# The 36 Best Film Adaptations of Classic Novels

> Sweeping Hollywood epics share the shelf with quiet, faithful period pieces, and every pick began as a novel readers still return to.

*By YPB Team · Published November 2, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/the-36-best-film-adaptations-of-classic-novels*

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## Current results (1 vote)

1. **Gone with the Wind (1939)** — score 1000/1000
   Victor Fleming's adaptation of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel, starring Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara, won eight competitive Academy Awards including Best Picture.
2. **To Kill a Mockingbird** — score 664/1000
   Robert Mulligan's 1962 film of Harper Lee's 1960 novel earned Gregory Peck the Academy Award for Best Actor as Atticus Finch.
3. **The Grapes of Wrath** — score 623/1000
   John Ford's 1940 film of John Steinbeck's 1939 novel won Oscars for Ford as director and for Jane Darwell as Ma Joad.
4. **Little Women (1994)** — score 561/1000
   Gillian Armstrong's version cast Winona Ryder as Jo March, earning Ryder a Best Actress Oscar nomination.
5. **The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)** — score 519/1000
   Charles Laughton plays Quasimodo opposite Maureen O'Hara's Esmeralda in William Dieterle's RKO adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel.
6. **A Room with a View** — score 519/1000
   The 1985 Merchant Ivory film of E. M. Forster's 1908 novel won three Oscars, among them Best Adapted Screenplay for Ruth Prawer Jhabvala.
7. **Wuthering Heights (1939)** — score 470/1000
   William Wyler's take on Emily Brontë's novel stars Laurence Olivier as Heathcliff, and Gregg Toland's camerawork won the Oscar for Best Cinematography.
8. **Tess** — score 470/1000
   Roman Polanski's 1979 adaptation of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles, starring Nastassja Kinski, won three Oscars.
9. **The Count of Monte Cristo (2024)** — score 415/1000
   Pierre Niney plays Edmond Dantès in this French adaptation of Alexandre Dumas's novel, which received 14 César Award nominations.
10. **Emma. (2020)** — score 415/1000
   Autumn de Wilde's first feature stars Anya Taylor-Joy as Jane Austen's matchmaking heroine Emma Woodhouse.
11. **Jane Eyre (2011)** — score 415/1000
   Cary Joji Fukunaga's film of Charlotte Brontë's novel pairs Mia Wasikowska as Jane with Michael Fassbender as Rochester.
12. **Barry Lyndon** — score 415/1000
   Stanley Kubrick's 1975 adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's 1844 novel shot some candlelit scenes with ultra-fast Zeiss lenses made for NASA.
13. **Ben-Hur (1959)** — score 415/1000
   William Wyler's epic of Lew Wallace's 1880 novel won a record 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
14. **Doctor Zhivago** — score 415/1000
   David Lean's 1965 film of Boris Pasternak's novel won five Academy Awards, including Best Adapted Screenplay for Robert Bolt.
15. **The Leopard** — score 415/1000
   Luchino Visconti's 1963 film of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's novel, starring Burt Lancaster as the Prince of Salina, won the Palme d'Or.
16. **Bram Stoker's Dracula** — score 351/1000
   Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 version with Gary Oldman as the vampire won three Academy Awards, including Best Costume Design.
17. **Pride & Prejudice (2005)** — score 351/1000
   Joe Wright's debut feature cast Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet, a role that brought her an Oscar nomination for Best Actress.
18. **Oliver Twist (1948)** — score 351/1000
   David Lean's second Dickens film features John Howard Davies as Oliver and Alec Guinness as Fagin.
19. **War and Peace (1965–67)** — score 351/1000
   Sergei Bondarchuk's four-part Soviet film of Leo Tolstoy's novel won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
20. **All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)** — score 351/1000
   Lewis Milestone's film of Erich Maria Remarque's 1929 novel won the Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director.
21. **One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest** — score 351/1000
   Miloš Forman's 1975 adaptation of Ken Kesey's 1962 novel, with Jack Nicholson as McMurphy, won all five major Academy Awards.
22. **The Wizard of Oz** — score 351/1000
   MGM's 1939 Technicolor musical of L. Frank Baum's 1900 novel stars Judy Garland as Dorothy and won the Oscar for Best Original Song with "Over the Rainbow".
23. **Frankenstein (1931)** — score 351/1000
   James Whale's Universal horror film, drawn from Mary Shelley's 1818 novel by way of a stage play, made Boris Karloff famous as the Monster.
24. **Rebecca (1940)** — score 351/1000
   Alfred Hitchcock's first Hollywood film, taken from Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel, won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
25. **The Age of Innocence** — score 351/1000
   Martin Scorsese's 1993 adaptation of Edith Wharton's Pulitzer Prize–winning 1920 novel stars Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer and Winona Ryder.
26. **Little Women (2019)** — score 277/1000
   Greta Gerwig wrote and directed this take on Louisa May Alcott's novel with Saoirse Ronan as Jo March; it won the Oscar for Best Costume Design.
27. **David Copperfield (1935)** — score 277/1000
   George Cukor's MGM adaptation of the Dickens novel features W. C. Fields as Mr. Micawber and was nominated for Best Picture.
28. **Great Expectations (1946)** — score 277/1000
   David Lean's Dickens adaptation with John Mills as Pip won Academy Awards for black-and-white cinematography and art direction.
29. **The Last of the Mohicans** — score 277/1000
   Michael Mann's 1992 film, with Daniel Day-Lewis as Hawkeye, draws on James Fenimore Cooper's 1826 novel and the 1936 screen version.
30. **East of Eden** — score 277/1000
   Elia Kazan's 1955 film of the last part of John Steinbeck's 1952 novel gave James Dean his first starring role.
31. **Moby Dick (1956)** — score 277/1000
   John Huston directed Gregory Peck as Captain Ahab from a screenplay he co-wrote with Ray Bradbury.
32. **The Great Gatsby (2013)** — score 189/1000
   Baz Luhrmann's 3D version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jay Gatsby and won Oscars for production and costume design.
33. **Far from the Madding Crowd (1967)** — score 189/1000
   John Schlesinger directed Julie Christie as Bathsheba Everdene in this version of Thomas Hardy's 1874 novel.
34. **Howards End** — score 189/1000
   Emma Thompson won the Best Actress Oscar for this 1992 Merchant Ivory adaptation of E. M. Forster's 1910 novel.
35. **Dracula (1931)** — score 189/1000
   Tod Browning's Universal film, based on Bram Stoker's novel and its Broadway stage version, stars Bela Lugosi as the Count.
36. **Sense and Sensibility (1995)** — score 0/1000
   Ang Lee directed Emma Thompson's script of the Jane Austen novel, and it won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Tags: movies, books, classics, adaptations