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Amazon Prime subscriptions include access to thousands of movies for free. If you're looking for something to watch, here are the best movies to watch for free with Amazon Prime Video.

UPDATE: 6/12/23

We've reviewed our guide, and because Election, In the Heat of the Night, and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring all left Prime Video, we've replaced them with three new picks.

Bound

Before they made The Matrix, the Wachowskis debuted with the stylish crime thriller Bound, an early indicator of their bold filmmaking style. Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon play neighbors Violet and Corky, who experience an instant and powerful romantic attraction.

They hatch an elaborate plan to steal from Violet's mobster boyfriend (Joe Pantoliano), taking advantage of his sexist dismissal of their intelligence and strength. The Wachowskis demonstrate visual inventiveness in even the most basic interactions, and the chemistry between Tilly and Gershon is electrifying.

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Dog Day Afternoon

Al Pacino gives one of his best performances as a sensitive bank robber in Sidney Lumet's mesmerizing true-crime drama Dog Day Afternoon. Nominated for six Oscars, it's set almost entirely within a small Brooklyn bank branch, where Pacino's Sonny and his partner Sal (John Cazale) hold employees hostage for hours after a robbery attempt gone wrong.

Lumet captures the heat and grime of a 1970s New York City summer, as crowds gather outside the bank to alternately cheer and jeer at Sonny. The film is a complex and nuanced take on an outlandish real-life event.

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Heathers

Cult classic Heathers is one of the best comedies on Amazon Prime. This dark satire takes on the teen movies of its era (the 1980s), bringing a violent edge to the story of an upstanding young woman falling in love with a rebellious bad boy. Veronica (Winona Ryder) and J.D. (Christian Slater) take their crusade against the vapid popular students at their high school to deadly extremes, while the movie retains a sense of the absurd. The filmmakers mix whip-smart dialogue with cutting commentary on conformity.

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His Girl Friday

Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell star as bickering newspaper reporters (and ex-spouses) in Howard Hawks' classic comedy His Girl Friday. Hawks swaps the gender of one of the main characters of the popular play The Front Page, turning the story into a comedy about remarriage as well as a farce. The rapid-fire dialogue is filled with clever put-downs and wordplay, and Grant and Russell continually one-up each other as their characters pursue the biggest story of their careers (and also fall in love again).

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Related: The 10 Best Movies on Netflix in 2023

Licorice Pizza

Paul Thomas Anderson pays tribute to California's San Fernando Valley in the lovingly nostalgic romance Licorice Pizza. Set in 1973, it stars Cooper Hoffman as a scrappy teenage entrepreneur who falls for a slightly older woman played by musician Alana Haim.

Both of them are somewhat immature, figuring out their lives and their places in Los Angeles' sprawling, Hollywood-adjacent suburbs. Anderson captures the swooning, often foolish experience of young love alongside the changing social climate in a period of transition for the city and the country.

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Love & Friendship

One of Amazon's best original movies, Love & Friendship is a delightful Jane Austen adaptation from filmmaker Whit Stillman. Based on Austen's early novel Lady Susan, the movie stars Kate Beckinsale as a ruthless, sharp-tongued social climber with witty rejoinders for everyone she meets. Love & Friendship adds a nasty edge to Austen's typical romantic narrative while still satisfyingly pairing off all the main characters in suitable marriages.

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Related: The 10 Best Video Game Movies to Stream in 2023

Night of the Living Dead

The zombie genre wouldn't even exist without George A. Romero's landmark 1968 horror movie Night of the Living Dead. Romero pioneered most of the key elements of zombie movies with his creepy, low-budget film about the dead rising from the grave, hungry for human flesh.

Taking place mostly within an abandoned house where characters hide from the growing undead hordes, Night of the Living Dead creates indelible scares on minimal resources. It's one of the most influential movies of all time (in any genre).

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The Northman

Director Robert Eggers (The Witch) is known for his extreme attention to period detail, and he brings that same meticulous sense to The Northman. It's a visceral action movie set among Vikings in the ninth century, inspired by a story so old that it was the source material for William Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Alexander Skarsgard plays a warrior out for revenge, with Nicole Kidman as his long-lost mother and Anya Taylor-Joy as his witchy ally. Eggers stages brutal battles with impeccably recreated sets, costumes, and weaponry, immersing the audience in a far-off time and place.

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Related: The 10 Best Original Movies on Hulu in 2022

Shaun of the Dead

Filmmaker Edgar Wright brilliantly parodies and pays homage to the zombie genre in Shaun of the Dead. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost play a pair of slacker friends who find themselves surprisingly adept at navigating the undead apocalypse, once they realize what's actually going on.

Shaun of the Dead is a warm comedy about friendship that's also an effective and sometimes scary horror movie. Wright's extensive knowledge of and affection for zombie films serves him well as he equally embraces and subverts the standard elements of the genre.

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To Catch a Thief

Alfred Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief is more lighthearted than many of the master of suspense's thrillers, but it's no less engrossing. Cary Grant plays an expert jewel thief whose retirement is threatened by an impostor robbing wealthy tourists on the French Riviera.

Determined to clear his name, the burglar, known as "the Cat," decides to catch the real thief. Along the way, he falls in love with a wealthy heiress played by Grace Kelly. It's a stylish caper that benefits from the stars' playful chemistry and Hitchcock's mastery of the camera.

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