13 Best Classic Movies on Prime Video (April 2026): ‘Fast Times at Ridgemont High’ and More

George and Kathy Lutz (Josh Brolin and Margot Kidder) have scored a great deal on an arguably even greater home in Amityville, New York. But they soon realize there’s a catch — years ago, the DeFeo family was brutally murdered and their restless spirits haunt the home’s colonial walls. George soon becomes withdrawn and increasingly violent, not unlike the man who killed the Defeos. Will the Lutzes meet a similar fate?

Supposedly based on a true story, The Amityville Horror has spawned numerous sequels, spinoffs, remakes and rip-offs. All of them are pretty bad (sorry, Ryan Reynolds), but the original remains the best due to its commitment to the story’s truth. With its gritty visuals and realistic acting, The Amityville Horror is a scary movie that convincingly argues that the Lutzes’ haunting actually happened — skeptics be damned.

It’s the early ‘80s, and being a teenager has its ups and downs. For freshman Stacy (Jennifer Jason Leigh), her first romance results in her first heartbreak, while her older brother Brad (Judge Reinhold) has to suffer through the fast-food job he hates. As for local burnout, Jeff Spicoli (Sean Penn), life is good as long as he has a bong and a surfboard nearby. 

These are just some of the many teenage and young adult characters that populate Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Amy Heckerling’s seminal coming-of-age film that shows adolescent growing pains never go out of style — even if some of the many fashions seen in the comedy have. In addition to future three-time Oscar winner Penn, the movie features Forest Whitaker, Nicolas Cage, Eric Stolz and ER’s Anthony Edwards in some of their earliest roles.

Right from the get-go, you know novelist Janet Frobisher (Bette Davis) is no good — she confesses to killing her deadbeat husband to his partner-in-crime, George Bates (Gary Merrill). But she’s still the least despicable person in Another Man’s Poison, an unusual noir set in the English countryside. She wants to get rid of George, too, but he’s smarter and deadlier than her now-deceased husband. She’ll have to use her imagination, plus some very convenient poison lying around, to dispose of George so she can be with her younger lover. But the best laid plans often go awry, and in Janet’s case, have fatal results.

Another Man’s Poison isn’t a top-notch thriller — its overcomplicated plot weighs it down just as much as a dead body in a lake. But what it does have is Davis, who acts and acts and acts some more, and leaves no pause silent and no glance unsubtle. She’s a force of nature, and she single-handedly makes this movie electric. Stay tuned for the finale, which involves one of the great switcheroos in the genre.

Working-class army vet Neil Klugman (Richard Benjamin) has almost nothing in common with rich college student Brenda Patimkin (Ali MacGraw), which is why he asks her out on a date. They quickly become romantically involved, but their differences — and Brenda’s nosey family — soon come between them. Neil thinks he loves Brenda, but he isn’t so sure she even likes him all that much. Is Brenda the one for Neil, or is she a mistake that he can’t quite quit?

Based on Phillip Roth’s 1959 novel, Goodbye, Columbus was one of 1969’s biggest hits, but few remember it today. That’s a shame, as the film takes a hard yet funny look at an age-gap romance in the age of free love. The film is dated in the best possible way, offering a fascinating glimpse into how male and female roles were changing onscreen in the late 1960s. 

Who needs Jacob Elordi when you have Laurence Olivier? Both actors played Heathcliff in wildly different adaptations of Emily Brontë’s novel, Wuthering Heights, but it’s Olivier who made the character an object of envy for men and desire for women. He’s a hunk with something to say and someone to die for.

Told in flashback, Wuthering Heights chronicles the doomed romance between Heathcliff and Cathy Earnshaw (Merle Oberon), who began as childhood friends before becoming teenage sweethearts. But Heathcliffe is an orphan from the lower class, and high-class women like Cathy are supposed to marry men like the stiff and boring Edgar Linton (David Niven). Is Cathy and Heathcliff’s love for each other strong enough to cross Britain’s rigid 19th-century social divides?

If you’re looking for a faithful adaptation of Brontë’s novel, look elsewhere. But if gothic romance is your vibe, then this Wuthering Heights will make you wither in delight. Olivier nabbed his first Oscar nomination for his charismatic, matinee idol performance, while Oberon is suitably pale and tragic as the constantly near-death Cathy. 

You can make a case that film noir really began with 1944’s Double Indemnity, a thriller about a pair of adulterous lovers who murder the wife’s husband for insurance money. You can also make the case that the genre never produced a better film than Billy Wilder’s seminal thriller, which is still being ripped off today. I guess that old proverb, “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” is accurate in this case.

When insurance agent Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) locks eyes with bored California housewife, Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck), he’s instantly in love — well, maybe not love, but definitely lust. That kinda explains why he agrees to help her murder hubby to collect his insurance, but how can he — or anyone — trust a woman as beautiful and deceptive as Phyllis? The answer is he can’t, and Walter soon finds himself in Phyllis’ deadly crosshairs.

Playboy Thomas Crown (Steve McQueen) has everything he needs in life — money, women and good looks. But he still craves adventure, and he finds it by masterminding a series of bank robberies in New York City. He’s smart enough to have gotten away with it so far, but his latest heist has drawn the interest of Vicki Anderson (Faye Dunaway), an insurance investigator who thinks Crown is her man. She has to prove it, though, which involves her getting close to him in a way that HR wouldn’t like. But will Vicki’s cat-and-mouse game with Crown work? And can she avoid becoming emotionally involved with a man who can manipulate almost anyone to do what he wants?  

Released in 1968, The Thomas Crown Affair is one of the chicest thrillers ever made. Everyone looks and sounds great, so much so that you may not notice the gaping holes in the movie’s wafer-thin plot. But does that matter when you have gorgeous stars like McQueen and Dunaway playing the sexiest game of chess ever captured onscreen? The Thomas Crown Affair is ridiculous, but its silliness is its own form of aphrodisiac. It’s a surprisingly horny movie, and it doesn’t show anything more outrageous than a bare shoulder and a pair of moist lips. 

When a government satellite crash-lands and kills almost everybody in a small New Mexico town, the U.S. military sends a small team of scientists to investigate. They suspect the satellite has brought a microscopic alien organism to Earth that, if uncontained, could wipe out humanity. But as the team investigates, they realize the organism, nicknamed “the Andromeda Strain,” is harder to neutralize than they first thought. And if they don’t contain it in time, they will be forced to use a last-resort option — detonating a nuclear bomb that will wipe them out and the entire town.

Directed by bestselling author Michael Crichton, The Andromeda Strain is a tense sci-fi thriller that prioritizes plot over emotion. Don’t expect stunning character development here — this is a lean and mean suspense flick about what could actually happen if an extraterrestrial microbe made its way to our planet. The scientists at the center of the story are fairly square and have no time for kinship — they have a disease to eradicate and a world to save. The result is a chilling and fairly realistic sci-fi picture that has one of the most dramatic endings of the ’70s.  

Leona Stevenson (Barbara Stanwyck) is a bedridden heiress who has everything she wants in life — a swanky New York City apartment, a loving husband, Harry (Burt Lancaster), and more money than she could possibly spend. Late one night, she tries to call her husband at work, but instead overhears a conversation between two unknown men. To her horror, she realizes they are plotting to kill a woman somewhere in the city. Desperate, she contacts the police, but they don’t believe her. Can Leona save the woman before she meets her gruesome end?

Adapted from a hit radio play of the same name, Sorry, Wrong Number is a classic Hollywood thriller that’s equal parts engrossing and absurd. As Leona, Stanwyck always looks super glamorous, with impeccable makeup and perfectly coiffed hair, even when she’s supposed to be out of her mind with fear. The movie pads the story with some unnecessary flashbacks, but there’s no denying the killer ending — literally! Stanwyck earned her last Oscar nomination for her somewhat hysterical but always effective performance, and she works every facial muscle like her life depended on it — which, if you think about it, kinda does. 

Did you know that every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings? If you don’t, then you haven’t watched It’s a Wonderful Life. The 1946 movie is still a holiday movie staple nearly 80 years later, and that’s due to the timeless nature of its story.

It’s Christmas Eve in the idyllic small town of Bedford Falls, but George Bailey’s (James Stewart) life is far from perfect. He’s spent most of it sacrificing his happiness to help others, and all he’s received in return is one misfortune after another. He thinks suicide is his only option left, but a mysterious man named Clarence is determined to show him what a wonderful life he has and how much he’ll be missed if he dies.

It’s a Wonderful Life is a surprisingly dark Christmas tale — after all, Replica Luxury Handbag Alone and Love Actually don’t have suicide as a major plot point. But that’s the key to Frank Capra’s classic: it shows George at his lowest so that his redemption at the end is all the more impactful. The movie also contains one of legendary actor James Stewart’s finest performances. Simultaneously hopeful and cynical, his George is an American Everyman constantly weighed down by life, but never beaten by it.

Harry Caul (Gene Hackman) is good at his job. As a surveillance expert working in San Francisco, he’s the best there is at spying on others who don’t want to be spied on. When he accepts a job to record an adulterous couple who meet at a crowded park, he thinks it’s just another routine cheating spouse gig. But when he starts to suspect his subjects could meet a grisly end, he tries to stop the tapes from getting in the wrong hands. Much to his dismay, Harry discovers he may be too late to save them — or himself.

A classic paranoid thriller made at the height of the Watergate scandal, The Conversation is simple yet unsettling. Its sole focus is on Harry and his growing obsession that someone is listening to him as he listens to others. Is it all in his head? Or are there really people out there in the dark tracking his movements? Director Francis Ford Coppola creates a vivid and tense mood of fear and suspicion, one that feels of its time yet also strangely relevant for today’s conspiracy-obsessed populace.

Well, la-di-da! When Diane Keaton died in late 2025, many cited Annie Hall as one of the Oscar winner’s best movies, and we won’t argue with that assertion. Written and directed by Woody Allen, the movie chronicles comedian Alvy Singer’s (Allen) complicated relationship with beguiling and flighty Annie Hall (Keaton). Hopelessly neurotic, Alvy can’t comprehend how someone like him can snag someone like Annie, so when he eventually loses her, he does everything he can to win her back. But falling in love isn’t so easy to replicate, and Alvy may have to accept the fact that some love affairs aren’t meant to last.

The foundation for every modern romantic comedy made in the last 40 years, Annie Hall feels mostly fresh today as it did back in 1977. Aside from the casual misogyny that’s present in almost all of Allen’s films, Annie Hall is a funny and truthful look at the messiness of falling in and out of love. Keaton won an Oscar for her performance, and it’s one of the best Oscar wins ever. Her Annie isn’t just a memorable character, but a template for every liberated female character in movies after 1977.

While the 2021 remake of West Side Story was fabulous, there’s something about the original that can never be replaced. Directed by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise, the musical reimagining of Romeo and Juliet is renowned for its choreographic storytelling — from Robbins’ dynamic dance sequences to Leonard Bernstein‘s iconic score and Stephen Sondheim‘s poignant lyrics.

Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer are star-crossed lovers Maria and Tony, whose budding romance is stymied by the fierce rivalry between New York’s toughest street gangs: the Jets, a group of white teenagers, and the Sharks, made up of Puerto Rican immigrants. Rita Moreno stands out as Anita, Maria’s close friend and the girlfriend of her brother Bernardo (George Chakiris). With 10 Academy Awards, West Side Story‘s status as a classic is indisputable.