As the calendar turns to December, you might expect the streamers to start pumping out Christmas movies, but that’s not really the case this first week of the month. Yes, our list of the best movies to stream on Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Max (HBO), and other services is getting a massive update, with nine new entries across six streamers, but there’s not a particularly strong holiday bent. In fact, it’s sort of an oddly Halloween-themed update thanks to highlights like Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Smile 2, and Speak No Evil.
While last week was more of a Christmas movie update, this week is kind of a Halloween update. Funny how that happens! Read on for several new entries, plus a whole lot more.
We also have guides to the best movies on Netflix, the best movies on Hulu, the best movies on Amazon Prime Video, the best movies on Max, and the best movies on Disney+.
-
-
-
Summer Camp2024
-
The Convert2024
-
Speak No Evil2024
-
Kneecap2024
Max (formerly HBO and HBO Max)
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)
62%Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is one of the strangest sequels going, and yet, the strangest thing about this movie might be just how incredibly fast it’s made it to streaming. After a September 6, 2024, theatrical release, it was exactly three months before it landed on Max. Just in time for Christmas!
Tim Burton is back behind the camera, Michael Keaton returns in the titular role, and Winona Ryder’s Lydia still has nightmares of Beetlejuice. But after an unexpected family tragedy, three generations of the Deetz family return home to Winter River, where Lydia’s teenage daughter, Astrid (Jenna Ortega), discovers the mysterious model of the town in the attic, accidentally reopening the portal to the afterlife. Now, there’s trouble brewing in both realms, and somebody, at some point, is going to have to say that name three times.
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story (2024)
77%
8.1/10Sweethearts (2024)
62%Watchmen: Chapter I (2024)
71%A gritty animated reproduction of the classic Alan Moore comic, Watchmen: Chapter I is a more faithful retelling than HBO’s Emmy-winning adaptation and more in line with Zack Snyder’s live-action film. Set in an alternate 1985 in which masked vigilantes once operated as government-sponsored superheroes, Watchmen: Chapter I follows Rorshach as he investigates the murder of one of these retired heroes.
Convinced somebody is targeting these former heroes, Rorshach encounters an uphill battle to convince his old colleagues to come out of retirement and help him piece together the puzzle. But there’s far more than a conspiracy to kill heroes at play.
Janet Planet (2024)
83%Hulu
Summer Camp (2024)
41%This is another kind of weird one to land on streaming in December, but if you’re looking for a winter warmer, this Golden Girls-esque comedy will fit the bill. Nora (Diane Keaton), Ginny (Kathy Bates), and Mary (Alfre Woodard) have been best friends since they met at summer camp 50 years ago. But as they’ve gotten older, they’ve seen each other less and less.
So when an opportunity arises for a summer camp reunion, they jump right back in the saddle. While it’s a little rocky at first, the three women soon remember the magic of camp and rediscover how much they need one another.
The Convert (2024)
66%Nutcrackers (2024)
53%Robot Dreams (2023)
87%Alien: Romulus (2024)
64%A compelling addition to the now somewhat extensive Alien franchise, Alien: Romulus is the rare “interquel.” It’s set after 1979’s Alien and before 1986’s Aliens. The story serves as a bridge between those two films for fans of the franchise, but it’s a fairly familiar one.
As space colonizers scavenge a derelict station at the far end of the universe, they unwittingly come face to face with a Xenomorph. Forced to fight for their lives, the group digs deep and uses all of their wits and resources available to them to get off the nightmare space station.
Peacock
Speak No Evil (2024)
66%An American remake of the 2022 Danish horror film of the same name, Speak No Evil is Blumhouse at its best. When an American family befriends a charming British family on vacation, they can’t pass up the invitation to rendezvous at their new friends’ idyllic country estate.
What begins as a dream weekend soon warps into a psychological nightmare as the Americans realize they’re not the first to be invited to this estate. Instead, they’ll have to try to be the first to leave alive. James McAvoy, Mackenzie Davis, and Scoot McNairy lead a strong cast.
Twisters (2024)
65%About a year ago, you might have asked yourself if anyone really wanted a sequel to the 1996 disaster flick Twister. Now, one question remains: Why didn’t they do it sooner? After racking up more than $370 million at the box office, Twisters was the summer’s fourth-biggest movie, and the second if you remove the two kids’ movies on this list.
In the standalone sequel, Daisy Edgar-Jones plays Kate Carter, a former storm chaser still haunted by a horrific tornado encounter in college. Although she studies storm patterns on screens in New York City, she’s lured back into the field by her friend, Javi (Anthony Ramos), to test a groundbreaking new system. There, she meets social media storm-chasing superstar Tyler Owens (Glen Powell), who offers to test the system in the field. But what starts as an ordinary test soon turns perilous as the crew finds themselves in the path of multiple converging storm systems in central Oklahoma.
Despicable Me 4 (2024)
52%Netflix
Kneecap (2024)
76%One of the year’s most underrated and outrageous movies, Kneecap is about rappers in Northern Ireland. When Belfast teacher JJ (DJ Próvaí) stumbles into the orbit of self-admitted “lowlife scum” Naoise and Liam Og (Móglaí Bap and Mo Chara), they discover a common passion of wanting to preserve their native Irish. (No, not Gaelic.)
Naturally, the three of them form a rap group called Kneecap, sparking a movement to save the mother tongue of 80,000 native Irish speakers in Ireland and Northern Ireland.
That Christmas (2024)
59%In the mood for a Christmas movie for the whole family? That Christmas is a new Netflix Original based on Richard Curtis’s trilogy of award-winning children’s books. The vignette-style animated film follows several entwined stories about family and friends, love and loneliness, and Santa Claus being fallible in the town of Wellington-on-Sea.
When the worst snowstorm in history hits, it’s an unusual Christmas holiday for everybody. Curtis — famous for films like Love Actually and Four Weddings and a Funeral — makes his first foray into animation.
Our Little Secret (2024)
Lindsay Lohan is quietly on a comeback tour, with this being her second Netflix Original movie of the year. The former teen idol is transitioning into a holiday movie queen as Netflix has her heading up its Hallmark Movie Imitation Division. (Figuratively speaking, of course.)
In this guilty pleasure rom-com, two resentful exes are thrust into an incredibly awkward Christmas night. It turns out their significant others are siblings. Burying old frustrations and feelings proves difficult as they both try to hide their romantic history.
JOY (2024)
59%Not to be confused with the 2015 Oscar nominee of the same name, this Netflix original tells the story of the world’s first “test-tube baby,” Louise Joy Brown. Of course, the film isn’t really about her. It’s about the trailblazers who made this extraordinary science possible.
Thomasin McKenzie, Bill Nighy, and James Norton star as the nurse, scientist, and surgeon who faced down opposition from virtually every institution in a relentless pursuit to revolutionize reproductive science. Netflix usually puts out a few Oscar hopefuls this time of year and it appears this year is no exception.
The Piano Lesson (2024)
69%Netflix’s second production from August Wilson’s Century Cycle (after Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom), The Piano Lesson, is a strong addition to the streamer’s Black Stories collection. Wilson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play is just one in an extraordinary 10-part series about the Black experience in 20th-century America, but The Piano Lesson has long been one of the most beloved entries.
The Charles household is falling apart over a family heirloom: a prized piano. Boy Willie (John David Washington) wants to sell the piano and begin to build the family fortune. Berniece (Danielle Deadwyler) refuses to let go of their family heritage. In the middle, Uncle Doaker (Samuel L. Jackson) attempts to mediate and broker a solution. As visions of the future and ghosts of the path collide, all parties are forced to evaluate their places in the world.
Paramount+
Smile 2 (2024)
66%The Smile horror franchise has taken off like a shot, with the second film already landing on Paramount+ just two short years after the theatrical release of the first one. Smile 2 gets even messier and gorier as global pop sensation Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) begins to experience increasingly horrifying and unexplainable events.
Believing they’re at least in some part related to the pressures of her tour and her fame, Skye is forced to face a very dark past to regain control of her life. Yet, she’s being haunted by something relentless.
Dear Santa (2024)
34%Dear Santa has a pretty ridiculous premise, and, depending on how you react to that, you can probably decide whether or not it’s your kind of Christmas movie. When a sixth-grader named Liam writes to Santa asking him to prove his existence, his dyslexia causes a minor issue.
Instead of addressing the letter to Santa, he sends it to Satan by mistake. As such, Satan (Jack Black) shows up at Liam’s front door pretending to be Santa and eager to take a sneaky little piece of Liam’s soul. Dear Santa has Jack Black being Jack Black, jokes about kids with dyslexia, and Christmas chaos. Do with that what you will!
Apple TV+
Fly Me to the Moon (2024)
53%The rare film to be made by another studio and get a theatrical release before landing on Apple TV+, Fly Me to the Moon had some modest box office success this summer. Marketing pro Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson) is brought in to fix NASA’s public image problems as the agency prepares for its most important mission to date: putting a man on the moon.
All this messaging wreaks havoc on launch director Cole Davis’ (Channing Tatum) worksite. When the White House deems the mission too important to fail, suddenly both Jones and Davis have another job. They must stage a fake moon landing, just in case the real one doesn’t pan out.
Blitz (2024)
71%Disney+
Beatles '64 (2024)
80%Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
56%Disney+ is now the streaming home to the summer’s two top movies: Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine. The third film in the Deadpool series finds Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) living listlessly in civilian life, retired from his days as the mercenary Deadpool.
As tends to happen in these movies, however, the planet soon faces an existential threat, forcing Deadpool to don the suit once again. But this time, he’s looking for reinforcements in the form of Wolverine (Hugh Jackman). Except this isn’t his Wolverine. Instead, Deadpool has to use Cable’s time travel device to rope in another Wolverine from another timeline.
Music by John Williams (2024)
72%Inside Out 2 (2024)
73%MGM+
Blink Twice (2024)
66%The directorial debut of Zoë Kravitz, Blink Twice stars Channing Tatum as tech billionaire Slater King. When he meets cocktail waitress Frida (Naomi Ackle) at his fundraising gala, he’s immediately smitten. After being invited to join him and his friends on his private island, Frida can’t believe what an amazing turn her life has taken.
But as strange things begin to happen, Frida begins to question her reality. Is she even on an island? There’s something sinister behind the party, and Frida will have to figure out what it is if she wants to make it out alive.
Amazon Prime Video
My Old Ass (2024)
74%Canary Black (2024)
Brothers (2024)
Challengers (2024)
House of Spoils (2024)
Shudder
Black Cab (2024)
The Exorcism (2024)
46%
