The best movies on Hulu to watch in January 2026

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Pick of the month
The 10 best Hulu movies

It's a new year, so we've given our list of the best movies on Hulu a bit of a refresh. On this page you'll find a mix of 10 all-time classics along with some more recent titles that are available to watch on the streamer.

Hulu has a truly impressive library of titles to choose from, and this list picks out some of the best. There are recent hits like Steven Soderbergh's ghost story Presence, sci-fi classics like Alien, and moving dramas like Nomadland. We've also added a bonus Pick of the Month – this time around we've chosen Dylan O'Brien's dark comedy Twinless, which was released in cinemas last year.

Pick of the month

Twinless

Year: 2025
Director: James Sweeney
Available: US

This black comedy starring Dylan O'Brien and director James Sweeney is a must-watch, in case you missed it in cinemas. It also stars Aisling Franciosi, Chris Perfetti, François Arnaud, Tasha Smith, and Gilmore Girls icon Lauren Graham.

Per the logline, "two young men meet in a twin support group and form an unlikely friendship. Roman (O'Brien) and Dennis (Sweeney) both search for solace and an identity without their other halves and soon become inseparable outside the group. But when Roman meets Dennis' ebullient co-worker, Marcie (Aisling Franciosi), all is revealed to be not what it seems, as each man harbors secrets that could unravel everything."

Here's where you can keep track of the most exciting upcoming movies.

The 10 best Hulu movies

10. Presence

Callina Liang as Chloe Payne in Presence, with the rest of the family behind her out of focus. — (Image credit: Sundance Institute)

Year: 2024
Director: Steven Soderbergh

Steven Soderbergh's innovative supernatural thriller is coming to Hulu on June 3. A haunted house story with a difference, Presence is told entirely from the spirit's point of view. Taking place within a recently renovated house, the ghost observes a new family – Lucy Liu's Rebekah, Chris Sullivan's Chris, and their kids, Tyler (Eddy Maday), and Chloe (Callina Liang) – move in. When Tyler's new friend Ryan (West Mulholland) becomes a regular visitor, however, the "presence" starts to become more active...

Shot in secret during 2023, Presence offers a fresh take on one of the oldest storytelling traditions. Soderbergh puts us in the position of the spirit, silently watching a family that is slowly falling apart. Meditative and moving as well as occasionally genuinely eerie, this is a true one-off.

9. Prey

Amber Midthunder as Naru in Prey — (Image credit: Hulu)

Year: 2022
Director: Dan Trachtenberg

There's a diabolical simplicity to the pitch behind Prey, the latest entry in the Predator franchise: What if a Predator hunted in a different period in history? Instead of having a Predator go up against the deadliest, Schwarzenegger-esque modern warrior with all the guns and ammo that entails, Prey is set in the Great Plains in the early 1700s. Amber Midthunder plays Naru, a Comanche woman whose desire to be a warrior instead of a healer, as her tribe would have her be, is tested to the extreme when an alien hunter searches for its quarry where the buffalo roam.

Prey is a fun, refreshing change of pace for Predator, and it will have you wondering why there aren't more movies like this. Have a Predator fight samurai, or gladiators, or pirates, or have a Predator square off against a battalion of Allied forces in World War II. The possibilities that Prey unlocked should be endless.

Read our Prey review for more insights ahead of Predator: Badlands.

8. BlackBerry

A close-up of a Blackberry phone on a white table during the movie Blackberry. — (Image credit: Elevation Pictures)

Year: 2023
Director: Matt Johnson

For whatever reason, there was a glut of movies in 2023 that dramatized how certain products — like Air Jordans, Tetris, and Flamin' Hot Cheetos — were created. But, by far the best movie to emerge from this trend focuses on the rise and fall of the once-ubiquitous BlackBerry mobile phone that dominated the '00s until the iPhone ate its lunch.

Starring Jay Baruchel and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia's Glenn Howerton as a geek and a ruthless businessman who forge a partnership as successful as it is tenuous, BlackBerry stands out from the crowd in its willingness to show the dark lows of capitalism in addition to its highs. It's a smart, insightful, and bleakly comedic look at tech and commerce.

Dive into one of the best drama movies around with our BlackBerry review.

7. The Host

Song Kang-ho as Park Gang-du and Go Ah-sung as Park Hyun-seo running from a monster during the movie The Host. — (Image credit: Magnolia Pictures)

Year: 2006
Director: Bong Joon-Ho

Parasite director Bong Joon-Ho made a creature feature in his own distinct way with 2006's The Host, which follows a Seoul family as they try to rescue a young family member who has been taken by a grotesque monster that emerged from the river and started wreaking havoc.

As with almost all of Director Bong's films, The Host blends comedy with darkness, dealing with some heavy themes involving class, bureaucracy, environmentalism, and more. The monster, some sort of mutated tadpole-like creature, is like nothing else you'll see on the screen, as is the unforgettable scene where it first comes ashore in broad daylight — totally throwing away the typical Jaws-style playbook of keeping the monster hidden. This is one of the best monster movies released in the 2000s and is well worth your time.

For more insights read our The Host review to find out more on this gem.

6. Late Night with the Devil

David Dastmalchian as Jack Delroy in Late Night with the Devil — (Image credit: IFC Films/Shudder)

Year: 2023
Director: Colin Cairnes and Cameron Cairnes

This recent horror is a terrific showcase for its star, David Dastmalchian. He plays Jack Delroy, the host of a late night talk show called Night Owls. Still grieving the death of his wife Madeleine, Delroy returns to work. It's Halloween, and the show is about to air a paranormal special. His guests for the show include parapsychologist Dr June Ross-Mitchell (Laura Gordon), who brings her latest study, 13-year-old Lilly D'Abo (Ingrid Torelli), who is said to be possessed by a demon.

Late Night with the Devil is a huge amount of fun, moving from a kitschy, camp tone to some genuinely unnerving scares. Dastmalchian excels as Jack Delroy, making the character both arrogant and sympathetic. Witty and original, this is a great modern horror movie.

5. Small Things Like These

Cillian Murphy in Small Things Like These — (Image credit: Shane O'Connor/Artists Equity/Big Things Films)

Year: 2024
Director: Tim Mielants

Cillian Murphy has long been one of our best actors, but his career has really stepped up a notch post-Oppenheimer. Small Things Like These may not be as grandiose a production as his Nolan collaborations or the forthcoming third 28 Years Later film, but this gripping drama was still one of the best films of 2024.

Murphy plays a good-natured and hard-working coal merchant named Bill Furlong. When Bill stumbles upon a dark secret at the heart of his community, it puts him on a collision cause with Emily Watson's stern Sister Mary. This dark 1980s-set drama is a wonderful showcase for Murphy's undeniable talents and a powerful story about a bleak real life chapter in Ireland's history.

4. Donnie Darko

Jake Gyllenhaal as Donnie and Jena Malone as Gretchen in Donnie Darko. — (Image credit: Newmarket Films)

Year: 2001
Director: Richard Kelly

25 years since it first blew minds – and made Jake Gyllenhaal a star – Richard Kelly's cult mystery thriller still fascinates. Gyllenhaal stars as Donnie, a troubled teenager with a sinister imaginary friend, who may turn out to be more real than he realises. Things seem to be looking up when Donnie starts dating Gretchen Ross (Jena Malone), but if his visions are correct, then the end of the world is coming soon...

Blessed with an iconic '80s soundtrack and a dreamy logic that recalls David Lynch's work, Donnie Darko is wonderfully atmospheric and perplexing. All the pieces for solving this eerie mystery are there, but Kelly smartly leaves it up to the viewer to piece it all together.

3. Nomadland

Frances McDormand as Fern in Nomadland. — (Image credit: Searchlight)

Year: 2020
Director: Richard Kelly

With Hamnet dominating the critical discourse at the moment, it's a great time to revisit one of Chloé Zhao's earlier films. Nomadland follows Fern – the great Frances McDormand, giving a wonderfully lived-in performance – a recently bereaved worker at a US Gypsum plant who loses her job. With nothing keeping her in the Nevada town where she lived, she buys a van and sets off across the country in search of work.

From that description, Nomadland probably sounds quite bleak, and it kind of is. But it's also an incredibly joyful film, one that finds hope and redemption in the kindness of the people that Fern meets along her journey. Zhao's direction and Joshua James Richards's spectacular cinematography, meanwhile, lend a sense of grandeur to this defiantly small scale epic.

2. Anora

Mikey Madison as Ani and Mark Eydelshteyn as Vanya in Anora. — (Image credit: Universal Pictures)

Year: 2024
Director: Sean Baker

The year's big winner at this year's Oscars was this heartbreaking, hilarious comedy-drama from director Sean Baker. Mikey Madison gives an outstanding performance as Ani, an American sex worker who ends up falling for Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn), the playboy son of a Russian oligarch. The two marry and look set for a happy life together, but Vanya's parents are far from pleased with the arrangement...

Anora starts out like a twisted fairytale, but quickly morphs into a tragic nightmare. Vanya's parents send a squad of goons to forcibly annul the marriage, leading to a stomach-knotting home invasion sequence and an unexpected tour of nocturnal New York. Despite all of this, it remains a genuinely funny film even as it arrives at its touching, painful, yet entirely believable conclusion.

Find out what we made of this year's Best Picture winner in our full Anora review.

1. Alien

Three astronauts leaving a spaceship during one of the best movies on Hulu, Alien. — (Image credit: 20th Century Fox)

Year: 1979
Director: Ridley Scott

A chest buster exploding out of Kane is one of the best and most gory scenes in film history, so it's only fitting that it's attached to one of the best horror movies ever made. When the seven-member crew of a commercial spaceship encounters a strange, parasitic alien killer, they're picked off one by one until only one of the great cinema heroines, Sigourney Weaver's Ellen Ripley, remains.

Ridley Scott's sci-fi horror masterpiece has spawned an entire franchise (the second installment, James Cameron's action flick Aliens, is also streaming on Hulu, and it’s also a must-watch). Because of how successful Alien has become, it can be a bit easy to take the Xenomorph for granted. Try to forget everything you know about Alien before seeing the movie. It's best to try and be like the audiences in 1979 who had never seen, let alone imagined, a creature like the one H. R. Giger designed.

If you want more Xenomorphs in your life, you can read our guide on how to watch all the Alien movies in order.

For more streaming picks head over to your lists of the best movies on Disney Plus, the best movies on Amazon Prime and the best movies on Netflix. We also have a handy guide breaking down all the new movies on the horizon if you want fresh releases.

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