Awesome movies that didn't need a large cast to be great

A quick path to a film with a small cast is to adapt a play. Mike Nichols’ debut movie “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” is such a movie. The film has a cast of four led by on-and-off couple Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Both of them were nominated for Oscars, and Taylor won. However, George Segal and Sandy Dennis were also both nominated, with Dennis winning as well. That’s a killer success rate.

“Sleuth” is an adaptation of a Tony-winning play, and the cast is even slimmer than “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?.” There are only two actors in this cat-and-mouse mind game. Those actors happen to be Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine, both of whom have Oscars on their resume.

“Gravity” is a directorial tour de force, and Alfonso Cuaron certainly earned his Best Director Oscar. Part of what made it so impressive is that the movie is almost entirely just Sandra Bullock. The only other face you see is George Clooney and he’s only alive for a handful of minutes in the movie.

Alright, so the cast for “127 Hours” is a smidge larger, but only a smidge. Plus, other than James Franco as Aron Ralston, the characters you see are only around briefly. They are only there to help set up the isolation Ralson feels while, you know, his arm is lodged in a rock. Based on a harrowing true story, Franco was nominated for an Oscar for it. That was the year he was co-host and, well, that didn’t go great.

Movies with a single cast member are rare, but unheard of. Getting a star for a one-actor movie, though, is trickier. “All is Lost” is about a man lost at sea, and that man is played by none other than Robert Redford. With barely any spoken dialog in the movie, it still manages to be quite compelling.

Speaking of those lost away from civilization. “Cast Away” is perhaps the most-famous example of such a movie, owing mainly to Tom Hanks playing a man stranded on a deserted island. Now, there are other cast members, but mostly in small roles, and for much of the film it is just Hanks (and Wilson as himself). Also, shout out to Robert Zemeckis. While he was waiting for Hanks to lose weight and grow out his hair, he shot all of “What Lies Beneath” and both ended up in the top 10 of the box office in 2000.

This is a smaller film than many on this list. In terms of budget and distribution, but also cast. The movie is a series of phone conversations, so we hear a few voices. There’s only one on-screen character, though. He’s played by Tom Hardy, which gives “Locke” its star power.

“10 Cloverfield Lane” is more coasting off the “Cloverfield” brand than an actual sequel, but it’s also much better than “Cloverfield,” which is a shaky cinematic mess. This film is a claustrophobic thriller with only a few cast members. Primarily among them we find Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Goodman. While Winstead is more of a recognizable face than a star, Goodman is certainly a screen icon.

It felt practically inevitable that someday Sam Rockwell would win an Oscar, and performances like what he did in “Moon” speak to that. This is a spoiler, but pretty much the only actor we see in the film is Rockwell, but he’s playing multiple versions of himself in this sci-fi flick. The film also served as the calling card for debuting director Duncan Jones. Unfortunately, this trajectory took him to “Warcraft,” and when that bombed, director jail was waiting.

Gus Van Sant, Matt Damon, and Casey Affleck all had career-altering success with “Good Will Hunting.” They re-joined forces for “Gerry,” though not looking for another hit. Van Sant directed, all three wrote the script (to the extent there was one), and Damon and Affleck are the only actors in the movie. “Gerry” is basically a filmmaking experiment, with a box office that speaks to that—still, an interesting effort.

When a movie is mainly about a writer being held prisoner by an obsessed fan, there’s not a lot of room for much cast beyond that. About a half-dozen people appear in “Misery,” but the Stephen King adaptation is largely just James Caan as the writer and Kathy Bates as the fan. Surprisingly, Bates won Best Actress at the Oscars for this movie, one of the better-received King adaptations. We don’t know if this is one of the ones King likes, but his opinions are bananas so who cares?

When you read the title and the intro to this piece, you may have thought to yourself, “What’s the name of that movie where Ryan Reynolds is buried alive?” It’s called “Buried.” You probably didn’t see it. That’s okay. It’s truly just about the novelty of a famous face playing somebody buried alive. The novelty wore off before most people saw it. Then Reynolds became super famous and started making stuff like “Free Guy.”

John Boorman had a wild career, but early on he directed an interesting two-hander in “Hell in the Pacific.” Two acclaimed acting legends, Lee Marvin and Toshiro Mifune, star in this World War II drama. They play an American soldier and a Japanese soldier, respectively, who both find themselves stranded on a deserted island. Unsurprisingly, they have a complicated relationship on that island.

We’re doubling up on Alfred Hitchcock for two reasons. First, both of these movies are noted for their small casts and essentially their single filming locations. In “Lifeboat” it’s a lifeboat, and in “Rope” it’s the apartment of two thrill killers who host a party with the corpse hidden away because, well, they’re crazy people. However, while both movies have small casts, they aren’t that small. Both have nine-member casts. So, given that we figured if we joined these two together we could justify including some classic Hitchcock.

Mike Nichols went full circle. His first film started off this list. His penultimate movie also makes the cut. Another adaptation of a play, “Closer” also has a cast of essentially four people like “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?.” This time, though, the cast is even more impressive. The four leads are played by Clive Owen, Natalie Portman, Jude Law, and Julia Roberts.

We have a new addition to the genre! “The Gorge” comes to us from Scott Derrickson of “Sinister” and “Doctor Strange” fame. Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy play two snipers tasked with guarding either side of a massive gorge, though neither knows why. Beyond those two, the movie is essentially just rounded out with Sigourney Weaver.