Navigating the new releases coming to streaming services alongside the archival titles the streamer has had for years can be an overwhelming challenge. Prime Video, for example, has plenty of great movies that are often buried on the service unless the algorithm by some miracle decides that they might be right for you.
The best thing to do is probably to avoid the algorithm altogether. Instead, we’ve pulled together three underrated movies available on the streaming service that you should check out this weekend. You may not have heard of any of these movies, but trust us, you won’t regret checking them out.
You Were Never Really Here (2018)
Joaquin Phoenix earned plenty of praise for his performance in Joker, but he may have delivered the best performance of his career one year prior in You Were Never Really Here. The film follows Phoenix’s brutal, anonymous enforcer as he is tasked with saving a young girl, and uncovers a dark ring of abuse that he will do anything to stop.
While this may sound like a slightly darker John Wick, You Were Never Really Here is much sadder than that. It’s a violent movie where the violence never feels exciting or titillating, and a movie that’s ultimately about how hard it can be to live with the darkness of the world around us.
You can watch You Were Never Really Here on Prime Video.
Fighting With My Family (2019)
If you’re looking for some lighter fare, Fighting With My Family is a pretty excellent sports comedy. Starring Dune: Part Two actress Florence Pugh when she was still a star on the rise, the film follows her as a young wrestler who has aspirations to join the WWE.
The film is inspired by a true story, and it is mostly focused on the way this young wrestler’s family both supports her and gets in her way as she gets closer and closer to achieving her dream. Pugh is unsurprisingly great in the central role, but she’s matched by a great supporting cast that includes Nick Frost, Stephen Merchant, Jack Lowden, and Vince Vaughn.
You can watch Fighting With My Family on Prime Video.
The Swimmer (1968)
Burt Lancaster was one of the great movie stars of the 1960s and ’70s, and The Swimmer is one of his strangest and most compelling movies. It follows a successful ad man who is visiting friends in the suburbs when he notices that every house seems to have a swimming pool.
Instead of just getting a cab, he decides to swim each of the pools on the 8-mile journey back to his home, and various incidents ensue from there. The Swimmer is slightly strange and existentialist, but it’s also a smart movie about materialism and the way that everything in America has been warped by the desire to have more.
You can watch The Swimmer on Prime Video.
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