Rain against the window and a film nobody else picked. This is one of the few configurations that actually allows you to pay full attention.
The early 2020s are already proving themselves. The best films from this decade will hold up. These are among them.
The best thrillers work because the tension is internal as much as external. The characters are fighting themselves as much as any external threat.
Ethan Hunt and his IMF team embark on their most dangerous mission yet: To track down a terrifying new weapon that threatens all of humanity before it falls into the wrong hands. With control of the future and the world's fate at stake and dark forces from Ethan's past closing in, a deadly race around the globe begins. Confronted by a mysterious, all-powerful enemy, Ethan must consider that nothing can matter more than his mission-not even the lives of those he cares about most.
Connected by phone in the same home but 20 years apart, a caller puts a woman's past - and life - on the line to change her own fate.
Antoine and Olga, a French couple, have been living in a small village in Galicia for a long time. They practice eco-responsible agriculture and restore abandoned houses to facilitate repopulation. Everything should be idyllic except for their opposition to a wind turbine project that creates a serious conflict with their neighbors. The tension will rise to the point of irreparability.
Trying to leave their troubled lives behind, twin brothers return to their hometown to start again, only to discover that an even greater evil is waiting to welcome them back.
In 2200, private detective Aline Ruby and her android partner Carlos Rivera are hired by a wealthy businessman to track down a notorious hacker. On Mars, they descend deep into the underbelly of the planet's capital city where they uncover a darker story of brain farms, political corruption, and a missing girl who holds a secret about the robots that threatens to change the face of the universe.
These films earn their suspense slowly, deliberately, brick by brick. By the time the pressure peaks, you're completely invested and there's nowhere to go.
Following the events at home, the Abbott family now face the terrors of the outside world. Forced to venture into the unknown, they realize that the creatures that hunt by sound are not the only threats that lurk beyond the sand path.
Unlucky assassin Ladybug is determined to do his job peacefully after one too many gigs gone off the rails. Fate, however, may have other plans, as Ladybug's latest mission puts him on a collision course with lethal adversaries from around the globe-all with connected, yet conflicting, objectives-on the world's fastest train.
When an ex-soldier who discovers gold in the Lapland wilderness tries to take the loot into the city, German soldiers led by a brutal SS officer battle him.
King Charles VI declares that Knight Jean de Carrouges settle his dispute with his squire, Jacques Le Gris, by challenging him to a duel.
The true story of the Mauritanian Mohamedou Ould Slahi, who was held at the U.S military's Guantanamo Bay detention center without charges for over a decade and sought help from a defense attorney for his release.
The best mind-bending films don't cheat. They follow their own logic rigorously - which is exactly why the rug-pull, when it comes, is so disorienting.
These films work because they take the mechanics of suspense seriously. Not as a trick. As a language for telling you something true about fear and choice.