Four underrated Netflix original movies you probably overlooked
Netflix’s streaming library is so spread out across formats and genres that it is easy to lose direction and, in the process, overlook hidden treasures.
This is where we chime in, ensuring the showbiz spotlight falls on titles that may not have been lucky enough to enjoy online anticipation, debates, discussions, and follow-up discourses.
Although tabloids usually go above and beyond to highlight new and upcoming releases, Netflix’s underrated catalogue calls for a trip down memory lane to see if we can find something worthy that we initially missed.
So, if you’re ready to commit to the best of the best, here are four underrated Netflix original movies you probably overlooked the first time around.
Four underrated original movies to stream right now on Netflix
Wheelman (Jeremy Rush, 2017)
Directed by Jeremy Rush, Wheelman is a page-turning Netflix Original action thriller that follows a nameless ex-con getaway driver who finds himself double-crossed and trapped in a deadly cat-and-mouse chase.
While waiting for two masked men who pull off a robbery in his standby getaway car, the driver gets an unexpected call from an anonymous person informing him that the heist has been compromised. Instructed to ditch the robbers the minute they put the money in his car’s trunk and drive away with it, the driver is threatened with extreme consequences unless he actually does so.
But when he accepts the orders in a state of panic and drives off with the loot, he realises that he’s trapped in a vicious turf war between feuding local mobsters; thus, Wheelman centres on the desperate driver as he navigates a deadly race against time.
Calibre (Matt Palmer, 2018)
Netflix thrillers are already in a league of their own, which undoubtedly includes the 2018 psychological thriller Calibre, directed by Matt Palmer. The British thriller follows childhood friends Marcus and Vaughn as they travel to a secluded, rural village in Scotland for a hunting weekend.
Although polar opposites by nature, neither fails to read the tense, unwelcoming villagers when they stop at a local pub. While stalking a deer the next day in the immensely dense forest, Vaughn accidentally shoots a young boy, Sam, who appears unexpectedly in their line of sight.
And to make things worse, his father arrives armed and enraged, prompting the loosening of another trigger. Instead of turning to the police or surrendering themselves to the villagers, they try to hide the bodies and flee, but the question is whether it is really that easy to escape the eyes of the villagers?
Hold the Dark (Jeremy Saulnier, 2018)
Based on William Giraldi’s novel of the same name, Hold the Dark is a neo-western action thriller which follows Russell Core, a wolf expert, who is summoned to the village of Keelut, Alaska, by Medora Slone, a grieving mother.
Tasked with hunting down the pack of wolves she holds responsible for the disappearance of three small children, including her six-year-old son Bailey, while Core tries his best to convince her that the indications are not of wolf behaviour.
But Medora is stuck on her conviction, and as if that’s not enough red flags, Core soon discovers that the person who hired him holds darker secrets than he can wrap his head around. As he makes his way back to Medora’s house, what he discovers is not her, but her missing child, no longer alive. Set against a harsh winter backdrop, Hold the Dark leans heavily into local folklore where character arcs are linked to survival, guilt and grief.
Lou (Anna Foerster, 2022)
To wrap up the midweek movie marathon, we recommend Lou, yet another underrated action thriller. Set against the backdrop of a severe storm on the remote Orcas Island in Washington in 1986, the gripping crime thriller kicks off with the terrifying abduction of a young girl named Vee, whose desperate mother, Hannah, turns to Lou, her gruff landlord and reclusive neighbour, for help, interrupting her suicide attempt.
As the two women brave the harsh weather to track down the kidnappers who abducted Vee, a dangerous rescue mission unfolds, and soon the real identity of the abductor is exposed.
It turns out that the kidnapper is someone actually close to Hannah’s home, whom she thought was dead. Lou follows the mysterious loner, whose rescue mission reveals dangerous skills and an uncanny past no one really knew of.