100 Best Movies to Watch with Friends

100 Best Movies to Watch with Friends

November 20, 2024

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There are some movies that fall flat when you view them alone but absolutely soar when seen with the right people. All of a sudden, the jokes are hilarious, the slow scenes are bearable, and the jump scares, which you found ridiculous a while ago, are now ridiculously fun. These kinds of movies are just so joyous or meaningful or challenging or thrilling (or all of these combined) that it feels like a waste not to share them with friends. So whether you’re looking to have a laugh with your favorite people, engage in a debate with them, or simply find the meaning of friendship onscreen, you’ll be sure to find the perfect watch in our list of the best movies to watch with friends below.

51. Show Me Love (1998)

best

8.2

Country

Denmark, Sweden

Director

Lukas Moodysson

Actors

Alexandra Dahlström, Bo Lyckman, Erica Carlson, Jill Ung

Moods

Emotional, Gripping, Romantic

Set in the small town of Åmål, western Sweden, the debut feature by Lukas Moodysson (We Are the Best), is itself a metonymy for the bigger questions of life. It’s playful and dead serious at the same time, in the way it portrays teenager Agnes, who, after two years of living in Åmål, still hasn’t made any friends that would attend her birthday party. Instead, she spends her time typing away on her computer, poetic diaries and love confessions to a girl from school named Elin. She’s the popular one and therefore, out of reach. The amount of tension and escalating ambivalence the film conjures with just a simple narrative decision—a bet, a kiss, an apology—is palpable throughout the 86 minutes of its runtime. A perfect capsule of lesbian desire and first love, Show Me Love is a gem of a movie; one that would make you think Close was a tad overrated. Oh, and don’t forget to add the titular song by Swedish pop star Robyn to your Spotify favorites.

52. Run Lola Run (1998)

best

8.1

Country

Germany

Director

Tom Tykwer

Actors

Armin Rohde, Beate Finckh, Franka Potente, Hans Paetsch

Moods

Action-packed, Mind-blowing, Suspenseful

An offbeat film with a more than decent amount of suspense. To that it adds really good music and unexpected animation, to make for a very audacious, interesting and mostly fun film. It uses all this to show how life can change in a twist and how it can be influenced by weird connections of otherwise unrelated events.

53. Camp X-ray (2014)

best

8.1

Country

United States of America

Director

Peter Sattler

Actors

Cory Michael Smith, Daniel Leavitt, J. J. Soria, John Carroll Lynch

Moods

Challenging, Character-driven, Thrilling

This is Kristen Stewart’s proof that she is more than a lip-biting, vampire-loving teenager. Reactive and emotive, she will not disappoint you here. Rather, expect an electrifying and exceptional performance. Paired with Payman Moaadi, they both make of this work an emotionally poignant movie that questions the notion of freedom in the unlikeliest of places: Guantanamo Bay.

54. Shinjuku Boys (1995)

best

8.1

Country

Japan, United Kingdom

Director

Female director, Jano Williams

Moods

Discussion-sparking, Thought-provoking

Directed by Kim Longinotto and Jano Williams, this documentary combines intimate interviews, fly-on-the-wall observation, and striking cinematography to present a compelling glimpse into the lives of three transgender individuals working as hosts in Tokyo’s bustling Shinjuku district. With unprecedented access to the subjects’ lives, the documentary delves deep into their emotional journeys, capturing their hopes, fears, and aspirations surrounding identity, gender, and societal acceptance.  An eye-opening documentary that wastes none of its 53-minute runtime, Shinjuku Boys challenges preconceived notions and invites viewers to empathize with individuals navigating a world that often marginalizes them. 

55. Perpetrator (2023)

best

8.1

Country

France, United States of America

Director

Female director, Jennifer Reeder

Actors

Alicia Silverstone, Avery Holliday, Casimere Jollette, ​Christopher Lowell

Moods

Dark, Intense, Suspenseful

There’s a degree of removal in Perpetrator which some viewers may find jarring: most visibly, in the performances, whose heightened sensitivity can seem unlikely for a horror film. That said, director Jennifer Reeder’s main conceit here is to entertain and make you think, and she doesn’t want you to get too comfortable. In the central concept of “Forevering,” a family curse spell that Jonny goes through, Reeder vests her character with metamorphic potential, and with that, ignites hope for a future that is better for women and for horror cinema as a whole. But the film is not overly intellectual. It’s rather intuitive in its world-building and celebrates horror’s final girl trope in a well-deserved way. A little gore, some slasher tropes, LGBTQ+ themes, and strong central characters make it a perfect pre-Halloween treat.

56. Pearl (2022)

best

8.1

Country

United States of America

Director

Ti West

Actors

Alistair Sewell, Amelia Reid, David Corenswet, Emma Jenkins-Purro

Moods

Character-driven, Original, Thrilling

It’s rare to see a prequel surpass its antecedent, but Pearl is that exception. You can watch it before or after X and still get the same satisfaction from piecing together the puzzle of Mia Goth’s many roles (three in total across the trilogy). If the first film owed a lot to slasher classics like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the second (surprise!) channels The Wizard of Oz and nods to the splendiferous melodramas of Douglas Sirk. The jarring form-content opposition here makes sense, as we’re seeing through the eyes of the main character, who most of all dreams of being in a movie. Because of that very same whimsy, everything has to change: the violence is not as explicit and the role of sex is brought to the forefront. All hail the new kind of final girl: a farm girl-turned-star.

57. The Royal Hotel (2023)

best

8.1

Country

Australia, United Kingdom, United States of America

Director

Female director, Kitty Green

Actors

Alex Malone, Barbara Lowing, Baykali Ganambarr, Bree Bain

Moods

Character-driven, Discussion-sparking, Gripping

The Royal Hotel sees Hanna (Julia Garner) and Liv (Jessica Henwick) resorting to take up a dire live-in job behind the bar in a remote desert part of Western Australia. Although they’re warned that they’d “have to be okay with a little male attention” in the outcast mining town, their financial precarity overrides the potential fear. Curiously enough, the fiction film is based on a real story, already told in the 2016 documentary Hotel Coolgardie by Pete Gleeson, but The Assistant director Kitty Green pulls no punches when representing how suffocating it must feel to be encircled by such unmediated male aggression. The brawls, the spilled beer, the c-word as a greeting all form the unnerving paraphernalia of life then and there. For Australian independent film devotees, there is actor Toby Wallace, who reprises his bad boy role from Babyteeth, and he’s joined by the ranks of Herbert Nordrum (The Worst Person in the World) and an utterly terrifying Hugo Weaving (The Matrix).

58. Paddington (2014)

best

8.1

Country

France, UK, United Kingdom

Director

Paul King

Actors

Alexander Bracq, Alice Lowe, Ancuta Breaban, Asim Chaudhry

Moods

A-list actors, Easy, Feel-Good

In a global movie industry of children’s entertainment that often feels like it isn’t even trying, this little Peruvian bear coming to England is a wonderful reminder that films aimed at younger audiences aren’t inherently limited. If anything, Paddington challenges itself to come up with a far more creative (and effective) way to talk about the lingering scars of colonialism manifesting as discrimination in everyday “civil” society. It sounds like heavy stuff, but Paddington approaches its fish-out-of-water story with the exact counterbalance of silliness, and a riotous cast that’s far funnier than anyone would have expected them to be.

59. The Raid: Redemption (2011)

best

8.0

Country

France, Hungary, Indonesia

Director

Gareth Evans

Actors

Acip Sumardi, Ahmad Ramadhan Alrasyid, Alfridus Godfred, Ananda George

Moods

Action-packed, Intense, Thrilling

A special forces team conducts a raid at a multi-story ghetto building where a criminal boss runs his business. Things quickly go wrong and chaos ensues. Full of pure action, with no overblown Hollywood-type CGI nonsense. It is made the way action movies should be made, full of realistic fight scenes. It is exciting, brutal and thrilling. The Raid: Redemption is definitely among the best action movies ever made.

60. Sunshine Cleaning (2008)

best

8.0

Country

United States of America

Director

Christine Jeffs, Female director

Actors

Alan Arkin, Amber Midthunder, Amy Adams, Amy Redford

Moods

Dramatic, Easy, Emotional

Sunshine Cleaning is a great addition to that unidentified genre of grown-up comedies populated by other great entries like Your Sister’s Sister and Enough Said. It is however, less of a comedy than it is a heart-warming emotional tale. Powered by outstanding performances from Amy Adams and Emily Blunt, it ultimately evolves into a character study of failed potential and validation seeking. Sunshine Cleaning is enjoyable, satisfying to a fault, and provides an interesting peak into the lives of its characters.

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