10 Films Amy Adams Made Brilliant

Adams' breakthrough role came in the 2005 comedy drama about an art dealer who travels from Chicago to North Carolina to meet her new in-laws. Adams' performance as the sweet and slightly naive pregnant girl, Ashley, who is mesmerized by the seemingly glamorous life of her sister-in-law, earned her her first Oscar nomination in the Best Supporting Actress category, as well as a Special Jury Prize after it premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival .

In this parody of Disney classics about a fairytale princess who is sent to the urban mecca of Manhattan by a wicked stepmother, Adams' plays Princess Giselle, a Disney cartoon princess brought to life, who conquers the cynicism of New York with her sickly sweet optimism and becomes attracted to a handsome lawyer. The film was a great critical and commercial success and won Adams a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a musical or comedy.

The film adaptation of John Patrick Shanley's play 'Doubt: a Parable' tells the story of a Catholic school principal who questions a priest's suspicious relationship with a  young student, and saw Adams play a nun who questions her fellow sister's (played by Meryl Streep) accusations against the priest in question. It's no small feat to outshine the Streep but Adams' performance earned her a second Oscar nomination, as well as Best Supporting Actress nods at the BAFTAs, SAG awards, and Golden Globes.

In this film about a woman who takes on a challenge to cook all 524 recipes in Julia Childs' famous landmark cookbook, Adams stars alongside Meryl Streep for a second time to play Julie Powell, an aspiring young cook and blogger seeking respite from her droll office job. 

In this biographical sports drama about the life of professional boxer Micky Ward (played by Mark Wahlberg), Adams puts on a sassy performance as Micky's girlfriend, Charlene Fleming. Critics praised her for playing against her usual type and she went on to win a third Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress, as well as nominations at the SAG awards, the BAFTAs, and the Golden Globes.

In this drama about a Naval veteran (played by Joaquin Phoenix) who arrives home from war disorientated, until he becomes drawn in by a philosophical movement called The Cause and its charismatic leader, Lancaster Dodd, Adams plays Dodd's steely wife, Peggy. The film garnered wide praise and Adams' individual performance won her a fourth Oscar nomination in the category of Best Supporting Actress.

In this dark comedy crime film, Adams stars alongside Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, and Jennifer Lawrence, and plays a seductive con-artist who teams up with the government to go after potentially corrupt politicians. The film received a whopping 10  nominations at the Oscars, including one for Best Actress for Adams, and a Golden Globe award.

Though her role in this film by Spike Jonze was widely overshadowed by her lead part in American Hustle, Adams nevertheless shone as the quietly disheveled Amy, a close friend who Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) fails to notice as he falls in love with an operating system and who we couldn't help falling for.  

In this hard-hitting sci-fi fiction drama adapted from Ted Chiang's award-winning book 'Story of Your Life', Amy shines as the Professor of Linguistics, Dr Louise Banks who is enlisted by the US government to decipher the language of extra-terrestrials when they initiate first contact and to determine the reasons for their visitation. 

In her second film this year, Adams plays a successful Los Angeles art-gallery owner whose privileged life begins to unravel when her ex-husband reenters her life in the form of a surprise manuscript. Hotly tipped for academy award success, could this be Adams' first Oscar?!