Thriller movies come in all shapes and forms. And though it sometimes can be hard to pin down what exactly falls under its vast umbrella, the genre’s universal appeal is pretty straightforward: In their platonic form, these films scratch a particular itch and satisfy our collective urge for suspense in a way that honestly few if any other genre can. But sometimes, you simply can’t be bothered to scroll through your streaming queue or commit yourself to an obscure gem you had on your radar, especially after a long day’s work.
Though by no means an exhaustive list, today we’re plucking out a selection of titles that should come in handy the next time you’re at a loss of what to watch but looking for something that you know will deliver the goods, get your heart racing, and keep you locked in throughout. It doesn’t matter if you’ve already worn out the VHS tape after seeing the movie a gazillion times before — you’ll still gladly sit down to watch it if you catch it on cable any day of the week.
In the interest of fairness, we had to lay down a few ground rules: a director could only be represented once (sorry, Fincher-heads!) and no full-fledged horror or animated movies were allowed. Strong cases were made for undisputed cultural touchstones (“The Third Man”, “Vertigo”, “Se7en”, and “Chinatown”), lighthearted guilty pleasures (“The Fugitive”, “Ocean’s Eleven”, “The Departed”, “Die Hard”) and standout international imports like “Memories of Murder”, “The Handmaiden” and “Hard Boiled” that each deserves a big shout out but just missed the cut. From high-octane shoot-’em-ups to mind-melting brain-teasers, the titles listed down below only seem to get better with each extra viewing.
1. Heat (1995)
Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. ‘Nuff said. The evergreen rewatchability value of Michael Mann’s sprawling crime epic is quite obvious when you get down to it: What if we had two of the most recognizable movie stars in the planet at the peak of their powers going toe-to-toe under the thumb of the best American genre director in recent memory in a high-stakes cat and mouse chase across L.A.?
In the wise words of Tom Sizemore’s Michael Cheritto, the action IS the juice as far as this gritty urban thriller’s concerned. Much lip service has been paid to the ground-level daylight heist shootout that rolls in two-thirds in — and for good reason: It’s a masterfully staged bravura sequence that stakes a legitimate claim to the title of greatest action set piece ever filmed. But make no mistake: What truly elevates “Heat” beyond standard-issue cops-and-robbers fare as an all-timer entry in the dudes-rock movie canon is the film’s surprisingly tactful exploration of the unspoken bond and uncanny parallels between two consummate workaholics on opposite sides of the law — De Niro’s calculated career criminal and the relentless homicide cop hot on his trail (Pacino).
Scrap the Avengers — nothing will ever top that diner scene as the ultimate film-nerd crossover moment.
2. Memento (2000)
While he’s moved on to helm considerably bigger and more lucrative projects now at the top of the Hollywood food chain, Christopher Nolan’s closest brush to perfection came early on in his career with this sleek, $4.5 million L.A. neo-noir. The film instantly put the director on the map and gifted Guy Pearce a plum lead role to sink his teeth in as Leonard Shelby — a hopeless amnesiac frantically trying to piece together his past while dealing with a crippling memory impairment that prevents him from retaining new short-term information.
Limited budget or not, this is a Christopher Nolan movie we’re talking about, so unless you’ve been living under the rock for the past 25 years, it goes without saying that crisscrossing timelines, reverse chronological narratives, and dead wives are all to be expected. If you’re a fan of the director’s flashy calling cards and deft sleight of hand as someone who knows exactly which buttons to push to keep you on your toes with every left turn, consider “Memento” something of a spiritual prequel to “The Prestige” and “Inception” that repays close attention and only grows a little clearer with each repeated viewing.
Want to impress your buddies with your cinematic intellect? Give this one a few shakes on your own, then invite someone over and help them piece it all together.
3. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Hardly a controversial pick, Jonathan Demme’s Best Picture-winning two-hander boasts career-best performances by both Jodie Foster as fresh-faced FBI trainee Clarice Starling and Sir Anthony Hopkins as the imprisoned cannibalistic psycho who helps her track down another serial killer still at large known as Buffalo Bill.
Only the third movie in Oscars history to walk away with the so-called ‘Big Five’ Academy Awards, this spine-tingling adaptation of Thomas Harris’ bestselling 1988 novel took the world by storm and anticipated the true crime fever that now stretches across all media and has taken hold of the nation in recent years. In fact, if today’s top-charting podcasts tells us anything about the way we collectively consume and interact with the thriller genre, it’s that few types of films can scratch our morbid curiosity as those that try to peek into the mind of deranged serial killers in the mold of Dr. Hannibal Lecter.
16 minutes of screen time was all that the former forensic psychiatrist needed to strike fear into our hearts, lodge into our memory banks, win Hopkins a long-overdue Oscar, and earn its place in the all-time pantheon of cinema baddies as the most iconic Hollywood villain since Darth Vader. Big props go to Michael Mann for staying ahead of the curve and getting the ball rolling five years prior with “Manhunter”.
4. Rear Window (1954)
Alfred Hitchcock has a problem that most first-rate directors in history would probably kill to have, which is to have produced such an overabundance of unassailable masterpieces over your career that trying to reach a critical consensus on which one stands tallest feels like a rather pointless endeavor.
Which is to say that we could’ve just as well tapped the Master of Suspense for “North by Northwest”, “Vertigo”, “Notorious”, or “Psycho” and be done with it. It’s a toss-up, really, but if there’s one title in Hitchcock’s personal catalog that is tough to resist if you ever run into it skipping channels on cable on a lazy Sunday, that’s “Rear Window”.
Jimmy Stewart gives a knockout performance in a career chock full of them as L.B. Jefferies, a newspaper photographer with a broken leg and a morbid curiosity who unintentionally stumbles upon what appears to be a murder cover-up while idling away the hours spying on his neighbors through his apartment window. It’s been said before many times over, but the timeless genius of this thriller is that it taps right into our voyeuristic side, suggesting that, whether we like to admit it or not, there’s a little bit of Jefferies in all of us. (See also: Brian De Palma’s 1984s “Body Double”).
5. The Sixth Sense (1999)
It’s not entirely irrational to assume that modern viewers aren’t exactly lining up to rewatch a 25-year-old feel-bad staple everyone knows through pop-culture osmosis because a line that spoils the ending twist in no uncertain terms caught on as a meme. But as it turns out, knowing the big reveal of “The Sixth Sense” beforehand only magnifies the overall enjoyment and appreciation for the film on repeated viewings, as it allows you to focus on picking up on all the little clues hidden in plain sight you may have missed that put two and two together much earlier than you realized.
It also doesn’t hurt that peak Bruce Willis, Toni Collette, and Haley Joel Osment all bring their A-game, or the fact that Shyamalan packs enough tension and scares to keep fussy genre fans happy. And for any young reader who may be wondering why the journeyman director-for-hire behind stinkers like “The Last Airbender”, “After Earth” and “Glass” was once upon a time being unironically pegged as Steven Spielberg’s heir apparent, pressing play on the breakthrough hit that turned him into the hottest ticket in town at the turn of the century should give them a hint or two.