There are enough movies on Netflix — and enough being added on a weekly basis — that it is easy for certain films to slip through the cracks.
Some of the streamer’s best hidden gems include a 2004 crime drama featuring a famously against-type Tom Cruise as its silver-haired villain and a 2022 serial killer thriller that repeatedly reinvents itself. The platform also has a 3-hour epic from “La La Land” director Damien Chazelle that was wildly under-appreciated at the time of its release but has understandably been earning the support of more and more viewers ever since.
Here are three hidden gems streaming on Netflix right now.
“Influencer” (2022)
Here is a slice of lean, mean horror that has flown consistently under the mainstream radar over the past three years. Director Kurtis David Harder’s “Influencer” follows Madison (Emily Tennant), a social media influencer whose solo backpacking trip through Thailand takes a dark turn when she meets CW (Cassandra Naud), an eccentric and assured woman whose true interest in Madison is more sinister than she lets on.
A Brian De Palma-esque psychosexual thriller with a nifty, well-executed serial killer twist, “Influencer” is a film that never settles into a familiar rhythm. It constantly reinvents itself over the course of its 92 minutes, and it pulls off its many left-turns with slick, sometimes bloody ease. Its sequel, “Influencers,” premieres on Shudder this week, which just gives you all the more reason to check out the first film, especially now that it is streaming on Netflix.
“Collateral” (2004)
2004’s “Collateral” is a propulsive neo-noir crime drama that immediately grabs your attention and holds onto it right up until its haunting final moments. Directed by “Thief” and “Heat” filmmaker Michael Mann, the film follows an unassuming, friendly Los Angeles cab driver (Jamie Foxx) who is taken hostage by a ruthless hit man (Tom Cruise) and forced to drive him to each of his targets over the course of one long, violent night. Boasting the same, color-soaked digital photography aesthetic as other Mann efforts like “Miami Vice” and “Blackhat,” “Collateral” is a thriller that knows how to do it all.
Across its 120 minutes, the film packs in just as many bursts of shocking, thrilling action as it does intimate, compelling moments of human drama and character growth. It is a thriller that works on just about every level, and it uses Cruise’s trademark, high-intensity screen presence to mine a rare but unforgettably villainous turn out of him.
“Babylon” (2022)
There are not many recent films that could be considered instant cult classics, but “La La Land” writer-director Damien Chazelle’s three-hour epic about 1920s Hollywood, fittingly titled “Babylon,” is one of them. A fictionalized take on Hollywood’s transition from its rowdy, early Silent Era days to the more stately and dignified age of the talkies, “Babylon” is both a love letter to Hollywood and a fierce condemnation of it. Featuring some standout performances from stars Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie, “Babylon” plays like the disillusioned, boozy B-side to Chazelle’s “La La Land.”
It is not a film that looks at Hollywood through rose-colored glasses so much as it marvels at it. There is both clear reverence for the filmmaking art form and yet palpable distaste for the industry that funds it, and Chazelle captures that contradictory emotional dichotomy with an infectious energy that feels equal parts cocaine-fueled and anxiety-riddled. It might be the best movie he has made to date. Even if it isn’t, “Babylon” is overflowing with enough memorable, inspired moments to convince you that it is while you’re watching it.
