The best movies coming to Netflix, Hulu, Prime and Max at the end of January 2024

Greetings, Polygon readers!

It feels like the year has only just begun and January is almost behind us. We’ve seen some impressive films so far, with surprise hits like Bend! and David Ayer’s The beekeeper, and there are even more exciting new releases planned for release in February. But before we get there, we’ve rounded up our picks of the best movies to watch before they leave streaming platforms at the end of the month. We have Janicza Bravo’s hilarious and bizarre black comedy crime film ZolaEdgar Wright’s 2010 cult classic Scott pilgrim against the worldan explosive early childhood Kaiju classic, and much more.

Here are the best movies you need to watch before they start streaming in January.

Editor’s choice

The Exorcist III

Director: Willem Peter Blatty
Form: George C. Scott, Ed Flanders, Jason Miller
Exit criterion channel: January 31st

I recorded it last October The exorcist novelist William Peter Blatty’s 1990 threequel to William Friedkin’s masterful adaptation of that book as the final entry in our annual Halloween Countdown list of horror recommendations. The reason why is simple: for a franchise made up almost entirely of deplorable entries that repeatedly try (and fail) to recreate the original film’s iconic terror, The Exorcist III is the one sequel that came closest to this feat in its willingness to tell its own equally terrifying story.

Based on Blatty’s 1983 novel LegionThe film follows William Kinderman (George C. Scott), a Georgetown police lieutenant who is assigned to investigate a series of murders possibly linked to a notorious murderer believed to have happened years ago. His investigation leads him to the psychiatric ward of a local hospital, where a mysterious amnesiac resembling Kinderman’s late friend Father Karras is being treated. Although infamous for several pre- and post-production issues, The Exorcist III is a truly fascinating and thoroughly terrifying film that explores the same territory as the original, but from its own unique perspective. If for nothing else, it’s easily one of the scariest jump scares ever captured on film, but I won’t tell you when it happens. I don’t want to spoil the surprise. —Toussaint Egan

Movies to watch on Netflix

Scott pilgrim against the world

Image: Universal images

Director: Edgar Wright
Form: Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran Culkin
Leave Netflix: February 1

Edgar Wright’s romantic action comedy is the textbook definition of a ‘zeitgeist’ film, embodying both the enormous popularity of the comic strip that inspired it and the generative spirit and aesthetic of the 2010s. Based on the graphic novel series by Bryan Lee O ‘Malley, Scott Pilgrim versus the world was a box office bomb when it was first released, but the film has steadily grown into a cult following over the past decade, culminating in last year’s Netflix anime adaptation, which saw the entire original cast return to reprise their roles to play. With the new context of that series, it’s a good time to return to the original adaptation. -AT

Movies to watch on Hulu

Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant monsters with all-out attack

Image: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

Director: Shusuke Kaneko
Form: Chiharu Niiyama, Ryudo Uzaki, Masahiro Kobayashi
Leaving Hulu: January 31st

There is one breathtaking moment in it Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant monsters with all-out attack with the camera zooming out from a man in a bathroom to Godzilla crushing the house he is in with his foot, and going from a full-size set to miniatures without breaking the shot. The film does this several times, switching to miniatures with clever masking techniques maximum impact and breathtaking scale, and the joy in the film’s formal approach energizes it.

GMK is a delightful throwback to the early era of Godzilla films, especially in its use of miniatures and the rejection of a CG Godzilla for the classic “man in a suit” approach. Like many of the best films in the franchise, the tones are also very well balanced. It’s funny – in the first 90 seconds it references both the original film and Roland Emmerich’s 1998 entry, humorously dismissing the latter’s potential status as canonical – but also very tense in the destruction sequences.

There are few guaranteed good times like a good Godzilla movie, and GMK certainly fits that picture. A note: Hulu only has the dubbed version, as Toho had dubbed the film for international release. The dub is very solid, however, with the voice actors keeping to the sincere (and sometimes silly) tone of the project. —Piet Volk

Movies to watch on Max

The Thomas Crown Affair

Image: Warner Bros. Home Entertainment

Director: John McTiernan
Form: Pierce Brosnan, Rene Russo, Denis Leary
Maximum exit: January 31st

Heist movies don’t get hotter than this. John McTiernan’s remake of the 1968 Steve McQueen/Faye Dunaway classic is a steamy romp, featuring Pierce Brosnan and Rene Russo at their sexiest.

Brosnan plays Thomas Crown, an arrogant playboy billionaire who in his spare time is also the world’s biggest art thief (in many ways, this is Brosnan’s Batman movie). Russo plays Catherine Banning, an insurance investigator tasked with solving and recovering Crown’s latest daring theft. The two fall for each other during a delightful game of cat and mouse, which culminates in an unforgettable, intricately choreographed sequence to Nina Simone’s “Sinnerman.” —PV

Movies to watch on Prime Video

Zola

Photo: Anna Kooris/Sundance Institute

Director: Janicza Bravo
Form: Taylour Paige, Riley Keough, Nicholas Braun
To leave Prime Video: January 31st

Few films embody the raw surrealism of our technologically mediated modern lives as fully as Janicza Bravo’s black comedy crime film starring Taylour Paige.Ma Rainey’s black pants) and Riley Keough (Under the Silver Lake). Based on that of David Kushner Rolling Stone story from 2015 and the viral Twitter thread that inspired the film, the film follows the story of Aziah “Zola” King (Paige), a part-time stripper living in Detroit who is convinced by her new boyfriend Stefani (Keough) to go on a road trip to Tampa to make money. However, what starts as a light-hearted weekend getaway quickly turns into a long and exciting odyssey full of absurdity, crime, violence and a colorful cast of characters. Four years after its premiere, there’s still nothing like it Zola. -AT