Thrillers are usually intense, because of course they are. They sort of have to be. It’s a whole genre of movies where the main emotion evoked is some kind of unease or excitement, or maybe a bit of both, contrasted with the horror genre, where the point is more unease and fear. But films can certainly belong to both genres, with some of the most intense of the kind being classics like Psycho, The Silence of the Lambs, and Jaws.
As for movies that avoid the thriller genre while remaining intense? That’s a whole other thing, but it’s certainly doable, if a movie is willing to get dark enough as either a black comedy or a psychological drama. Most of the films below fit into those categories, with some war movies that aren’t thrillers also added, too. And, to keep things even more interesting, none of these films belong to the horror genre in the traditional sense. Basically, all of them find ways to unnerve and cause unease without being thriller and/or horror movies.
10
‘Magnolia’ (1999)
Magnolia is a drama on an epic scale, even though it doesn’t cover nearly as much time as most epic movies out there. In fact, it takes place over a single day, but there are so many characters coming and going throughout (and sometimes having their stories interweaving) that the whole thing ends up being expansive and ambitious in scope.
It’s also a very heightened kind of drama, and maybe even something of a melodrama, but thanks to the performances and some very confident writing and direction on Paul Thomas Anderson’s part, it ends up working surprisingly well. And Magnolia deals with some heavy ideas and people going through tough times in their lives, so you get a good deal of emotional intensity throughout, as a result.
9
‘Spencer’ (2021)
The main reason to watch Spencer is Kristen Stewart’s performance as Princess Diana, though you could also watch it if you like Christmas movies but don’t want to watch a nice/happy Christmas movie. It takes place around the end of the year, and follows Diana struggling with her marriage and being wrapped up in – and seemingly suffocated by – the royal family. No one in the institution comes away looking particularly good, in the end.
It’s an unrelenting historical drama/biographical film, but all for a good reason and still while retaining a strong amount of empathy. Spencer is no ordinary biopic or any kind of puff piece for the royal family, and the whole thing ends up being surprisingly intense. The acting’s great, the atmosphere is strangely eerie, and Spencer is, overall, pretty relentless.
8
‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ (2004)
Featuring one of the best screenplays of the 21st century so far, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is emotionally unrelenting in the way it explores breaking up, the complicated nature of love, and memory/grief. It’s about two people who decide to undergo a procedure that will erase the memories of their ex-partners, but during the process, regret sets in, even though it seems too late to go back.
The whole thing dives deep into the subconscious of the lead character’s mind, and so watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind seems kind of invasive, even if it is a fictional character and story (you know, being sort of sci-fi and all). It’s also a factor in the whole movie being exhausting and ultimately quite sad, but you do also have to admire the honesty of it all, and the lengths it’s willing to go to when it comes to unpacking some challenging stuff.
7
‘Christiane F.’ (1981)
If Christiane F. can be classified as a coming-of-age movie, then it’s surely one of the most frightening ever made, since it pulls no punches while also being based on a true-life story. It’s about a young girl who starts experimenting with drugs, owing partly to peer pressure, but then she keeps chasing certain highs – and riskier substances – with the film then being about her life falling apart.
There’s an excitement and energy to the start of the film that gradually shifts into misery, so you really do feel what the main character’s going through to a rather mortifying extent.
Even by the standards of films that look at addiction, Christiane F. is a tough sit, and it kind of has to be in order to do justice to the real-life narrative at hand. There’s an excitement and energy to the start of the film that gradually shifts into misery, so you really do feel what the main character’s going through to a rather mortifying extent. It’s beyond visceral and intense, in turn being, somehow, both a vital and near-impossible watch all at once.
6
‘Scenes from a Marriage’ (1974)
Scenes from a Marriage is a powerful drama that focuses on the degradation of a marriage, technically being a romance film in one way, but one centered on falling out of love instead of falling in love. Most of the sequences are long and only have the two main characters in them, so Scenes from a Marriage kind of feels like a string of arguments, basically, each one usually being more full-on than the last.
And this goes on, feeling remarkably intense and uncomfortably grounded, for close to three hours if you watch the theatrical cut, and then close to five hours if you watch the miniseries version. Scenes from a Marriage is, therefore, a very demanding experience, to say the least, but it’s worth it if you want a realistic drama that’s as brutally honest as it is remarkably acted.
5
‘Come and See’ (1985)
There aren’t many war movies that feel more realistic or grounded than Come and See, which takes place during World War II and showcases all sorts of horrors from the point of view of a young boy. He gets swept up into a group of resistance fighters who are trying to combat German invaders, but they end up being outgunned, with the film having one tragic event after another, the whole thing marching forward in a most distressing manner.
It’s not the same as being at war, obviously, but Come and See does go the extra mile in making you feel how terrible it would be to find yourself in – or even just near to – active combat. Few anti-war films are this successful at being anti-war, and it’s almost as terrifying as a movie can be without actually belonging to the horror genre.
4
‘Saving Private Ryan’ (1998)
Similarly tense, within the realm of World War II movies, is Saving Private Ryan, which does showcase a certain kind of heroism to a greater extent than Come and See, all the while still driving home the idea of war being hell. Much of it’s about a rescue mission to get the titular Private Ryan home safely, since he’s behind enemy lines, and all his brothers have already been killed in combat.
The opening sequence is the most famous part of the film, and also the most intense, but the rest of Saving Private Ryan is also harrowing (and the final battle isn’t far off the opening one in terms of being visceral). It’s a movie that often gets called one of the greatest of all time, as far as war movies go, and it’s not too hard to see why.
3
‘Shiva Baby’ (2020)
On paper, Shiva Baby might not look like too intimidating a watch, seeing as it’s a comedy that’s less than 80 minutes in duration. It all takes place inside a single location, and it’s mostly about an awkward family gathering where a young woman has to keep various secrets in line, with so many difficult truths being at risk of getting exposed at just about any point, all within a confined location.
Describing it a little more like that might start making Shiva Baby sound like an uncomfortable comedy, or an otherwise very dark one, but then the execution of it all takes it up another level. This is the kind of film that really puts a good many thrillers to shame as a cinematic tension-building exercise. It does so much with what initially seems like so little, and the fairly common comparisons to Uncut Gems (which is longer, more conventionally brutal, and also classifiable as a genuine thriller) are well-deserved.
2
‘Requiem for a Dream’ (2000)
Like Christiane F., Requiem for a Dream is a movie about drug addiction, here following several people with relatively equal screen time instead of mostly being centered on a single person. It’s a way to explore the effects of different kinds of substance dependencies, and also, the approach means Requiem for a Dream can show some different ways that people can fall into addiction.
Unlike some other addiction-related movies, though, Requiem for a Dream really wants to feel like a worst-case scenario or even something of a nightmare, so there’s little by way of hope or suggesting that recovery can be possible. You can critique it for that, if you want, but you can also approach the extremeness of it all a bit more charitably, finding some merit in a film being this uncompromising to such an in-your-face extent. But either way, you can’t really deny the intensity of it all.
1
‘Whiplash’ (2014)
Apologies for the hyperbole, but Whiplash might just be the best film released in 2014, and that’s saying quite a bit, since there were a ton of great movies that came out that year. It’s a psychological drama with a ton of music, being about a young man trying to achieve greatness, as a drummer, and being tormented/“trained” by a rather terrifying instructor who demands perfection from his students.
Not that the first 80 to 90% of the film is lacking when it comes to tension, but the ending of Whiplash puts it up a whole other level. It’s one of the most riveting climaxes to any film in recent memory, or maybe even of all time, and the troubling implications of the sequence linger even after the credits have stopped rolling. If you can get through Whiplash without feeling jittery or at least a little on edge, then maybe you really have seen it all.
Whiplash
- Release Date
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October 10, 2014
- Runtime
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107 Minutes
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