Emma Watson’s Best Movies Apart From ‘Harry Potter’ And ‘Beauty And The Beast’

For Harry Potter fans, Emma Watson will always be Hermione Granger, a role that she had played for 10 years and for eight movies. And now that Watson’s movie Beauty and the Beast has become a monstrous hit at the box office (it’s currently estimated to earn $170 million this weekend, the biggest opening of any film so far this year, according to USA Today), Emma Watson’s personification of the iconic character Belle in Beauty and the Beast will also likely become as firmly embedded in popular consciousness as her role as Hermione. For those of you who have already seen Beauty and the Beast and loved Watson’s performance in the movie, here are some of the best movies Emma Watson has starred in in her post-Harry Potter years that will keep you sated before you can go see her next film, the sci-fi thriller The Circle, which also stars Tom Hanks, John Boyega, Karen Gillan, and the late Bill Paxton.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)

The Perks of Being a Wallflower was one of the first movies that Watson acted in after the conclusion of the Harry Potter franchise, and her performance in the film as Sam, a sophisticated, troubled teenager, ensured audiences that she was capable of transitioning beyond her role as the bookish Hermione in the Harry Potter movies.

The movie, a coming-of-age tale that addresses themes of sexuality, abuse, and teenage angst, received glowing reviews from critics, and many praised the strong performances by its young main leads, including Watson, Logan Lerman (Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief), and Ezra Miller (We Need to Talk About Kevin).

The Bling Ring (2013)

And from The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Emma Watson went on to star in Sofia Coppola’s The Bling Ring, a film that centered around the Bling Ring, a real-life group of thieves that burgled the homes of several celebrities, most notably, Paris Hilton, from 2008 to 2009.

Watson steals the show with her role as the egotistical and superficial Nicki and is presented with a great opportunity in The Bling Ring to demonstrate her comedic chops, something that she has rarely been able to tap into in her previous roles.

Noah (2014)

Like it or hate it, Darren Aronofsky’s Noah was an indisputably grandiose effort to bring the biblical story of Noah’s Ark into the 21st century. And for those who are not interested in spectacle-heavy disaster films or films with religious or metaphysical overtones, there’s Emma Watson to look forward to in a small but memorable role as Ila, Noah’s daughter-in-law. The predicament Watson’s character is placed in later in the film gives the actress a chance to play a more mature role and deliver a heart-rending performance as a mother who has complicated emotions about the birth of her children.

Honorable Mentions: My Week with Marilyn (2011) and This Is the End (2013)

While Emma Watson has very limited screen-time in these two films, both My Week with Marilyn and This Is the End are worthy of an honorable mention because of the sheer pleasure it gives its audience. My Week with Marilyn mainly focuses on the budding romantic feelings between Eddie Redmayne’s Colin Clark and Michelle Williams’s Marilyn Monroe, but there are scenes in the film that touch upon a brief fling between Colin and Emma Watson’s character Lucy, which for Harry Potter fans may be a mind-blowing interaction straight out of fan fiction, considering the fact that Redmayne later went on to play Newt Scamander in the Harry Potter spinoff Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

And finally, This Is the End deserves an honorable mention on the list for having Emma Watson play herself and jam the wooden end of an axe straight into Seth Rogen’s face. Enough said.

[Featured Image by Mike Coppola/Getty Images]