Timothée Chalamet is only 28, but he’s already a household name. After small appearances in films such as Interstellar, the French-American actor had acclaimed roles in films by Greta Gerwig and Luca Guadagnino, before taking on Roald Dahl’s chocolate innovator in Wonka and the lead in the Dune franchise. His trademark curls (apart from a brief bowl cut in The King) and sharp cheekbones earned him his enduring heart-throb status.
Here’s our list of his top five film roles, but what do you think? Leave your favourites in the comments below.
1. Call Me by Your Name (2017, Netflix)
Chalamet burst on to our screens as Elio in Luca Guadagnino’s acclaimed Call Me by Your Name, an adaptation of André Aciman’s 2007 novel of the same name. In this coming-of-age romance, Chalamet’s intelligent, precocious, inexperienced teenager meets Oliver (Armie Hammer), his father’s graduate student. The pair’s complex emotional relationship soon develops from dislike to intrigue and desire, against the sensual backdrop of a 1980s Italian summer. Chalamet’s final scene, after returning to the Italian home in winter, is particularly masterful. His nuanced performance (for which he also learnt Italian from scratch) earned him Oscar and Bafta nominations for best actor.
2. Little Women (2019, Netflix)
In this adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s 1868 novel, set in Civil War-era Massachusetts, Chalamet plays Laurie, the loveable family friend and varying love interest of the four March sisters. It marked Chalamet’s second collaboration with star Saoirse Ronan and director Greta Gerwig, after Gerwig’s 2017 debut, Lady Bird. Chalamet’s performance makes his heartfelt, hillside declaration of love to Jo (Ronan) all the more moving, and all the more heart-wrenching when it is rejected. His later blooming relationship with Amy (Florence Pugh) is equally passionate, with emotional maturity.
3. Dune (2021 and 2024, Netflix, in cinemas)
Chalamet has been busy recently fronting Denis Villeneuve’s Dune franchise, as the young Paul Atreides. The son of a duke and a Bene Gesserit with mysterious supernatural powers, Chalamet’s Paul treads a fine line between his youthful inexperience and the power he must soon hold on the planet Arrakis, especially as the films progress. Chalamet holds his own in a star-studded cast, with emotional range — particularly in his developing standing among Arrakis’s native Fremen and relationship with Chani (Zendaya) — and some mighty hair-ography in the desert winds.
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4. Lady Bird (2017, Prime Video)
In Greta Gerwig’s directorial debut, Chalamet plays the infuriatingly pretentious boyfriend of Saoirse Ronan’s protagonist, Lady Bird. Whether he’s declaring that he only smokes hand-rolled cigarettes, spouting conspiracy theories about government tracking devices, making aloof comments about capitalism, or playing in his French-named band, Chalamet’s Kyle is a true “softboi”, in Gen Z terms — and a cruel one at that. As the bad boy who is ultimately just quite bad, Chalamet showed his resistance to being typecast as the classic romantic lead in the wake of his immensely popular performance in Call Me by Your Name.
5. Bones and All (2022, Prime Video)
Bones and All was the hotly anticipated return of Chalamet’s collaboration with the director Luca Guadagnino, as another romantic figurehead — but this time, a cannibal. In this adaptation of Camille DeAngelis’s 2015 novel, Chalamet’s Lee travels 1980s America with Taylor Russell’s Maren, a fellow “eater”, killing and eating people to satisfy their hunger for human flesh, and falling in love. It might sound bizarre and horrible, but Chalamet and Russell bring a guilt and vulnerability to their performances that makes them somehow sympathetic and unsettling all at once.
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