Entertainment
10 Thriller Movies To Watch if You Love ‘Send Help’
So, you work in an office job, and your employers don’t seem to value just how important you are, or, heck, you as a person. But then, you accompany them on a business trip, and just as they’re laughing it up at your expense, the plane begins to nose dive into the ocean. You and another survivor, one of your bosses, make it to a deserted island, where he attempts to establish that he is, in fact, your superior. But, you’re not in the office anymore, and in the battle for survival, only one of you can come out victorious, aka, alive.
What you just read is the plot for Sam Raimi‘s survival horror thriller Send Help, which features a clash of dynamics between the subservient worker and the predatory boss, to see who has the survival instincts to make it back to civilization alive. Right from the start, you can instantly tell this is a Sam Raimi movie. He has a distinct way of telling stories, a way that few directors can capture, and the high-stakes nature of the film won over critics, and has won over audiences. It’s actually shocking that Send Help was released in January, because it doesn’t feel like a traditional “January movie.” Nevertheless, Send Help is definitely a contender of being one of the best films of the year, with a lot of 2026 left to go. So, after you’ve seen the horror play out in this thrilling film, you must still be hungry for more thrillers to satisfy your appetite. Well, you’re in luck, as we have movies that will capture your heart the same way Rachel McAdams did.
1
‘Violent Ends’ (2025)
If you were a big fan of the unabashed violence in Send Help, then this underrated 2025 thriller will certainly bring a smile to your face. Directed by John-Michael Powell, Violent Ends follows Lucas Frost (Billy Magnussen), a guy who really wants out of his family’s violent legacy to try to build a life for himself and his fiancée, Emma (Alexandra Shipp).
But, as the old saying goes, the streets have a long memory, and he is thrust back into this violent, criminal underworld to seek revenge after an armed robbery committed by one of his family members proves fatal. The violence in Violent Ends can be over-the-top at times, but it really does highlight how brutal drug life can be, and why Lucas was so desperate to escape it. It’s truly shocking that no one has talked about this independent film.
2
‘Phone Booth’ (2003)
So, back in the early 2000s, before the rise of the smartphone, the main way that people could make calls while they were in public was through the phone booth. For readers who may be too young to know what a phone booth was, it was a space where you went in, paid a quarter, and made your call. Most of the time, it was a harmless experience, but for Stuart Shepard (Colin Farrell), it became his personal hell.
2003’s Phone Booth is one of the most underrated thrillers of all-time, and it’s not even close. The movie follows Farrell as he’s held hostage by a sniper (Kiefer Sutherland), who forces him to reveal ugly truths about him to the public. Oh, and if he steps out of the phone booth, he gets shot. Every minute of the 81-minute runtime is filled with pulsating tension, and you wind up rooting for a guy who, honestly, you realistically wouldn’t be rooting for.
3
‘The Manchurian Candidate’ (1962)
We are living in strange times, indeed, but not even this crazy decade can match up to the wild and turbulent decade of the 1960s. It was a time of political upheaval, and it seemed like the entire world was on fire, which is why 1962 was the perfect year for United Artists to release The Manchurian Candidate.
Directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Frank Sinatra, the film follows Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey), who becomes an unwitting assassin tasked with taking out the presidential nominee, which the communists hoped would lead to an overthrow of the U.S. government. There isn’t a moment that’s wasted in The Manchurian Candidate, as the film was the perfect blend of thriller and satire; and while the movie can be uncomfortable to watch at times, if you’re used to the violence in Send Help, The Manchurian Candidate should be a cakewalk for you.
4
‘Zodiac’ (2007)
Here’s a little history lesson. In the late 1960s, a man had the San Francisco Bay Area in a state of terror, as five people were killed by him in a span of two years. He would go by the name of the Zodiac Killer, who mailed cryptic letters to multiple Bay Area newspapers with detailed information on the police news, and threatened to unleash a reign of terror on the region if the newspapers didn’t print his letters. The scary part is, the Zodiac Killer was never truly caught.
This bizarre and scary time period was chronicled in several films, but the best and most well-known was David Fincher‘s Zodiac, released in 2007 to rave reviews from both critics and audiences. The film did a splendid job in recreating the terror that residents of the Bay Area were feeling at the time, and the notes sent to the newspapers by the Zodiac Killer were indeed creepy. Zodiac has since gained a huge cult following, and is considered one of the best thrillers of all-time.
5
‘Se7en’ (1995)
If you thought Send Help was a crazy thriller, then us millennials have a movie that will certainly send a chill down your spine. Directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman, Se7en was a mind-trip that, to this day, those who saw it in the theater still can’t wrap our heads around.
The basic premise of Se7en is this: Freeman and Pitt play two detectives who are trying to stop a serial killer who commits murder based on the seven deadly sins. While Send Help did have some light-hearted comedic moments sprinkled in, you will be very hard-pressed to find that here. The atmosphere is dark and forbidding, and the ending is one of the best in movie history. And, if you’ve seen the movie, yes, we’re still wondering what was in the box.
6
‘Barbarian’ (2022)
When I first saw the trailer for Barbarian, I didn’t know what to make of this movie. So, I decided to go into Barbarian completely blind, not looking into what the synopsis of the movie was about. It was a good idea, because if you think that Barbarian is what you think it is from just watching the trailer, I’m here to tell you, it will certainly catch you by surprise, in a good way.
For Barbarian, giving you a mini synopsis wouldn’t do the movie justice. This is a film that, if you haven’t seen it yet, you should definitely go in blind and watch how things unfold. I will say, that the first act of the film is a masterclass at setting up what is to come in Barbarian, and the whiplash you’ll get from the shift in tone is unforgettable.
7
‘Us’ (2019)
OK, so here’s a scenario for you: You go to a cabin, and one night, you see a family standing quietly and eerily in your driveway. You don’t know who these people are, or why they chose your driveway in the first place. Then, all of a sudden, the people attack you, and once you see them in the light, they unveil who they are: they’re you, except more terrifying.
Us, directed by Jordan Peele, is one of the best psychological horror films of all-time, right up there with Peele’s directorial debut Get Out. It was a movie that explored the darker side of the American experience. Us was kind of a strange movie, yes, but that’s the entire point. It wanted to get people talking, and it did. The ending to Us is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated plot twists in movie history. It was creepy, yet a satisfying way to end what was a great, mind-bending thriller.
8
‘The Fugitive’ (1993)
“I didn’t kill my wife!” I think we can all agree that this line, spoken by Dr. Richard Kimble (Harrison Ford) in the acclaimed 1993 action thriller The Fugitive, is one of the pop culture staples of the 1990s. It was so simple, yet so powerful, and its inclusion in the promotional trailers for the Andrew Davis film did wonders for its marketing. The Fugitive is a manhunt thriller, in which Deputy Samuel Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones) of the U.S. Marshals attempts to locate Dr. Kimble, who is wrongfully accused of killing his wife.
The Fugitive could have been a one-and-done movie with a simplistic plot, but the acting from Ford and Jones was so powerful, it transformed what could have been a moderately successful movie, into one of the best of the decade. We root for Kimble as he desperately tries to kill his name, while not having contempt for Deputy Gerard, who comes off as a man who’s just trying to do his job. If you love thrillers, The Fugitive is a must-watch.
9
‘Don’t Move’ (2024)
Before he directed Send Help, Raimi served as a producer for a Netflix film that is similar in vibe, but is darker in tone. That move was 2024’s Don’t Move, starring Yellowstone alum Kelsey Asbille as a grieving mother who, after being kidnapped by a serial killer, is injected with a paralytic agent. From there, we spend most of the 92-minute runtime rooting for Asbille’s Iris to escape her captor and get help before the shot takes full effect and her body completely shuts down.
So, just by reading the quick synopsis of Don’t Move, you can already tell that this is a movie that goes to a darker place than Send Help did. This movie is a great example of how to create a high-concept hook, and with the tight pacing, and Asbille’s tremendous job in what must have been a very difficult performance, Don’t Move is a movie that will shock and thrill you for the entire runtime. In fact, before watching Send Help, we highly recommend you watch this film first.
10
‘Pulp Fiction’ (1994)
You can’t be a fan of thrillers, and not be a fan of the 1994 classic Pulp Fiction. We know, it’s technically a black comedy crime film, but there were a lot of moments in this film that will certainly thrill you the same way Send Help does, and add an extra dose on top of it. As great as Quentin Tarantino is, and he’s certainly made a lot of great movies, Pulp Fiction is definitely his magnum opus.
The structure of Pulp Fiction is extremely unique, and one that only Tarantino could create; but to give you a general idea of what the film is about, Pulp Fiction centers on three interwoven storylines that come together to create a satisfying ending. The violence is graphic, the dialogue is quotable and peak cinema. When it comes to crime thrillers, you can’t get any better than Pulp Fiction.
