The Best Movies to Stream This Week

Looking to settle in with a good movie? Me too. That’s why I’ve pored over release schedules to bring you the best original and new-to-streaming movies you can watch on Netflix, Prime, Max, Hulu, and other streaming platforms.

It’s October, so the most notable released this week are horror. The best fright flicks this month include Netflix original It’s What’s Inside, a genre-fluid look at the body-switch movie, the feature-length version of Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot on Max, in case you thought the two mini-series based on the book were a bit much, and Prime’s House of Spoils, with its unique, supernatural-foodie vibe. That’s not all, though; check out the full list below.

It’s What’s Inside

Freaky Friday, 17 Again, Rob Schneider’s The Hot Chick; I’ll watch literally any movie where people switch bodies, so I’m totally jazzed for It’s What’s Inside. The high concept in this sci-fi/horror/comedy is a group of friends at a pre-wedding party all switch bodies. There’s some machine or something; doesn’t matter. Body-switching movies are often critically maligned, but this one is even getting decent reviews on Rotten Tomatoes.

Where to stream: Netflix

Salem’s Lot

This reimagining of Stephen King’s 1975 novel takes us back to the haunted town of Jerusalem’s Lot, Maine, which has a long-running problem with vampires. Lewis Pullman plays Ben Mears, a writer who returns to his hometown to learn about himself. Instead, he learns that a blood-sucking freak and his familiar just bought a notoriously haunted house in town.

Where to stream: Max

House of Spoils

If The Bear had a female lead and was a horror movie, it might be something like House of Spoils. Ariana DeBose plays a hungry young chef who scores a potentially career-making gig: the chance to run her own high-end restaurant. While her spot has the usual new eatery hurdles—a remote location, a less-than-perfect-staff, a questionable investor—the biggest problem is supernatural. It seems the “farm” part of her farm-to-table menu comes from a witch’s garden, and haunted food makes a Michelin star much harder to earn.

Where to stream: Prime

Doctor Sleep (2019)

If you don’t judge 2019’s Doctor Sleep against 1981’s The Shining, it’s an effective, scary, and interesting movie that somehow manages to be respectful to both Kubrick’s movie and King’s novel. It’s one of those sequels that feels like seeing relatives at a family reunion: “There’s the elevator full of blood! There are the spooky twins saying ‘hello, Danny! Oh my god! Room 237!” The “new elements” are pretty good too.

Where to stream: Max

Hold Your Breath

In this psychological horror film, Sarah Paulson plays Margaret Bellum, a mother trying to guide her children through the dustbowl disaster in Oklahoma in the 1930s. If the Great Depression wasn’t scary enough, the Bellums are visited by “The Grey Man,” a supernatural entity that travels through the dust and causes its victims to commit horrific crimes. Hold Your Breath pits a mother against the forces of nature, evil, and madness, just in time for Halloween!

Where to stream: Hulu

The Platform 2

The Platform was pure cinematic madness and this sequel looks like more of the same. Like the original, The Platform 2 is a horror/sci fi movie set in a tower prison where the people who live on the top floor get an opulent spread of food every day. The inmates on the floor below get what’s left over, and the inmates below them get the left-over left-overs, and so on, down to the starving wretches hundreds of levels deep who are killing each other over table scraps. It’s not the kind of story that begs for a sequel, but I’m still curious where it’s going.

Where to stream: Netflix

Nightmare on Elm Street mania!

It’s not October in my house without a screening of 1984’s Nightmare on Elm Street and 1987’s A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. This year, I’m having a Freddy Krueger festival because Max is streaming the first five Elm Street movies, plus Freddy vs. Jason. Sadly, the final movie of the original run, 1991’s Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare is not available on Max. Happily, the 2010 remake isn’t either.

Here are all the Elm Street movies streaming on Max in October:

• A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

• A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985)

• A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)

• A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988)

• A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989)

• Freddy vs. Jason (2003)

Where to stream: Max

Last week’s picks

Wolfs (2024)

This action/comedy might overload your television with charisma, charm, and chiseled jaws. Wolfs features bonafide movie stars Brad Pitt and George Clooney playing criminal fixers who’ve always worked alone. But a job covering up a high-profile crime forces the opposites to work together, and when things get crazy, they’ll have to cooperate if they hope to make it through the night.

Where to stream: Apple TV+

Apartment 7A

A prequel to horror masterpiece Rosemary’s Baby, Apartment 7A is an early Halloween treat for horror fans. This flick invites us to revisit old fiends Roman and Minnie Casteve, fun-loving New York oldsters who love befriending young, fertile women who move into apartment 7A down the hall—I think they might be up to something. Purists may scoff at anyone other than Ruth Gordon playing Minnie or anyone other than Roman Polanski directing, but snobbery and horror movies are a bad fit; better to enjoy the nostalgia, or at least give it a hate-watch.

Where to stream: MGM+

Will & Harper

In Will & Harper, GOAT comedian Will Ferrell and writer Harper Steele take a long drive in a car. Steele and Ferrell have worked together and been close friends for 30 years, and the two decided to take this cross-country trip when Ferrell learned his old friend was coming out as a trans woman; so they have a lot to talk about. Will & Harper has a rare perfect score on Rotten Tomatoes. 

Where to stream: Netflix

She Taught Love

This thoughtful film is a modern take on a premise that’s worked for romantic comedies since Shakespeare. Darrell Britt-Gibson and Arsema Thomas play Frank Cooper and Mali Waters, two very different people who fall in love. Cooper is a barely employed actor who fills his time between roles with booze and women. Thomas is a driven career woman on a mission to take over the world. Can these star-crossed lovers learn to embrace each others’ differences and get to their happy ending?

Where to stream: Hulu