Amazon’s Prime Video has a movie for just about every mood. The streamer’s film library is large and diverse and packed to the brim with both throwback and modern classics. That is true especially of the platform’s selection of psychological thrillers, which includes masterpieces from over 50 years ago, early calling cards for some of Hollywood’s biggest living directors and a few contemporary gems.
Here are the seven best psychological thrillers you can stream on Prime Video right now.
“Memento” (2000)
Part neo-noir mystery, part psychological thriller, “Memento” is the film that put writer-director Christopher Nolan on the map. Nolan’s second feature effort, the film follows Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce), a man suffering from a form of short-term memory loss that prevents him from forming any new memories, who hunts down the person who killed his wife using a complex system of tattoos, notes and photographs. Nothing turns out to be quite what Leonard thinks, though, in a film that is visually grittier than any of Nolan’s subsequent efforts and yet no less unpredictable, narratively complex or engaging.
“The Conversation” (1974)
One of the greatest films of one of Hollywood’s greatest decades, “The Conversation” is the masterpiece Francis Ford Coppola directed in between “The Godfather” and “The Godfather Part II.” Released the same year as the latter, “The Conversation” follows Harry R. Caul (Gene Hackman), a surveillance expert who ends up caught in a difficult moral and philosophical dilemma when he becomes convinced that his latest recordings will be used in a potential murder. Drenched in ’70s-era paranoia and featuring one of Gene Hackman’s best performances, “The Conversation” is a riveting moral drama and conspiracy thriller that keeps you — much like its protagonist — perpetually and unnervingly on your toes.
“Le Samouraï” (1967)
One of the many masterpieces made by the master of cool, Jean-Pierre Melville, “Le Samourai” is a jazzy, slick thriller. It follows a solitary, stoic French hitman (Alain Delon) as he tries to evade the police while also uncovering who hired him for his latest job and then tried to have him killed after it was done. Like its cool, calm protagonist, “Le Samourai” is a meditative, polished thriller. Across its lean 105 minutes, though, the waves of paranoia, anxiety and guilt crashing beneath the surfaces of both it and its increasingly desperate anti-hero are revealed. The result is a psychological crime thriller that holds your attention from its poetic opening images all the way to its gut-punch closing seconds.
“The Handmaiden” (2016)
A twisty, Swiss-watch piece of historical fiction, South Korean auteur Park Chan-wook’s 2016 drama “The Handmaiden” is a masterful, edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller about betrayal, trust, greed, love, repression, oppression and sexual liberation. Based on a 2002 book by Welsh novelist Sarah Waters, the film follows a Korean girl (Kim Tae-ri) who is hired during Japan’s rule over Korea to become the handmaiden to a wealthy Japanese heiress (Kim Min-hee) who lives on a secluded estate with her domineering uncle (Cho Jin-woong).
Divided into separate yet overlapping sections, “The Handmaiden” unfurls the many layers of its story with masterful, wicked glee, all while building toward an emotional and dramatic climax that is as shocking as it is unexpectedly moving. Boasting its director’s signature, transgressive sense of humor and appetite for violence, “The Handmaiden” is one of the best movies of the 21st century so far.
“Conclave” (2024)
A political and psychological thriller that sometimes feels like it would fit right in within murder-mystery extraordinaire Agatha Christie’s oeuvre, “Conclave” justifiably delighted and charmed moviegoers when it hit theaters last year. Based on a 2016 novel by Robert Harris, the film follows a Catholic Cardinal (Ralph Fiennes) whose role managing a conclave to elect the Catholic Church’s next pope is complicated when he is forced to investigate the secrets, lies and scandals that threaten to corrupt the entire election.
Thanks to its crowd-pleasing nature and its prestige presentation, “Conclave” briefly got wrapped up in the awards cycle of late 2024 and early 2025, which ended with it taking one home Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. Fortunately, “Conclave” will outlive its awards run. It is an engrossing, beautifully staged thriller rife with doubt, guilt, corruption and, ultimately, grace.
“The Menu” (2022)
Like “Conclave,” “The Menu” is also anchored by an astonishing performance from Ralph Fiennes. That is where the similarities between the two films end, though. Abrasive and harsh where “Conclave” is contemplative and soft-spoken, “The Menu” is an acidic, razor-sharp psychological thriller about class, self-worth and the suffocating, soul-killing power of capitalism.
Directed by “Succession” and “Game of Thrones” director Mark Mylod, the film follows an escort (Anya Taylor-Joy) who accompanies a status-obsessed foodie (Nicholas Hoult) on a trip to an exclusive, legendary restaurant run by a seclusive chef (Fiennes). However, what starts out as another night of fine dining quickly takes a sharp, murderous turn. Lean, mean and brimming with quotable lines and memorable moments, “The Menu” is a thriller that does not take itself seriously, which just makes it all the more entertaining and impactful.
“10 Cloverfield Lane” (2016)
For a brief time, it felt like the future of the “Cloverfield” franchise was limitless. That was entirely thanks to “10 Cloverfield Lane,” director Dan Trachtenberg’s loosely connected spin-off follow-up to Matt Reeves’ “Cloverfield.” Co-written by “Whiplash” and “La La Land” director Damien Chazelle, the film follows a young woman (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who wakes up from a violent car crash in an underground bunker built by a paranoid, controlling man (John Goodman) who insists that something has caused the surface of the Earth to become uninhabitable for humans. “10 Cloverfield Lane” is, in other words, both a psychological thriller and a battle of wills, and it all just works far better than it has any right to — or should.
