The Best Thrillers On Amazon Prime Right Now

A good thriller is an edge-of-your-seat cinematic experience, a film that keeps you guessing, expertly weaves plot twists into larger narratives, and delivers endings you never saw coming. Each of the movies of this list checks those boxes. They might be of different genres and decades, but these gripping films keep the heart racing and the mind whirling. Here are the best thrillers on Amazon Prime right now.

Related: The Best Action Movies On Amazon Prime Right Now

Suspiria (2018)

Run Time: 152 min | IMDb: 6.8/10

Luca Guadagnino’s buzzed-about horror remake is a mind-bending exercise in the cinematic. Dakota Johnson plays Susie, a young dancer who arrives at a prestigious academy where disturbing happenings begin to take place. After one dancer goes missing, another dies, and a third is severely injured, the students begin investigating their instructors to discover they belong to a coven of witches with troubling rituals that rest upon the dancers playing their parts.

A Quiet Place (2018)

Run Time: 90 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

John Krasinski’s breakout horror flick has made its way to Amazon. The film stars Krasinski and his wife, Emily Blunt, as a couple trying their best to raise their family in the middle of an apocalypse where the slightest sound might attract other-worldly creatures intent on hunting them down and killing them. It’s a thrilling turn for both actors, with twists you don’t see coming and a satisfying ending.

Shutter Island (2010)

Run Time: 138 min | IMDb: 8.1/10

DiCaprio and Scorsese team up again, this time for a dramatic thriller that feels different from their normal fare but still just as intense. DiCaprio plays a detective drawn to a mysterious island that houses a psychiatric facility for the criminally insane. He’s investigating the case of an escaped convict, but a conveniently-timed storm, a hostile staff, and some strange happenings lead him down a rather dark and dangerous rabbit hole. There’s a twist ending here worthy of its build-up, and DiCaprio shares the screen with some notable talents including Mark Ruffalo, Michelle Williams, Sir Ben Kingsley, and Emily Mortimer.

Chinatown (1974)

Run Time: 130 min | IMDb: 8.2/10

Faye Dunaway and Jack Nicholson star in this neo-noir about a private investigator who becomes entangled in a government scheme. Nicholson plays Jake Gittes, a P.I. hired by Evelyn Malwray (Dunaway) to follow her husband and report on his dealings. It turns out, Mr. Malwray was at the center of a government cover-up as the local water authority was trying to run people off their land by drying up their water source. There’s a lot going on here — corruption, a twisted family secret, romance, and plenty of violence — but watching Nicholson confusedly sort through it all is most of the fun.

Add To Watchlist

You Were Never Really Here (2017)

Run Time: 89 min | IMDb: 6.8/10

Joaquin Phoenix stars as a troubled hitman with a dark past in this thrilling crime flick from Lynne Ramsay. Phoenix plays Joe, a gun for hire, former military man and FBI agent, who spends most of his time rescuing victims of sex trafficking. He’s recruited to save a Senator’s daughter from a brothel that caters to high-end clientele, but the job thrusts him into the center of a conspiracy that costs him everything and ends in blood and tragedy. It’s a relentless slog to be sure, but it works because Ramsay is more interested in profiling the man, not the hits he makes.

Hereditary (2018)

Run Time: 127 min | IMDb: 7.3/10

Toni Collette stars in this terrifying nightmare by first-time director Ari Aster. The film charts the grief and shared trauma of the Graham family. Annie (Collette) is mourning the loss of her secretive mother, worrying over her inherited mental health issues and her children. When her son Peter accidentally kills his sister, hauntings begin happenings. Malevolent spirits, possessions, a seance gone wrong — this is pure nightmare fuel, people.

Fatal Attraction (1987)

Run Time: 119 min | IMDb: 6.9/10

Michael Douglas and Glenn Close star in this classic thriller about a married man and his scorned lover. Douglas plays Dan Gallagher, a family man whose indiscretion with a beautiful woman named Alex (Close) comes back to haunt him in a big way. Alex, intent on having Dan for herself, or at the very least making him pay for his mistreatment of her once their affair ended, goes to extremes to get what she wants in a game of cat-and-mouse that keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Shot Caller (2017)

Run Time: 121 min | IMDb: 7.3/10

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau stars as Jacob Harlon, a stockbroker and family man who accidentally kills his best friend in a car accident and serves a limited sentence in prison for his crime. While there, Harlon becomes embroiled in gang wars, being forced to fight and do terrible things to survive life behind bars. When he’s finally released, Harlon must navigate between his old life with his wife and son, and the pressures of his continued commitment to the gang boss that protected him on the inside.

Primal Fear (1996)

Run Time: 129 min | IMDb: 7.7/10

Richard Gere and Laura Linney star in this neo-noir crime thriller about a Chicago defense attorney assigned to defend a man accused of murdering an influential Catholic Archbishop. Gere plays Martin Vail, a vain lawyer who takes on the case of a young man with a stutter who may have killed a high-ranking member of the Catholic Church. Vail begins digging into the boy’s past and finds disturbing links between the crime of which he’s accused and the abuse he suffered as an altar boy. The movie takes so many twists and turns, trying to predict its ending is nearly impossible — the mark of a truly good thriller.

Three Days Of The Condor (1975)

Run Time: 117 min | IMDb: 7.5/10

Faye Dunaway and Robert Redford play a bookish CIA analyst and the woman he holds hostage in this political thriller. Redford’s Joe Turner returns from lunch to find his co-workers murdered and himself on the run as he tries to find out what happened and why while mysterious forces hunt him down. Dunaway plays Kathy Hale, a woman he kidnaps and holds hostage who soon begins to help him unravel the mystery.