The Best Movies to Watch Right Now, According to the GQ Editors

Many people find themselves, at present, confined to their homes, unable to leave except for vital grocery or health runs. So we've rounded up the best movies to watch from the comfort of those very homes, should you have the time. Among our list, you'll find some classics, some directors' cuts, a soon-to-be horror classic, and more. These are the best movies to watch from home right now, according to the GQ editors (for the best TV shows to watch right now, click here).

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Swallow

Carlo Mirabella-Davis’s domestic horror is not for the faint of heart… or stomach. A young housewife (played by a chilly Haley Bennett) feels stifled in her art deco home and develops pica, a dangerous penchant for ingesting small objects. First, it’s a marble—then a thumb tack begins to look tantalizing. Soon she takes bigger risks: a rock, a nail, a battery. The film could easily venture into Cronenberg-ian body horror, but it decides against the sensational. Swallow only offers small glimpses of the bloody aftermath, because it knows that the most disturbing images are the ones you create when you’re forced to fill in the gaps. —Iana Murray

Motherless Brooklyn

I rewatched Motherless Brooklyn the other day, and it's absolutely worth another look for movie lovers and New York City lovers alike. Edward Norton's performance as a private eye coping with Tourette's is one of last year's best. The movie's film noir style, gang narrative, and unexpected love story make it worth a rental, especially now. An added bonus? There's lots of cameos to look forward to, including Bobby Cannavale, Alec Baldwin, and Willem Dafoe.—Dana Mathews

Kingdom of Heaven (Director's Cut)

Ah, the director’s cut: a movie you (usually) love, but more of it. Sometimes you really do need 45 more minutes. No director proves this better than Ridley Scott, who has been packing extra footage onto DVDs throughout his career, often to transformative effect. Take Kingdom of Heaven: the theatrical release was a middling adventure vehicle for Orlando Bloom that fizzled with critics and audiences, but the director’s cut, all 194 minutes of it, is a multi-layered historical epic worthy of your time. So start with that and then make your way to Blade Runner and beyond (and thank me later).—Colin Groundwater

The F Word

There are New York movies. There are Chicago movies, Boston movies, Baltimore movies. There are movies set in Gotham City, in Raccoon City, and in Derry, Maine. But there aren’t a whole lot of Toronto movies, despite it doubling for all the places I just mentioned for decades. The same warm glow I felt as a kid seeing another Asian face pop up on television, I feel now whenever my hometown gets to play itself in a feature film. And in the last decade, no movie’s used Toronto more effectively than the 2013 romantic comedy The F Word.

Just a couple of years earlier, Edgar Wright’s Scott Pilgrim adaptation was a fun-as-hell showcase for the city, but locations-wise, it stuck mainly to the hits: tourist traps like Casa Loma, iconic landmarks like the now-demolished Honest Ed’s, fast food franchises like Pizza Pizza and Second Cup. The F Word, by contrast, captures what it’s really like to be single, broke, and completely directionless in Toronto in your early twenties—all of which I happened to be in 2013. The loaded cast—including post-Harry Potter Daniel Radcliffe, Zoe Kazan at her alluring best, Girls-era Adam Driver, a ready-to-breakout Mackenzie Davis, and an always-on-point Rafe Spall—amble aimlessly through parks during the day and bars at night. They crash on their siblings’ couches and try on clothes they can’t afford. They watch old movies alone at The Royal, chomp burgers at the George Street Diner, and show up at their nephew’s karate tournament with a bunch of their friends just to have something to do that day. The whole thing is held aloft by the perfectly calibrated, enormously charming script by Elan Mastai, who also wrote the decade’s most romantic Vonnegut-y time travel romp of a novel, All Our Wrong Todays.

If you’re now wondering how you missed the boat on a delightful rom-com starring Harry Potter and Kylo Ren, I’m fairly certain I know the reason: in America, The F Word was regrettably and generically retitled What If?, damning it to a lifetime of getting scrolled past thoughtlessly on streaming services. I refuse to ever call it that, the same way no one other than Drake will ever non-ironically call Toronto “The 6.” —Yang-Yi Goh

Ocean's 12

Honestly, I’d settle for any Soderbergh here. What I’m really looking for from a movie in our strange moment is competence and a little zip; I know no major filmmaker with a better grasp of both of those than Steven Soderbergh. But Ocean’s Twelve, oddly enough, feels like a viral viewing high-water mark. The film was panned on release, and I honestly can’t figure out why. It’s just...famous people...being charming...in Europe...while stealing stuff. What could be better? What could be further from our present moment? Come for the Julia Roberts bit, stay for Brad Pitt’s buzz cut, and chortle amongst yourselves at Vincent Cassel’s whole capoeira thing.—Sam Schube

He's Just Not That Into You

When I was fully single, I spent way too much time waiting for messages from guys who were simply... just not that into me. In these dark, chaotic times, this movie is a fun reminder to take the hint in all aspects of life. If he’s sitting at home with nothing to do for 18+ hours a day, and you still can’t get a text back: he’s just not that into you.—Ashlee Bobb

Prisoners

Talk about an uninviting title: Prisoners? No thanks, I’m living it! And yet, here we are. It may be early in what looks to be a very long quarantine, but I for one am already at the point where a diet of ‘90s sitcoms, pop star livestreams, and cute animal TikToks isn't cutting it. The point where I’m craving something that’ll get my heart rate up and make me forget that I even own a smartphone. And friends, Denis Villeneuve’s 2013 WHERE’S MY DAUGHTER!!! thriller is just the thing. Though Prisoners is commenting on America’s Bush-era torture program, it’s pretty resonant right now, too: Here’s a picture of how much more frightening captivity could be.—Max Cea

The Virgin Suicides

Given what's going on around the world right now, a movie depicting the suicide of teenage girls sounds like a poor remedy for loneliness. Not for me! Deep into social distancing, I find myself drawn to the isolation rampant in Sofia Coppola’s films. Comb through her catalogue and you will find loneliness embedded in the DNA of her protagonists: an actor alone and adrift in Tokyo, an adolescent queen loathed by her people, but none more so than the Lisbon sisters of The Virgin Suicides. Their drew me in as it oddly mirrors the protective measures I’ve been practicing as of late. In place of a contagion, the sisters are quarantined by their parents to shield their innocence from the sins of the world. The sisters ultimately (...spoiler alert?) take their own lives while in captivity, and the true motivator for their deaths is never revealed. What is known, however, is that they escape and solve their isolation with a morbid solution. With the light at the end of the COVID-19 tunnel looking like a pinhole, I found myself in calm and melancholic when the movie ended, knowing this strange time will also come to a much more pleasant end.—Alex Wedel

Castaway

If you're feeling lost during the time of self-isolation, why not let America's favorite leading man show you how to cope with it? We may not be stranded on a desolate island with a dearth of resources and nothing but a volleyball to keep us company like Tom Hanks was (lets hope not, at least). Nonetheless, his resolve and persistence to build a new routine is both inspiring and—for all of us now—instructive. This film shines light on two very important human qualities: our ability to renormalize and also to persevere. Lets hope our rescue boat finds us all soon.—Keir Novesky

Until the End of the World (Director's Cut)

Looking for a movie about humanity collectively panicking while teetering on the edge of a global catastrophe? Allow me to suggest: the five-hour director’s cut of Until the End of the World. Wim Wenders’s 1991 techno-futurist road epic takes you on a multi-continent trek with a French woman named Claire (Solveig Dommartin) chasing a debonair American man, Trevor (William Hurt), who has a mysterious device that allows the blind to see—all while a satellite is slated to fall through the atmosphere and crash back to earth. As we’re stuck in our homes for the foreseeable future, the film’s exquisite, breathtaking location shots and sublime soundtrack are not just gorgeous but fully transcendent. Also of note: the dulcet tones of Sam Neill’s narration, many great hats.—Gabriella Paiella

12 Monkeys

I found myself watching 12 Monkeys (1995) a few nights ago. Directed by Terry Gilliam and inspired by the French post apocalyptic film La Jetée, this trippy saga about a virus that wipes out most of humanity may seem a little on the nose for our current predicament. But it's also hopeful in a sad nostalgic way: if Bruce Willis can time travel back to the 1990s to stop the virus in its tracks (spoiler alert: he fails), maybe some enlightened hero from our future could figure out how to do it too.—Jim Gomez

Demolition Man

The 1993 action classic Demolition Man is a blockbuster set in a near-future utopia where every restaurant is a Taco Bell. For me this movie checks all of the boxes, including an incredible cast, anchored by a pre-Speed Sandra Bullock and a young as heck Rob Schneider. It’s streaming on Showtime, currently, and is slated to be played on a weekly rotation during my self isolation. Why? Because this movie makes me happy, and nothing beats seeing Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes as men out of their time, battling it out in a better future that should have been.—Noel Howard

Certain Woman

In the Before Time, when I did stuff like going to the movies, I had plans with a friend to go see Kelly Reichardt's First Cow, which had just come out in New York. Reichardt works in an artfully spare, realist mode, with deep characters but not a lot of action—it's the kind of thing I always appreciate seeing in a theater but struggle with at home. (When I'm settling in on my couch I'm usually shamefully dependent on punchlines and explosions to keep me from looking at my phone.) But since I now have no idea when I'll get to see First Cow, I took a flier on her 2016 Certain Women, featuring Laura Dern, Michelle Williams, Kristen Stewart, and some blustery Montana landscapes. Nothing much happened, and I loved it.—Chris Cohen

Self isolating? We've got your next few weeks fully covered.

Originally Appeared on GQ