Your Halloween Movie Marathon *Must* Include These Psychological Thrillers
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Now that the leaves are starting to fall and there’s a chill in the air, it’s time to start prepping for ~spooky~ season. While I love a good romantic comedy, there’s nothing like curling up in a warm blanket and watching a thriller on a crisp fall evening. You know, those movies that leave you feeling deeply unsettled, either from confusion or fear (or both!).
Ever since childhood, when my mom exposed my siblings and I to the classic ’80s horror film Poltergeist, I’ve been a big fan of scary movies. Psychological thrillers tend to be my favorite because, rather than being a violent spectacle of blood and gore, these films usually contain elements of surprise and suspense that often leave you asking questions and pondering plotlines for weeks afterward. When I first saw Olivia Wilde’s Don’t Worry Darling and the cult classic American Psycho, for example, the complex characters and unpredictable plot twists kept my eyes glued to the screen the entire time. Oh, and let’s not forget about Jordan Peele’s Get Out, which had myself and the entire internet talking for days.
With so many streaming services at your disposal, it's never been easier to give yourself the heebie jeebies from the comfort of your own couch. (Plus, you can always press pause if you need to take a moment to, uh, calm yourself down.) From 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs to The Strays, here are the 25 best psychological thriller movies to watch in 2023:
Gone Girl (2014)
Nick and Amy Dunne are your typical upper-class, attractive couple who’ve settled into life in the suburbs…or so it seems. On their fifth wedding anniversary, Amy (Rosamund Pike) suddenly goes missing, and the police quickly point to Nick (Ben Affleck) as the prime suspect in her disappearance. As the film unfolds, lies, past lovers, and even current affairs are all exposed on the journey to finding out what exactly happened—or didn’t happen—to Amy.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
A true classic in the realm of psychological thrillers, The Silence of the Lambs follows FBI trainee Clarice (Jodie Foster) on a mission to interview renowned psychologist and convicted murderer Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) from jail. The goal: to coax out information he may have about another serial killer’s case. As Hannibal shares the inner workings of the mind of a killer to Clarice, he pressures her to reveal details about her childhood, which he attempts to use to manipulate her. Between the buildup of psychosexual tension and the urgency of an ongoing murder case, this film will have your skin crawling…pun intended.
Baby Ruby (2022)
Thrillers are always creepier when there are children involved…but babies? Yeah, that’s next level scary.
Baby Ruby follows soon-to-be parents Jo (Noémie Merlant), a lifestyle blogger, and her husband Spencer (Kit Harrington). While the film begins rather cheerfully with Jo setting up for a Pinterest-worthy DIY baby shower—one that receives rave reviews on her popular blog, btw—the story starts to take a dark turn after the party. Jo begins to see and hear things that make her question her reality, such as a new mom friend brutally murdering her baby. Once baby Ruby is born, events spiral out of control. Who can Jo trust, who has her and Ruby’s best interest at heart, and what the heck is wrong with that damn baby? Guess you’ll have to watch to find out!
Watcher (2022)
If you’re someone who’s currently paranoid about your nosy neighbors, you might want to skip Watcher. This psychological thriller follows an American woman named Julia (Maika Monroe) and her boyfriend Francis (Karl Glusman) on their move to Bucharest, Romania. After settling into their large apartment with grand windows, Julia begins to notice a strange man constantly staring at her through his window across the street. She grows increasingly paranoid about her neighbor’s creepy behavior, and starts her own investigation into him by following the suspicious, older man to his job as a janitor at a nearby strip club. Although her snooping—and later involving the local police—proves fruitless, Julia won’t stop until she has answers. Eventually, she discovers the gruesome truth…but it may be too late.
The Strays (2023)
It’s no small feat when a psychological thriller can both scare audiences and make some important social commentary at the same time. The Strays follows the story of a biracial woman living a seemingly perfect life with her husband and two children. As the headmistress at her local private school and a popular figure amongst her social circles, Neve (Ashley Madekwe) seems to have it all. That is, until the secret past she left behind comes back to bite her. This film will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very twisted end.
Us (2019)
What begins as a seemingly happy family vacation to her childhood home becomes a living nightmare for Adelaide Wilson (Lupita Nyong’o). When she brings her husband and two children to the beachfront house, past traumas resurface and her worst fears manifest into a terrifying attack. In short, four masked strangers who appear in their own likeness break into the home and Adelaide and her family must fight (uh, against themselves?) for their lives.
The Woman in the Window (2021)
Spying on your neighbors is rarely a good idea… that is, unless you become a witness to a violent crime. Dr. Anna Fox (Amy Adams) is an agoraphobic child psychologist in Manhattan who has recently separated from her husband. Scared to go outside but curious about her surroundings, Anna begins spying on a neighboring family—the Russells—through her window. When she witnesses a murder occur in their apartment, she immediately calls the police and thus begins a chaotic story of lies, stolen identities, and even hallucinations.
Don't Worry Darling (2022)
Despite its mixed reception among critics and viewers, Don’t Worry Darling was a highly enjoyable movie that kept me guessing until the very end. Starring Florence Pugh as Alice and Harry Styles as Jack, the movie focuses on an idyllic town and its near-perfect residents enjoying a life of comfort and frequent debauchery. In the community of Victory, traditional gender roles are highly regarded as the men of town go to work on a top-secret “project” daily while their wives stay home and take care of all the domestic duties (oh, and ensure that they look drop-dead gorgeous while doing so). Once Alice starts to experience odd flashbacks and recognize strange inconsistencies in her day-to-day life in Victory, the facade of their perfect life begins to shatter—and ultimately, the truth comes out.
I’m Thinking of Ending Things (2020)
It may be one of the strangest films I’ve ever watched, but I’m Thinking of Ending Things is also arguably a cinematic masterpiece. When an unnamed young woman played by Jessie Buckley and her boyfriend Jake (Jesse Plemons) visit his parents at their rural farm for the first time together, things aren’t quite what they seem. Over the course of the evening, the young woman’s reality starts to unravel as she notices strange behaviors from Jake and his parents, whose appearance and age shift several times throughout the film. After the couple leave the house and grab ice cream on their way home, the film rounds out in a strange dream ballet sequence, a recreation of a famous Broadway musical number, featuring a maggot-infested animated pig. This one’s a head-scratcher, to say the least.
Get Out (2017)
If there’s one thing Jordan Peele knows how to do well is produce an electrifying scary movie with a big message behind it. In Get Out, viewers see Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), a Black man, and his white girlfriend Rose (Allison Williams) getting ready to meet the parents. When Chris and Rose arrive at her affluent parents’ home, there’s a nervous energy that Chris chalks up to the family’s attempts at being extra sensitive to the fact that their relationship is interracial. As the visit proceeds, however, Chris begins having terrifying realizations about the state of things at the house, the diverse staff, and the true nature of Rose’s parents.
The Platform (2019)
Class warfare and cannibalism abound in the Spanish-language thriller movie The Platform. The film is set in a prison of sorts called the “Vertical Self-Management Center.” The “center” is made up of 333 levels of giant concrete slabs, which each hold two prisoners. On the top level, prisoners receive access to all of the food they could possibly eat—at the expense of those below them. The food descends in a trickle-down manner, with prisoners on the very bottom levels receiving leftover scraps, or often nothing at all. The story features several prisoners and their futile attempts to change the system, and others simply trying to survive. This psychological thriller will shake you up and have you pondering class structures.
Parasite (2019)
Sometimes, it’s nice to pretend to be someone you’re not… until it ends in disaster. The Kim family learn this the hardest way possible in 2020 Oscar winner Parasite. Living together in a dingy basement apartment and facing immense financial difficulty, they start to scheme about how they can change their situation. Min-hyuk, one of the sons and a university student, suggests that his brother Ki-woo take his place and pose as an English tutor for the wealthy Park family’s daughter. The rest of the Kim family members then decide to pose as various “qualified” professionals in order to get employed at the Park residence, but their hungry (and some say righteous) ruse slowly spirals into chaos—and even deadly results.
A Cure For Wellness (2016)
Asylums almost always make for a haunting setting in scary movies, and the backdrop of A Cure for Wellness is no exception. Here’s the gist: Lockhart (Dane DeHaan), a finance executive in New York City, is tasked with traveling to the Swiss Alps to bring back his company’s CEO, Pembroke (Harry Groener), from a “wellness center.” When Lockhart arrives at the center, he immediately grows suspicious of the operation, and for good reason. The patients there seem to ingest a mysterious elixir out of small blue bottles as part of their “treatment,” and once Lockhart begins to pry into just what “cure” is being given to them, he wakes up after a car accident and finds himself being held prisoner there. The center’s terrifying background and its horrors are soon revealed, and Lockhart must escape and expose its masterminds before it’s too late.
Fight Club (1999)
There’s a reason why “the first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club.” With its unexpected twists and turns, this cult classic follows an unnamed white-collar worker (Edward Norton) who is fully unsatisfied with his boring, corporate-run life. As a way to combat his melancholy, he begins attending various support groups for addiction and cancer diagnosis. After Norton’s character meets Tyler (Brad Pitt) at a nude beach, his life is turned upside down as the two form an underground club for other unsatisfied men to feel something by physically fighting each other. If you’re open to movies featuring violence combined with psychological twists and complex characters, this is a must-watch film.
A Simple Favor (2018)
I love films where women are centered, even if they are villains, so I personally couldn’t get enough of A Simple Favor. The film features a star-studded cast with Anna Kendrick playing mommy vlogger Stephanie and Blake Lively playing Emily, a glamorous fellow mom at her son’s school. Without giving away too many spoilers, this thriller weaves a complicated tale of deception, betrayal, secret siblings, and even incest (yeah, didn’t see that one coming). Trust, you’ll be locked in until the very end.
American Psycho (2000)
You can’t create a list of the best psychological thrillers and not include American Psycho. Deeply disturbing, but truly gripping, the film is set in 1987 and follows the posh life of New York City resident and successful young professional Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale). He seems to live a normal life as a handsome, affluent Manhattan executive with a beautiful fiancée (Reese Witherspoon) in tow, but Patrick has a deeply dark secret: He’s a psychopathic serial killer. Although it’s also considered a dark comedy due to the social commentary, American Psycho certainly scared the [redacted] out of me, so much so that I tend to stay out of strange men’s apartments until I’ve confirmed that they don’t have a tendency to seduce and shank unassuming women.
Exam (2009)
Have you ever wanted a job so badly, you’d go through absolute torture to get hired? Well, the candidates featured in Exam do just that. When they’re all put in a sterile room together with individual desks and no windows or accessible exits in sight, eight candidates for a lucrative position within a prestigious company realize they may be in for something they didn’t expect. The film starts off a bit slow, but soon unravels into absolute madness as the candidates fight tooth and nail to pass the “exam” laid in front of them. This thriller is as surprising as it is disturbing. It might just make you think twice about the next job listing you see on LinkedIn.
Knock at the Cabin (2023)
When a happy gay couple and their adopted daughter Wen (Kristen Cui) embark on a family vacation to a secluded cabin, everything seems perfectly serene…that is until Wen is approached by a strange, large man while playing outside. The man, Leonard (Dave Bautista), tries to befriend Wen in order to gain access to the cabin. When Wen and her dads try to take shelter, locked inside, Leonard and three other strangers break in and take the family hostage. Leonard and his crew quickly reveal that the world is going to end, and that its fate lies in the hands of their small family. The choice to make either an unthinkable sacrifice or let the world burn is placed before them. Some pretty insane events follow as the couple tries to reconcile with how to handle an impossible situation.
The Weekend Away (2022)
Everyone can appreciate a girls’ trip, especially when it’s a posh European getaway. In The Weekend Away, Beth (Leighton Meester) and her bestie Kate (Christina Wolfe) take a weekend trip to Croatia, where Beth reveals her dissatisfaction with her marriage, and that she isn’t sure what next steps to take. One night, the two women go clubbing, and the next morning Beth, without memory of the night before, finds that Kate is missing. When Beth’s husband Rob (Luke Norris) arrives to help with the police investigation, Beth comes to realize that a lot of secrets are being kept by her husband and best friend—and nothing is as it seems.
I See You (2019)
A terrifying frog mask, child kidnapping, and a home invasion all make up the complex storyline of I See You. The movie follows local detective Greg Harper (Jon Tenney) who’s investigating a recent kidnapping that happened in his town. Once he discovers pieces of evidence that seem obviously connected to a string of abductions committed by a former prisoner, he considers the case closed and convicts the man. The prisoner quickly demands a retrial, claiming innocence in this particular kidnapping. Meanwhile, things are tense at the Harper residence after Greg’s wife Jackie (Helen Hunt) recently cheated on him—her son hates her for it, and their relationship is now strained. What’s more? Behind the scenes, a young couple is hiding in their upstairs guest bedroom, committing a crime called “frogging.” Everything comes to a gruesome and shocking head when the squatting couple discover the truth behind the recent kidnapping, and the true monster is exposed.
Cam (2018)
Sex work can be risky, even when its done in the comfort of your own home. Alice (Madeline Brewer), a camgirl working under the screen name “Lola” livestreams for hours a day, performing sexual acts and roleplaying different characters for hundreds of men online. For the most part, she is able to keep this job and her personal life separate, until she encounters two of her loyal viewers in-person. One is a planned meeting, while the other is a surprise run-in while out in her small town. When she logs onto her camgirl account the next day, Alice is locked out, but sees that there is a person with her exact likeness and mannerisms currently streaming on her account. The plot unravels from there, with Alice desperately trying to stop this imposter from both overtaking her account and putting her in danger. All of these events culminate in a duel via livestream where Alice faces her enemy once and for all.
Level 16 (2018)
One of the few psychological thrillers I’ve seen that jump straight into the horror of it all is Level 16. The film keeps you guessing from the very beginning. It’s set in a strange girls academy where the students must abide by strict rules and routines—such as being required to thoroughly wash their faces and take a mysterious medication at the same time everyday or risk major punishment, like getting locked in a small cage for days at a time. The school claims to be “training” the girls for adoption by kind and successful families, but as you can imagine, that’s not the case. When two of the students reach the final level (level 16, duh) of training at the school and discover that adoption is not in the cards, they embark on a fight for their lives to discover the truth about the prison they’ve been kept in for years.
Swallow (2019)
You know the saying, “Happy wife, happy life?” Well, Swallow is essentially a cautionary tale of what can happen when a wife isn’t so happy. The story features Haley Bennett as Hunter, a pregnant and bored housewife of the wealthy Manhattan heir to a finance company. Unhappy with how her husband treats her—and her unremarkable domestic life in general—Hunter gives in to her intrusive thoughts and eats a marble. The thrill offers her just the feeling she’s been looking for, so in order to keep chasing that high she continues to ingest random household items, including thumbtacks and batteries, to see what happens. After she is diagnosed with pica, a disorder that causes people to eat inedible objects out of compulsion, her husband tries to institutionalize her until she gives birth to their baby. Unhappy with her fate, Hunter escapes her home and runs away to a motel, where her pica continues to spiral, and leads her to make sense of her traumatic upbringing. If you’re squeamish, it’s safe to say this may not be the film for you.
Mother! (2017)
Some movies pack a punch with their messaging, and others are just plain confusing AF. Mother! falls under the latter category, but still stands as a great psychological thriller with a top-notch cast. Mother, played by Jennifer Lawrence, is renovating a beautiful Victorian home with her husband, Him (Javier Bardem). When a strange Man (Ed Harris) appears at their door and becomes an unexpected guest in their home, madness ensues and the couple’s reality begins to shatter as Mother discovers horrifying issues within the home, all while fending off additional unwanted guests. You’ll have a million questions by the end, but will be scared silly nonetheless.
Misery (1990)
Recognized as one of the most famous and critically-acclaimed psychological thrillers in history, you’ll be haunted for days by Misery. When novelist Paul Sheldon (James Caan) gets into a terrible car accident, he is rescued by nurse Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates), who brings him to her secluded cabin to nurse him back to health, but not before telling him that she is one of his biggest fans. Paul’s comfort quickly turns into terror as Annie begins torturing him in response to learning that he will be killing off one of her favorite characters in his next novel. As gruesome as it is legendary, this film is one you can’t pass up.
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