Summary

• Movies with ethical dilemmas offer captivating stories and thought-provoking moral quandaries, challenging both the characters and the audience's decision-making.
• Films like Sicario, Watchmen, and Sophie's Choice present complex choices, such as compromising morals for the greater good or making impossible decisions in dire circumstances.
• These movies showcase the moral grey areas and tough positions the characters face, leaving viewers pondering what they would do in similar situations.

Movies with ethical dilemmas or moral decisions make for some of the most compelling stories. Almost every film sees the protagonist having to overcome tough choices, and then possibly having to deal with the aftermath and the consequences of those choices too. But some movies with ethical dilemmas do it better than others, and some choices pose fascinating moral quandaries that would leave even the biggest puritans and samaritans scratching their heads.

The audience is put in the position of these characters and asked what they would do in such a situation when the answer is not always so clear. Between deciding to torture a man who could be innocent, and lobbying for tobacco companies when trying to be a decent role model to building a bomb that could end all war but also doom humanity, these characters in some of the best movies ever have been put in the toughest positions.

15 Sicario (2015)

• Stream on MGM+

Sicario is one of those intense movies that is hard to process at first but the idea behind it and its war on drugs dilemma is very compelling. The movie opens with an FBI investigation that shows the horrifying lengths the cartel is willing to go to and the law enforcement’s struggle to address these tactics. The movie then follows Emily Blunt’s agent who finds herself in an operation that is willing to go to similar extreme lengths with the purpose, not to wipe out the drug trade, but to give power to one cartel to make it more manageable. It is the idea that the war on drugs is so dire that compromises must be made.

14 Watchmen (2009)

• Release Date: March 6, 2009
• Director: Zack Snyder
• Runtime: 163 minutes
• Cast: Jackie Earle Haley, Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Matthew Goode, Carla Gugino, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Patrick Wilson
• Stream on Max and Prime Video

Movie villains can sometimes do bad things with good intentions, and Ozymandias' actions are the best example of this. Yet, there are many who could very easily agree with his actions. Ozymandias killed three million people to prevent nuclear war, and in doing so, he saved the entire human race. Yes, what the character did was wrong, but it was also the right thing to do. In one of the movie's most memorable bits of dialogue, Nite Owl says, "You killed millions," and Ozymandias responds, "To save billions." Watchmen is one of those movies where the bad guy wins, and yet it's actually hard for some to fully call Ozymandias a villain, in the end.

13 Sophie's Choice (1982)

• Release Date: December 10, 1982
• Director: Alan J. Pakula
• Runtime: 151 minutes
• Cast: Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, Peter MacNicol
• Stream on Hulu and Peacock

When it comes to famous moral dilemmas in movies, Sophie's Choice is the obvious answer. It's such an obvious answer, in fact, that the title of the movie has even become a metaphor for moral dilemmas. Sophie's Choice is an emotionally exhausting movie, and it gets worse than any viewer could ever imagine when the titular character had to make an impossible choice in Auschwitz. Sophie was forced to decide which of her two children should live and which should be sent to the gas chamber, and if she didn't decide, then they would both be killed.

12 Prisoners (2013)

• Stream on Netflix

Prisoners follows Kelly Dover going to extreme lengths to find his abducted daughter. When a suspect is dropped by the police, Kelly takes matters into his own hands by taking the former suspect captive and torturing him. The logic behind Kelly's actions is that if Alex is the abductor, he'll find out once Alex can't take any more torture. But if Alex isn't the abductor, Kelly will have tortured an innocent man. What's worse is that Alex turned out to be completely innocent in the crime, even if it was his mother the whole time. That's all before the gripping Prisoners ending too.

11 Schindler's List (1993)

• Stream on Showtime

Oskar Schindler is often seen as a great hero in Steven Spielberg’s Best Picture winning movie Schindler’s List, but rewatching the movie shows the complexity of the man. As with the true story of Schindler’s List, Schindler was a war profiteer who was becoming successful off the labor of Jewish citizens assigned to his factory. However, as he becomes more aware of the realities of the holocaust, he is faced with the moral dilemma of whether he can continue to turn a blind eye or save as many as he can. In the end, there is no victory for Schindler despite saving thousands as he is tormented by the idea that he could have saved more.

10 Thank You For Smoking (2005)

• Release Date: March 17, 2006
• Director: Jason Reitman
• Runtime: 92 minutes
• Cast: Aaron Eckhart, Maria Bello, Cameron Bright, Adam Brody, Sam Elliott, Katie Holmes, Rob Lowe, J.K. Simmons
• Rent on Apple TV

Compared to other movie moral dilemmas, the one in Thank You For Smoking is fairly straightforward. Not only that, but it makes for one of the most overlooked and entertaining films of the 2000s, not to mention that it's Jason Reitman's best movie. The movie is about a Big Tobacco spokesperson who goes on TV to lie through his teeth about how cigarettes aren't unhealthy. However, he doesn't smoke himself, and he has to act as a decent role model for his son while still lobbying for these tobacco companies. It's a brilliant satire, as the lobbyist even convinces a cancer patient to take up smoking.

9 The Dark Knight (2008)

• Stream on Max and Netflix

There's a lot about the Joker's plan in The Dark Knight that doesn't make much sense, such as intentionally getting captured just to escape again. However, it all accumulates to a shocking finale that's classic Joker. On the sea, there are two cruise ships, one filled with hardworking civilians and the other filled with convicts, and they're both rigged to blow. In a classic Sophie's Choice predicament, each cruise ship can detonate the other, but if neither of them does it, Joker will blow up both. It holds up a mirror to the audience and forces them to think about what they'd do themselves.

8 The Mist (2007)

• Stream on DIRECTV

At the end of The Mist, when David, his friends, and his young son are stuck in the car and out of gas, they think the best thing to do would be to kill themselves quickly than get picked apart by the monsters. David shoots all of them, including his young son, to spare them from the creatures. Though choosing whether to kill his own son or watch him get killed is a heartwrenching moral dilemma, it doesn't take long for David to decide what to do. It's a snap decision, and that's part of what makes it so grueling to watch.

7 Batman Forever (1995)

• Stream on Max and Prime Video

In Batman Forever, the Riddler makes Batman choose who to save, Robin or Dr. Chase Meridian, as he can only reach one or the other. Though Riddler seemed like much more of a threat in some amazing Batman Forever deleted scenes, there wasn't much at stake with regard to the moral dilemma. In the end, Batman, of course, ends up managing to save both of them.

It was even done much better in The Dark Knight, as the caped crusader has to choose between the love of his life or the one man who can clean up Gotham, Harvey Dent. However, the 1995 movie is representative of all the superhero movies that follow this heavily repeated trope. It's used in other Batman movies, almost every Spider-Man movie, and so many other superhero blockbusters.

6 Toy Story 2 (1999)

• Stream on Disney+

Toy Story 2 is one of the best examples of why Pixar is one the best studios when it comes to storytelling, not just its groundbreaking animation. It's a lesson that adults can learn from just as much as children. Woody is torn (quite literally, as he rips his arm in the process) between being encased in glass and living on for generations, or having a family and being loved. It's a classic moral dilemma that has been the crux of stories for centuries, where characters choose between being immortal or enjoying the life they have, and Toy Story 2 approaches it in such a unique way.

5 No Country For Old Men (2007)

• Stream on Prime Video and Paramount+

No Country for Old Men begins with a very simple moral dilemma of a man finding a suitcase full of money in the desert and deciding whether or not to keep it. Llewelyn Moss comes across a drug deal gone wrong with only one survivor who he leaves to die of his wounds. However, the movie sets up a second dilemma when Moss cannot simply walk away with the money and goes back to help the dying man. This decision is what kicks off the story of him running for his life. No Country for Old Men's ending makes an interesting point about the consequences of such dilemmas as Anton Chigurgh represents the idea that Moss was a dead man as soon as he decided to take the money.

4 Looper (2012)

• Stream on Tubi

It's the age-old dilemma: if someone could go back in time and kill Hitler when he was a baby, would they do it? On one hand, it would save the lives of six million people, but on the other hand, he hasn't yet done anything wrong. Looper essentially posits the same dilemma. In the time travel movie, criminals are sent back in time to be shot, which makes for a debate over whether or not they should be killed for their potential evil. However, a much more interesting moral dilemma arises within this first one. The man who is hired to shoot these criminals sees his older self sent back in time, creating the dilemma of whether or not he should kill himself.

3 Gone Baby Gone (2007)

• Release Date: October 19, 2007
• Director: Ben Affleck
• Runtime: 114 minutes
• Cast: Casey Affleck, Michelle Monaghan, Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris, Amy Ryan
• Stream on Paramount+

Ben Affleck’s first movie as a director, Gone Baby Gone, proved his skill behind the camera in handling this complex crime story. Casey Affleck stars as Patrick, a private detective investigating a case involving a young girl who was taken from her mother’s home. However, the investigation leads him to discover the girl was taken by her uncle and some police officers in order to get her out of her dangerous household. Patrick is faced with the decision of what is best for the girl— to return to her neglectful mother or have her raised by her kidnappers. In the end, he’s unsure if he made the right choice.

2 Oldboy (2003)

• Buy on Apple TV

The moral dilemma in Oldboy is one of the most vulgar and hard to watch. At the end of the movie, Oh finds out that he unknowingly had sex with his own daughter, who he hadn't seen since she was an infant. He either must live his whole life knowing that he unwittingly did this, or he can kill himself. In the same situation, the character Lee kills himself, but Oh doesn't, and it's one of the most shocking twists in cinema. There was a Hollywood remake of the movie in 2013, but it didn't have half of the impact of the original.

1 Oppenheimer (2023)

• Now in theaters

Oppenheimer has become the highest grossing biopic of all time with Christopher Nolan’s movie examining the man who built the atomic bomb. The movie explores a lot of elements around J. Robert Oppenheimer’s life, but the question of what he is unleashing on the world is what weighs heaviest on him. He does make justifications along the way, suggesting that while he is unsure if they can be trusted with the bomb, it is far more dangerous in the hands of the Nazis. But in the end, whatever ideas of winning the war may have comforted him before, he is struck by the idea that he created something that will destroy the world.