This article employs John Fiske’s three-level semiotic approach to examine the representation of the family in selected Oscar-winning films from 2001 to 2015 and to identify its characteristics. To this end, out of thirty-one award-winning works over the fifteen-year period, ten films with family-related themes were analyzed. Based on the findings of this study, the following elements were identified in the representations of the family across these works: intergenerational conflicts, cohesive parent-child relationships, emphasis on love as a sustaining element of the family, the importance of femininity and motherhood, the dominance of technology, the emergence of new family forms, homosexuality, and the declining authority of the family. Furthermore, based on the analysis of the films, three main discourses were identified: the normative and traditional family, which emphasizes conservative values, the prominent role of the father, and religious morality; alternative and resistant families, including single-parent families, chosen families, and critiques of patriarchy and capitalism; and the fluid and disintegrating family, in which loneliness, individualism, and technocracy dominate human relationships and family structures. The findings indicate that the selection of films by the Academy Awards consistently involves the reproduction of normative values while simultaneously providing a limited space for social and cultural critique. This article emphasizes that the representation of the family in selected Oscar-winning cinema is not merely a reflection of social reality but rather a product of the balance between cultural conservatism, artistic innovation, and economic-political imperatives, stemming from America’s imperialistic and hegemonic policies on a global scale.