30 Best Fantasy Movies of the 2010s You Must Watch
The 2010s were a golden decade for fantasy, blending myth, magic, and modern storytelling with dazzling craft. From hand-drawn epics and stop-motion marvels to live-action spectacles and heartfelt family adventures, filmmakers took us to afterlives, dragon-filled skies, enchanted kingdoms, and streets where the extraordinary hides in plain sight.
This guide gathers 30 essential titles that showcase how wildly varied fantasy can be—cozy and frightening, intimate and operatic, wistful and wildly inventive. Whether you crave creature features, folklore-steeped quests, or emotional journeys that just happen to include spirits, spells, and portals, these are the decade’s must-watch wonders.
30. ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ (2016)
This globe-trotting wizarding adventure shifts the spotlight to a gentle magizoologist whose suitcase holds a menagerie of wonder. Its period setting and empathetic hero refresh familiar lore while inviting newcomers into a bustling, secret world.
Beyond the shimmering spells, the story’s warmth comes from a mismatched crew that finds family amid chaos. Sleek production design and creature work give the film a tactile charm that rewards repeat visits.
29. ‘Mirai’ (2018)
A small boy meets a future version of his sister and generations of relatives in a time-twisting domestic odyssey. The film’s gentle magic turns a backyard into a multiverse of memory, imagination, and growth.
With playful vignettes that blossom into something profound, it captures childhood’s swirl of jealousy and wonder. Its fantasy is tender, showing how love stretches across time in ways kids can feel long before they can explain.
28. ‘Weathering with You’ (2019)
A runaway boy meets a “sunshine girl” who can change the sky, and together they chase light through a rain-soaked city. The film fuses myth with urban romance, stitching everyday details to jaw-dropping supernatural set pieces.
The stakes are personal and cosmic, asking what we owe the world versus the people we love. Luminous visuals and soaring emotion make its stormy fairy tale forecast impossible to forget.
27. ‘The Kid Who Would Be King’ (2019)
Arthurian legend crashes into modern school life when a bullied kid pulls a sword from a construction site. The result is a bright, boisterous quest that treats bravery as a practice, not a pedigree.
Its magic is as much about teamwork and integrity as it is about monsters and capes. Fun, earnest, and surprisingly wise, it’s a rare family fantasy that earns its heroism.
26. ‘Into the Woods’ (2014)
Classic fairy-tale characters collide in a musical that asks what happens after “happily ever after.” The woods themselves become a testing ground where wishes have consequences and love grows complicated.
With sly humor and haunting numbers, it re-enchants familiar stories while interrogating them. The ensemble crackles, and the film’s second half deepens from whimsy into moving reflection.
25. ‘Swiss Army Man’ (2016)
A marooned man befriends a strangely useful corpse, sparking a bizarre and beautiful survival fable. Crass gags morph into catharsis as the film transforms bodily absurdities into metaphors for loneliness and connection.
Beneath its audacity lies a sincere ode to the weirdness of being alive. It’s fantasy as emotional exorcism, gleefully inventive and unexpectedly tender.
24. ‘A Monster Calls’ (2016)
A grieving boy meets a towering tree-creature who tells him stories and demands truth in return. The allegory is clear yet never heavy-handed, letting myth speak where ordinary words fail.
Gorgeously illustrated interludes and a soulful central performance fuse into a balm for complicated sorrow. It’s a tale about learning to hold two feelings at once: love and loss.
23. ‘The Secret World of Arrietty’ (2010)
A tiny Borrower family lives hidden within a suburban home, where danger and friendship are giant-sized. The film’s quiet magic resides in scale: a pin becomes a sword, a sugar cube a treasure.
Graceful pacing and painterly detail make every corner feel enchanted. It’s an exquisitely small story that opens up vast emotional space.
22. ‘Wonder Woman’ (2017)
An Amazon leaves paradise to confront humanity’s wars, discovering courage shaped by compassion. The film embraces myth while grounding heroism in empathy, giving its action scenes an emotional spine.
What lingers is the sincerity: idealism worn without irony. It’s a battlefield myth that believes people can be better—and fights to prove it.
21. ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ (2017)
A thunder god loses his hammer and finds his sense of humor in a neon-blazed cosmic romp. The film reinvents its hero with color, rhythm, and a punk-rock attitude toward prophecy.
Beneath the jokes beats a story about exile, inheritance, and the cost of empire. Spectacle and sincerity ride the same lightning bolt.
20. ‘Doctor Strange’ (2016)
A brilliant surgeon becomes a sorcerer, and city streets fold like paper in a kaleidoscope of possibilities. The film’s visual language reimagines combat as geometry, turning mirror worlds into ballet.
At its core is a story about humility and purpose. The leap from skeptic to mystic lands because the character—and the craft—earn it.
19. ‘Beauty and the Beast’ (2017)
An enchanted castle, a cursed prince, and a woman who reads her way into bravery—some legends endure for a reason. This retelling luxuriates in design and melody, honoring a classic while expanding its heart.
Its magic arrives not just in waltzes and winks but in the way kindness breaks old spells. Familiar, yes, but comfortingly so, like a storybook warmed by lamplight.
18. ‘The Witch’ (2015)
On the edge of a New World forest, a devout family meets something ancient and hungry. Folklore coils into dread as isolation, suspicion, and temptation blur the line between sin and survival.
The film’s spare style and old-world language make its sorcery feel plausibly real. It’s a parable etched in candle smoke—unsettling and unforgettable.
17. ‘Crimson Peak’ (2015)
A young writer marries into a decaying mansion where ghosts bleed through the walls. This gothic romance treats spirits as grief made visible, its colors lush as poisoned petals.
It’s a swoon wrapped in a shiver, a love story that acknowledges the rot beneath velvet. Beauty is the lure; truth is the knife.
16. ‘Cinderella’ (2015)
Kindness is a superpower in this crystalline re-envisioning of the pumpkin-and-glass-slipper tale. The film trades cynicism for sincerity, letting gentleness feel radical.
Its fantasy glitters in gowns and coaches, but the transformation that matters is internal. Elegance and emotional clarity never go out of style.
15. ‘Tangled’ (2010)
A tower-bound dreamer and a roguish thief escape into a world of lanterns and self-discovery. The film’s buoyant humor and musical sparkle pair with a warmly beating heart.
Visually sumptuous hair-whip action is a delight, yet it’s the tender character work that shines. Adventure is fun; finding your voice is magic.
14. ‘The Jungle Book’ (2016)
A boy raised by wolves navigates law and legend in a photoreal menagerie that still feels storybook. The film deftly balances peril and playfulness, honoring a fable while refreshing it.
Its digital sorcery is breathtaking, but the soul comes from friendships that feel lived-in. Nature, like family, is wild and worth protecting.
13. ‘How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World’ (2019)
A chief and his dragon face the bittersweet future of their bond as discovery forces hard choices. The series crescendos into a meditation on leadership, love, and letting go.
Gliding flight sequences remain pure cinema joy. The farewell it earns is gentle, honest, and perfectly pitched.
12. ‘How to Train Your Dragon 2’ (2014)
The saga expands from friendship to stewardship, widening its world without losing intimacy. A new threat tests what it means to rule with courage rather than fear.
Action soars, but character arcs are what give it lift. It’s a rare sequel that grows up alongside its audience.
11. ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ (2010)
A misfit meets a misunderstood dragon, and together they redraw the map of their village. The bond at the center is wordless and wondrous, a trust that changes everything.
Its flight sequences remain among the decade’s great pleasures. The message—lead with empathy—lands as softly as a dragon on grass.
10. ‘Life of Pi’ (2012)
A shipwrecked boy and a Bengal tiger share a lifeboat where faith and fable entwine. The ocean becomes a cathedral, each swell a question about truth and survival.
Its images are metaphors you can practically touch. The story invites you to choose the version of reality that helps you live.
9. ‘Frozen’ (2013)
Sisterhood, snow magic, and a redefinition of true love—this fairy tale reshaped the modern musical. Catchy melodies meet a story that gives agency to both heroines.
The icy spectacle sparkles, but the warmth is what endures. Love that listens is stronger than any curse.
8. ‘Paddington 2’ (2017)
A polite bear brightens London with marmalade and radical kindness, then proves community is the mightiest magic. It’s a comedic jewel box where every gag clicks and every heart swells.
The film’s optimism isn’t naive; it’s courageous. Few fantasies better capture how generosity transforms a world.
7. ‘Moana’ (2016)
A wayfinder answers the ocean’s call, steering her people toward a future written on the waves. Myth and music sail together, celebrating heritage, courage, and curiosity.
The demigods and monsters dazzle, but the truest wonder is self-discovery. Destiny isn’t a map you follow—it’s one you draw.
6. ‘The Tale of the Princess Kaguya’ (2013)
Brushstrokes breathe as a moon-born child experiences earthly joy and sorrow. The film’s hand-drawn textures feel like wind on paper, fragile yet fierce.
It’s a folk poem about the beauty and cost of being human. Fantasy here is whisper-soft and devastatingly true.
5. ‘The Shape of Water’ (2017)
A mute janitor falls in love with a captured amphibian, and suddenly the monster movie blooms into a romance. The film reframes otherness as something holy, not feared.
Lyrical craft turns laboratories into dreamscapes and danger into dance. It’s a fairy tale that insists love is an act of rebellion.
4. ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2’ (2011)
The long war for a wizarding world concludes in sacrifice, courage, and a final reckoning. It delivers closure without forgetting the friendships that made the journey matter.
Magic here is both spectacle and memory. Few finales stick the landing with such thunder and grace.
3. ‘Kubo and the Two Strings’ (2016)
A boy storyteller battles moonlit forces with a shamisen that can move the world. Stop-motion craft conjures origami giants and snowy seas with tactile awe.
Beneath the adventure lies a hymn to memory and family. Stories, it argues, are the strings that keep us whole.
2. ‘Your Name.’ (2016)
Two teenagers linked by dreams share a bond that defies distance and destiny. The film slips between comedy, yearning, and cosmic stakes with effortless rhythm.
Its fantasy conceit blooms into a meditation on timing and fate. By the end, it feels like you’ve lived a whole other life—and found your way back.
1. ‘Coco’ (2017)
A boy crosses into the Land of the Dead to find his voice and his family’s truth. The afterlife bursts with color, music, and lovingly observed detail.
What makes it timeless is the way memory becomes magic. It’s a celebration of legacy, reminding us that to be remembered is to live again.
Share your favorite picks from this list—or the hidden gems we missed—in the comments so fellow fans can discover more fantastic worlds.
