Best movies on Amazon Prime Video (November 2023)

The first time we saw Robert De Niro and Al Pacino on screen and it's in a fantastic movie. Heat is a cops and robbers tale, put the through the clinical lens of Michael Mann. It's a superb thriller and its effects can be seen in movies since - including The Dark Knight.

UK Only

Kumail Nanjiani is currently famed across the internet as the nerd who got "swole". But The Big Sick was a highlight of his pre-muscle days.

It was written by Nanjiani and his wife Emily Gordon, and is based on their own experiences of an interracial relationship and their struggles with Gordon’s health issues. It is real, relatable and dances effortlessly between its funny and serious sides.

In the US? Stream The Big Sick on Prime Video here.

One of the greatest movies ever made, Once Upon A Time In America is a generation spanning tale about the rise and fall of gangsters in the US. Robert D Niro, James Woods and the rest of the cast are superb. This was the final movie of Sergio Leone and his absolute masterpiece.

UK Only

Best-selling novel Gone Girl gets a brilliant movie adaptation thanks to David Fincher. Rosamund Pike is 'gone girl' Amy - someone who has gone missing and is being searched for by her husband Nick (Ben Affleck). But everything isn't as it seams with many untruths about to be uncovered about the relationship

A wonderful timeloop movie that manages to find something fresh in what is now a well-worn plot point. Adam Samberg is fantastic as the man stuck replaying the same day over and over which he hates - until someone comes into his life that unwittingly falls into the same predicament he finds himself in.

UK Only

Riz Ahmed gives a career-defining performance as a drummer for a metal band who loses his hearing. The results are a gripping, tender study of the human psyche when it has to combat something that is life changing.

In the US? Stream Sound of Metal on Prime Video here.

A really nice ultra low budget thriller that has one of the best tracking shots in it we have seen. In the 50s a DJ and switchboard operator find an audio signal that could well change a town in New Mexico forever. The movie keeps you guessing right up to the end. At times it feels like an extended Twilight Zone episode but it's all done so well.

In the US? Stream Vast of the Night on Prime Video here.

There is no better than Rosamund Pike to create a villain so evil but bloody persuasive that you nearly end up rooting for her. She did it in Gone Girl and has done it again in I Care A lot. Here she is a con artist trying to grift retirees by becoming their legal guardians. What happens is jaw dropping and Pike is just fantastic to watch throughout.

UK Only

We were surprised by Wrath of Man. Given it stars Jason Statham and is directed by Guy Ritchie, we were expecting a fun, sarcastic romp. Instead, this is a taut thriller that just doesn't let up. Statham is ace as a new cash truck driver that isn't what he seems.

The Watch is a gripping look at the true story of those trying to hold the government account for its 'enhanced interrogation' practises in the events after 9/11. Adam Driver is superb as the senator looking into how the CIA conducted its business and the abnormalities in what they were doing, trying to uncover a level of brutality that nobody wanted the world to know about.

In the US? Stream The Report on Prime Video here.

One of the strangest and most original movies you will watch, Everything Everywhere All At Once showcases the talents of Michelle Yeoh as a bank clerk who ends up having to try and save the world. The premise is superb, where we meet multiple versions of her, taking the idea of the multiverse and just running with it. The result is a visually stunning, mind-melding masterpiece.

One Night In Miami is an understated movie and all the better for it. For the most part, it takes place in one room (a motel room) after Cassius Clay's big fight with Sonny Liston. Within that time the worlds of Clay, Malcolm X, Jim Brown and Sam Cooke collide in a drama that is compelling to watch.

In the US? Stream One Night In Miami on Prime Video here.

This escapist fantasy is unlikely to feature on many top 10 all-time film lists. But it is an absolute must-see in 2020, when we can all do with a break from the real world.

A pilot (Felicity Jones) and nerdy meteorologist (Eddie Redmayne) are an unlikely team in a record-breaking hot air balloon trip into the sky. Tune your brain into The Aeronauts frequency and you’re in for one of the most charming live action family movies in years. There are sofa-clenching sections too.

In the US? Stream Aeronauts on Prime Video here.

Ben Affleck both stars and directs this brilliant film about the Nike execs who wanted to sign a yet-unknown basketball player to their books. The player was Michael Jordan and the rest is history. This one has only just finished in the cinema but because of its backing from Amazon Studios, it's now available to watch on Prime.

If you’re looking for an action movie that is a pure blast to watch, check out Edge of Tomorrow. It’s a sci-fi Mission Impossible meets Groundhog Day. Tom Cruise plays a slick military marketing man who finds himself on the front lines of an alien invasion, and in way over his head. But each time he gets killed, he wakes up on that very same day. Emily Blunt co-stars in what is one of the most all-round satisfying action movies of the last decade.

Frank Herbert's Dune novels were considered borderline unfilmable until Denis Villeneuve had a crack in 2021. And David Lynch had already had a good stab back in the 80s. It's an epic and truly cinematic adventure starring Timothee Chalamet as Paul Atreides. Elaborate set pieces and imposing visuals reign, but the film also represents character intentions well to ensure the film actually makes sense.

One of the greatest films of all time is now streaming on Prime Video. Fellini's 8 1/2 is a love letter to cinema - about a director who is looking for inspiration for his new movie and it comes from his past. Sit, back, relax and prepare to be mesmerised.

Riding high on our best Christopher Nolan movies shortlist, The Prestige sees Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale face-off as rival magicians in the 1890s. It is most famous for its stunning twist reveal, but is also an engaging drama that feels much less dumbed-down than the average blockbuster. The Prestige stars David Bowie as Nikola Tesla too, which has to be witnessed at least once.

This Aaron Sorkin drama features a nearly unrecognisable Nicole Kidman as Lucille Ball, focusing on her time on the hit show I Love Lucy. Javier Bardem is the other half of the power couple and we see the goings on of their lives through the course of filming an I Love Lucy episode - from script read to performance. Both the acting and the script here are fantastic, as you would expect with the talent on show.

It’s by no means a perfect movie but the Borat sequel strikes a much-needed political cord with its look at Borat and his daughter making their way to America once more to make fun of the ignorant. While the ‘story’ is wafer thin, it was a genius idea to bring his daughter along for the ride as she can do everything Borat would do but nobody recognises her - and her scene with one of the most famous people in America caught with his hands down his pants is just brilliant.

In the US? Stream Borat 2 on Prime Video here.

After a rewatch of the entire Mission Impossible franchise, Fallout might just be the all-out most fun instalment in this brilliant series. Ethan Hunt and crew have to stop plutonium from falling into the hands of a group that wants to set off nuclear explosions across the world in order to bring down society as we know it. Hugely action-packed and entertaining, this is what Mission Impossible is all about

Rachel Brosnahan (of Prime Video's The Marvelous Mrs Maisel) is fantastic in this '70s-based drama about a housewife that becomes embroiled in a life of crime. While the first half of the movie is the best, it's a caustic look at what life was like for women in the Seventies with a nice mix of crime thrills.

In the US? Stream I'm Your Woman on Prime Video here.

We could argue for hours about which Bond movie is the best. A fat stack of them are available on Prime Video. However, once we factor in all the people who don’t have decades of affection for this series, recommending one film is easy: it’s Skyfall. This Sam Mendes-directed slice of expert action filmmaking sees MI6 compromised, forcing Bond and Judi Dench’s M to go underground. It’s thrilling stuff, even if you don’t care a jot about James Bond.

A creator returning to a series is one thing. But doing so thirty years later and then somehow managing to create the best film in a series? That’s something else, and is exactly what George Miller achieved with Mad Max: Fury Road. It’s a dusty apocalypse road movie in which Max teams up with Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron, to take on a much larger, better armed and much less sane gang of wasteland survivors.

The Argento cut of Dawn Of The Dead is an intriguing one. It's pretty much the Dawn Of The Dead you know and love but the soundtrack has way more Goblin. This is the cut that most of Europe has seen and it's a much faster-paced version of the movie than you might have seen. Okay, so it's not the purest version of Romero's movie but it is still well worth a watch. And if you don't fancy it, then both the theatrical cut and Cannes' cut are available to watch on Prime, too.

One of the most mesmerising movies of recent years, The Green Knight is a psychedelic rendition of the great Arthurian legend. Dev Patel is proving once more that he is the actor to revise old English stories (he was also amazing in David Copperfield) and the rest of the cast are also sublime. This is a slow, enveloping movie but we loved it.

Here’s a good option if you want a flat-out good time with a horror twist. A serial killer returns after a 35-year hiatus, and Jamie has to travel back in time to stop the killings from happening in the first place. There’s slasher action, time travel and a bit of mother-daughter Back to the Future’ing. Totally Killer has a similar feel to Happy Death Day or Freaky, and comes totally recommended.

Brendan Fraser is a morbidly obese, depressed man in The Whale, a film that landed the actor a Best Actor Oscar after years largely out of the limelight. Critics are split on whether this is actually a good film, with some suggesting it's exploitative. However, almost all agree that Fraser's performance is quite something to behold.

Guy Ritchie is back with a slice of what this iconic British director does best: action. And Operation Fortune also stars one of the greatest of the genre, Jason Statham. While this movie may not pop quite as much as Ritchie classic Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, it's worth a watch if you regard this director's earliest films fondly.

Intense. That’s the word we’d use to describe Detroit, Kathryn Bigelow’s dramatisation of 1967 riots in Detroit. It’s centred around the Algiers Hotel, which is raided by police. John Boyega plays one of these policemen, and bears witness to the brutality and racism of his colleagues. It’s a must-watch movie, even if it will leave your nerves in tatters.

Everybody's Talking About Jamie is a fantastic filmic take on the stage play of the same name. The movie follows Jamie, a schoolboy who dreams of becoming a drag artist. Richard E Grant is there to help him on his way, even if his school doesn't believe in him. It's a brilliant feel-good British film that everyone should watch.