The lingering effect of a psychological thriller can be haunting when a script dissolves the sense of reality and manipulates viewers with its psychological narratives. Fear and anxiety drive psychological tension throughout the film as the principal characters’ distorted perceptions and fractured relationships unravel. Unlike traditional horror, the thrill in a psychological thriller is more internalized, making it a particularly haunting experience.
The psychological construct of narrative results from a unique historical shift inward – toward the secrets of the human mind. The human evolution from superstitions to science blurred the mysterious line between reality and imagination. That acts like a brain tease and makes you question almost everything around you. Hulu has a great assorted collection of such mind-bending, genre-jumping films with psychological narratives that will undoubtedly make your brain restless. I am trying to pick ten that worked for me and are highly underseen. Let me know your thoughts.
10. Here Before (2021)
A film the sound and fury for which went quiet after its premiere at the SXSW Film Festival, Here Before has a premise that cooks the perfect recipe for an entertaining mainstream film in its own way. It is about a perfectly normal, if also distraught, middle-aged woman who finds a genuine companionship with her little neighbour Megan, a warm relationship that turns into a maddening obsession. With mysterious themes such as fixation and even reincarnation, the film had ample and justified scope for sensational storytelling. But instead, writer-director Stacey Gregg wisely finds the groundworks of psychological horror in the protagonist’s central trauma. Megan might just be another little girl for everyone, but the uncanny resemblance she and her behaviour bear with Laura’s dead little girl make us look at her condition with empathy and understanding.
For a first-time filmmaker, Gregg shows an impressive talent in crafting a haunting slow-burn picture. She basically writes off a tightly crocheted thriller about a universal mental health issue and turns it into a gloomy and atmospheric psychological noir. It barters the fast pace for a toned-down approach, that deftly establishes the mundanity of Laura’s day-to-day life as a housewife. Even the conscious setting of a Northern Ireland neighbourhood is not ornamental, the tightly packed arrangement of houses and constricted rooms making some dynamic room for claustrophobic visuals, which can get somewhat anxiety-inducing on an unpleasant day.
For a debut film with such complexity upfront, Here Before is not a film without flaws. The slow-burn approach ensures that the film gets boring after a solid thirty-minute mark. There are editing issues that persist throughout. Yet, it coasts along with a surprising depth and remains engrossing, thanks to an effective and considerably layered leading performance delivered by Andrea Riseborough. Her portrayal of Laura is there to accelerate the film’s imagery of trauma and obsession.
9. Run (2020)
Run is probably the most accessible, campy psychological thriller on this list. With familiar beats, you know exactly where the film will go, but the journey is bloody damn entertaining! The film stars Kiera Allen as Chloe Sherman, a disabled homeschooled teenager who begins to suspect that her mother, Diane (Sarah Paulson), is keeping a dark secret about her upbringing.
Kiera Allen has used a wheelchair in real-life since 2014. The filmmakers wanted to cast a disabled actress, stating that Hollywood rarely casts disabled actors for disabled roles, which makes this the first significant thriller to star a wheelchair user since Rear Window (1998). Kiera and Sarah lead the film to such an unusual trajectory with their performances that it starts to play with you psychologically. Clocking in at an economical 90 minutes, Run takes a simple premise and unfolds it with such energy that your brain is frozen before you know it. Director Aneesh Chaganty’s career is something to look out for, and I can’t wait to see what he does next.
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8. God’s Country (2022)
Directed by debutant Julian Higgins who adapts his 2015 Sundance Labs short film Winter Light for the feature-film format, God’s Country stands out from the other films in the list. While the other psychological thrillers here view life from a broader spectrum of the mental health conversations that never begun or the cracks of our social system that instead of being talked about went into the sinkhole, this is a rather simple character study by design. And yet, the deeper psychological implications are sketched to the design and framework itself. For starters, Higgins makes a clever choice of reversing the gender and turning the male protagonist of his short film into a woman this time. It is interesting to see how the story plays out thus.
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The heroine Sandra, living a solitary and nearly inaccessible life, is a middle-aged New Orleans professor still in grief over the loss of her mother. Initially, we are not permitted at all to view her with even a tinge of likeability, alluding to her unreasonable and bitter nature. However, when the empathy and subtlety do arrive for her to be studied, the narrative gets breathless and, in a way, anxiety-inducing. The violent twists and turns explode every now and then, turning the film into a full-fledged neo-Western more than anything else. It’s like the writing challenges you to find a way through the headspace of Sandra at this point.
By the end, it thoughtfully and neatly lays out the metaphor for the United States being a disintegrated state of mind, struggling with dualities of race and class every now and then. It might or might not work in favour of the film, and it might not hit with the kind of impact one might anticipate. Still, the excellent ruggedness of Thandiwe Newton and the way she assimilates the nuance of Sandra through herself makes the film worth a watch.
7. Watcher (2022)
It is easy to dismiss Chloe Okuno’s Watcher as a casual embracement of the trappings of a stalker thriller. It tells a fairly straightforward tale of a failed Hollywood actress who travels with her industrialist husband to Romania and is introduced to a terrible neighbour who follows her everywhere, or at least, she thinks he does. On the surface, the film has pretty glossy furnishings not unusual for a mainstream film of its kind, and to top that, it is full of pulpy overtures. But Okuno gets the assignment almost explicitly right- she casually, if only gradually, strips the narrative from the oppression of male gaze.
The subsequent arrival of female gaze is so patient and restrained that the constant surveillance of our heroine becomes terrifying to watch. Up until then, the psychological drama only seems to be all about straightforward mind games. However, it ultimately boils down to become a story embedded in the social fabric of being a woman in this world, whose impulses, decisions and anxieties are constantly informed by their interpretation by the men around her. In that way, the husband, always mansplaining the complaints of Julia with a dismissive front, becomes no different from the unnamed ‘watcher’ whose monstrous gaze the film uses as a first-hand experience.
The turmoil is effectively and pointedly conveyed thanks to an incredible leading performance by Maika Monroe, supported by an unnerving turn from Burn Gorman. The writing stitches the psychological tension in a gripping manner, putting us in the shoes of Julia as all of the Romanian dialogues remain unsubtitled throughout.
6. Fresh (2022)
Fresh follows Noa (Daisy Edgar-Jones), who meets the alluring Steve (Sebastian Stan) at a grocery store and – given her frustration with dating apps – takes a chance and gives him her number. After their first date, Noa is smitten and accepts Steve’s invitation to a romantic weekend getaway. Only to find that her new paramour has been hiding something unusual.
Edgar-Jones is a revelation here as Noa. After years of solid work in TV, Fresh is a career moment for her. She owns the film. She commands attention when she is vulnerable, in charge, bored, or excited. Even if the subject matter might be too hard for some, you can’t ignore her performance. The first act of Fresh gives a false sense of familiar beats.
The title and opening credit roll out approximately 40 minutes into the film, and your jaws will be on the floor by then. The first act of Fresh gives a false sense of familiar beats. The stunningly apparent tonal shift is going to blow your mind away. Thriller in its text and psychological execution, Fresh is a refreshingly unpredictable and off-kilter feature debut of the director Mimi Cave. I recommend you get into it with minimal knowledge to have the maximum impact. It’s one of the most interesting psychological films on Hulu.
5. Sanctuary (2022)
Easily one of the sharpest and the most rewarding ‘entertainers’ in the list, Sanctuary is a completely pulpy psychosexual thriller which, for being a two-hander chamber drama, is quite an immersive experience to be put through. What seems to be an escalated moment of passion between a debutant business magnate and his long-time scripted dominatrix starts resembling one of those countless mythologies about the king and the nymph. Ultimately, then, the ‘little games’ involving carnal sex, fetishized pain and unreasonable demands water down to become a power struggle so dynamic that it would put monumental business rivalries to shame.
But there is always a subtlety towards the suggestions, and a deception to the promises of ‘getting things right’, because both the controller and the controlled have more to say than what we hear and have more to reveal than what meets the eye. Director Zachary Wigon carefully and cleverly pulls his cards so the blurring of lines between the oppressor and the oppressed gets apparent, and not because of silly turnarounds or shocking twists. Sanctuary deftly underscores the fact that these are two clever people who are pretending to lose their sense of rationality only to find themselves in a position of economic and emotional security. In the process of losing themselves to a spiral of lust, they eventually find themselves. And then, the film shuts its doors on them at a moment which is just as complicated as it is tender.
There is immense vulnerability in this conflict of role-playing, and to convey such stacking layers of identity is easier said than done. But Christopher Abbott and Margaret Qualley match the beats of each disguise with a surprising intensity and conviction. The latter, especially, proves a nearly metallic electricity in conveying her sense of fragility and isolation, meanwhile also denuding before her ‘slave’ her own hard-earned lessons which he must acknowledge. If only for the pleasure of watching their riveting turns, Sanctuary is a must-see.
4. Stay (2005)
Unlike the other films on the list, the psychological ‘thrill’ of watching this Marc Forster film lies less in the themes explored by the story and more in the filmmaking grammar. Digital manipulation and practical effects are used to underscore the imagery of emotional trauma and depths of madness. Rapid and non-linear cuts of the film’s editing seamlessly stitch the convenience of the film’s unreliable narration. Asche and Spencer cleverly deliver the cold and sharp tension of the film, their ambient soundscape feeling like a mood-piece more than anything else. Also, the blurry and saturated colours are there to evoke the film’s small but thoughtful conversation on art and perception, evoking an intertextual undertone that helps.
Unfortunately, the relentless energy of Stay’s direction and visual literacy also means that it falls short on the depth of its actual themes. The film explores depression and suicidal intentions, tying them up with the more metaphysical ideations of illusion and afterlife. This could have made for an especially masterful film in which the inner and outer lives of a disturbed individual is explored with clarity and humanism. Instead, the film gets bogged down by its own insistence on being a mind-bending entertainer. Even as it ties everything neatly and squarely in the climax that explains the hallucination, it feels like a cop-out more than anything else.
Having said that, the performances are wonderful for not being ornamental or excessive. The straight-face aura of Ryan Gosling amplifies the mystery of his character, while Ewan McGregor easily keeps the film afloat by being compassionate and restrained on the face of the film’s bizarre flexibility, Naomi Watts’ easy presence feeling like a natural extension. If there has to be one reason to watch the film, it has to be this exemplary cast.
3. Donnie Darko (2001)
Although it wears the shoes of its titular hero and fixates on the man in a giant bunny rabbit suit, Donnie Darko is a beast of its own. Director James Richard Kelly tells the story of a deeply troubled boy’s narrow escape of a fatal accident. But in focusing on the aftermath that entails his school life, love life, family dynamic and therapy sessions, it refreshingly contradicts every rule from the American coming-of-age handbook. Instead, it delves into the subtler social, political and psychological implications of the narrative. I mean, if this is not the successful blurring of lines between reality and potent make-belief, I don’t know what is.
And yet, it’s not merely the style or the status as a cult classic in science fiction filmmaking that defines it, but rather the thematic ambiance it crafts without arbitrarily spelling things out, that makes it work. Donnie Darko snatches the spotlight from a kid’s perceptive mental illness and places his dilemma and aggression in an existential framework. Donnie is a character whose adolescence seems to fascinate everybody around him for its extremity. But no one seems to make an attempt at seeing that he is a kid asking questions about free will, fate and meaning of life. Eventually then, the closure is found in the acceptance of death and mortality.
Looking back, the decision to feature a young protagonist like Donnie enriches the film’s exploration of resisting social conformity and the regrettable consequences of yielding to it. The alienation resulting from the rejection of dogmatism is intricately woven into the psycho-horror elements of the narrative.
2. Titane (2021)
With only two films so far, French writer-director Julia Ducournau has established herself as one of the most fantastic filmmaking voices when it comes to the carnal, grotesque storytelling. She had already made waves with her debut film Raw, a coming-of-age story dressed as a body-horror film which caused ambulances to storm into Cannes. Her latest, the Palme D’Or winner at the festival, which is ambitious almost as a natural progression, is probably still a coming-of-age movie walking as body-horror. Except, its Cronenbergian vitality and nearly weird sexual charge makes it so much more.
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The film tells the story of a woman named Alexia who suffers from a physical condition due to a vehicular metal plate stuck in her head from a childhood accident. The metal embedded into her body seems to nearly drive the vehicle of her life choices, as she grows up to become a showgirl at the local motor show. However, a series of totally fucked-up and absorbingly dark events lead her to the doorsteps of a firefighter, after which we are led to the uneasy warmth of found family and the dark alleys of familial trauma. Spearheaded by a terrific first-time performance from Agathe Rousselle and supported by a beautifully in-form Vincent Lindon, this is a truly morbid film that makes sure its morbidity seeps into the theatrics and technicalities.
Also, it feels like a primal masterclass on directing an out-and-out psychological thriller. In telling the story of a woman driven by impulses, the film lays bare all forms of psychological violence that she has endured up until the momentum it reaches. After all, external physical violence mostly becomes the extended pile-up of all the psychological turmoil that happens internally. And Julia figures a chaotic, and at times even beautiful, way of expressing that with what is only her second feature-film.
1. Anatomy of a Fall (2023)
The second of the two Palme D’Or winners gracing this list, one might argue that Justine Triet’s Anatomy of a Fall is a courtroom drama more than anything else. For starters, Triet has established herself as a genre filmmaker more than anything else, with a body of work that covers the disparate range between political satire and romantic comedy with a flourishing ease. However, the trials and tribulations of female life has been a connective tissue. This is what informs the broader psychological contours of this thriller. For one, it makes you ponder on the limitations of the genre by committing itself solely to the facts which meet the eye during the legal proceedings, even if that means forsaking an objective interpretation of the ‘truth’.
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Don’t get me wrong, it is not the first film to have had a lack of literal resolution. However, the ambiguity, which is itself a sharp turnaround from a fully formed open ending, is far from typical. In this way, the film seems to say that facts go deeper than their objective representation. It shows a quiet and nuanced commitment to an emotional truth above any other ‘truth’ that might be fiercely talked about and debated. So, we would never know whether Sandra, or someone else committed the fated murder (or was it a suicide!) that is shown at the very beginning.
What remains important is that we are made to stand on the balustrade and are seamlessly shown a marriage story getting unpacked, and we come to know that irrespective of what transpired, it was Sandra who made her way out of the toxic relationship she was in. On the technical front, this film is one of the most immersive this decade and benefits from a terrific performance by the child artist Milo Machado-Garner, whose portrayal of trauma and depression is nothing if not utterly truthful.
