Pitt and Affleck dance around in this tense game, sweeping shots of isolated landscapes evoke the old feeling created by the film’s predecessors in the genre.

3 Good Will Hunting

The writing team of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon wrote the screenplay for Good Will Hunting, and the duo starred in the movie as well with Robin Williams. It was a surprise smash hit, grossing around $225 million at the box office against a meager budget. A 20-year-old genius from Boston is a janitor at MIT and seems like a nobody at first glance, but when he solves a mathematical problem intended for graduate students, the professor notices his remarkable abilities. Taken under the professor’s wing, his life may change for the better, even if the road getting it is bumpy.

Related: Ocean's Eleven Prequel in the Works with Margot Robbie, Jay Roach to Direct

2 Manchester By the Sea

The 2016 drama Manchester by the Sea was, per Vox, one of the biggest releases the year it came out after appearing at Sundance. Affleck, Lucas Hedges, and Michelle Williams star in this grand meditation on grief and responsibility. Affleck’s character, Lee, is a depressed janitor who is told one day that his brother is dying. Upon the brother’s death, Lee is named the legal guardian of his nephew. At the same time, he struggles with the fact he accidentally caused the deaths of his three children. A sweeping portrait of grief, Manchester by the Sea was brilliantly done.

1 Interstellar

Interstellar offers a portrait of what the world may look like under climate change. The year is 2067, and it looks like humans may no longer be able to survive under the environmental conditions they now face. A former NASA pilot turned farmer is enlisted to go through a wormhole in search of finding a new planet humans can live on. To do so, he must leave his family behind in search of a better life for everyone. Interstellar was a fresh addition to science fiction movies when it came out and had powerful themes to back it up.