7 Crime Thrillers that will Give You Chills for Weeks

Among all contemporary film genres, "thriller" is most likely the most difficult to define. But the thrillers are of great fun. There are so many movies of this genre that serves the best when we need to watch something crime and thrilling.

Posted On August 13th, 2021

Silence of Lambs

The masterpiece of Johnathan Demme sits on the border between thriller and horror films, and it is one of the few films in the latter category to win an Oscar. There isn't a lot of gore and violence, but the subject matter is rather horrible.

Basic Instinct

Basic Instinct, released in 1992, was far ahead of its time in terms of sex depictions, with New York Times critic Janet Maslin comparing it to Alfred Hitchcock's oeuvre. Basic Instinct, like all of the best movies ever made, was divisive.

Memento

Memento is likely the only mainstream film ever told entirely backward, a narrative move that cleverly mirrors the protagonist's anterograde amnesia. The aesthetic may not last, but the avant-garde gesture beneath the film's somewhat silly conceit is almost absurdly ambitious for a mainstream film. The story also comes to a satisfying conclusion.

Parasite

Parasite is also a moving semi-Marxist commentary on the difficulties of escaping poverty and the growing class resentment in the underground. Before mainstream critics recognized his genius, Bong Joon-ho had made a string of absurdly amazing films, including some great sci-fi films, but Parasite is his best work yet.

Mulholland Drive

Mulholland Drive doesn't have a coherent plot. Still, if you can accept the logic of dreams, Lynch's menacing cosmology is gorgeously maddening. No one could deny the noir-inspired beauty of Lynch's cinematography, nor could anyone deny Naomi Watts' power as an actress — playing both a naive actress who stumbles upon criminal enterprises from beyond this world and a naive actress who stumbles upon criminal enterprises from beyond this world.

Lady Vengeance

Lady Vengeance is one of the film's most underappreciated works. After being released from prison, the protagonist embarks on a dangerous hunt for the murderer, who may or may not have framed her. This film is technically the third installment in a (very!) loosely related trilogy — and, while it will inevitably be compared to its more popular cinematic siblings (Oldboy and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), it more than holds its own.

Misery

Rob Reiner's excellent and darkly suspenseful film adaptation of Stephen King's meta-textual short novel about a literary fanatic who kidnaps her favorite author and holds him hostage for her own (sexual?) gratification. After delivering this deeply deranged performance, Kathy Bates became an unlikely horror icon. The film's heart-stopping climax is one of the most viscerally nauseous in cinema history.