22 Best Movies About Obsession
It's one thing to be so deeply in love with someone that you like all their pics on Instagram, but it's a whole other thing to start tracking their whereabouts via geotags. That, my friends, is called stalking. And yet, some romantic movies, like Twilight, can blur that line—even rom-coms like Love, Actually are guilty—which might be why so many of the best movies about obsession are based in romantic relationships.
In fact, stalker movies rarely start out as such. It's only when the characters that start as friends and lovers turn into tormentors that movies about obsession really become stalker movies. TLDR; the best movies about obsession need the best, and most terrifying, stalkers. It's in this spirit that I present to you a list of the best movies about obsession, ranked by creepy factor. May the best stalker...uh, win?
22. Fifty Shades of Grey
Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) is a stone-cold fox, but cold is the operative word. Sure, he's in love, but he's also possessive, obsessive, and truly just plain weird about his feelings for Anastasia (Dakota Johnson). Don't let his hotness distract you from his sociopathic red-flag behavior. The only reason he's so low on the list is because, unlike many other movie stalkers, he doesn't have serial killer potential.
21. Chloe
Erotic thrillers are all about obsession, and Chloe is no different. The film starring Liam Neeson, Julianne Moore, and Amanda Seyfried follows a woman (Moore) who hires a young escort (Seyfriend) to seduce her husband (Neeson), but finds herself tangled up in a web of lies instead.
20. Twilight
Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) may not be a full-blown sociopath with violent sexual fantasies, but! His bad-boyfriend-alert red flags include: kidnapping, prohibiting his girlfriend from seeing her friends, and watching her sleep every night. That said, those stalker vibes are easily eclipsed by Robert Pattinson's cheekbones and Taylor Lautner's abs.
19. Do Revenge
Unlike most movies on this list, Do Revenge isn’t an erotic thriller, so it’s not so much about romantic obsession as it is about, well, revenge. A campy high school dramedy, Do Revenge follows high school seniors Drea (Camila Mendes) and Eleanor (Maya Hawke) as they form an alliance to take down their respective nemeses. But sometimes revenge isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially if you're the target. Giving away too much of the obsession plot point would ruin the twist of this movie, but I'll just say it's pretty diabolical.
18. 365 Days
This NSFW movie follows a mobster (Michele Morrone) who kidnaps a woman (Anna-Maria Sieklucka) and makes her stay with him for 365 days to see if she’ll fall in love with him. As a trigger warning, the creepy, obsession-ridden plot received some backlash over its lack of consent and sex scenes. Wild to think this kicked off a trilogy, but...there it is.
17. Swimfan
No spoilers, but we're getting into potentially murderous stalker territory with Swimfan, an early 2000s classic starring Erika Christensen as Madison, a girl who becomes obsessed with her one night stand, Ben (Jesse Bradford). Too bad he already has a girlfriend (Shiri Appleby).
16. The Crush
Lemme tell ya, you're not alone if you ever crushed on a houseguest when you were a kid. But I bet your harmless crush never turned into a full-blown psychotic obsession, like 14-year-old Adrian in The Crush. Alicia Silverstone's breakout role (yes, before she was Cher) takes a cute lil girl crush to a wholeeeee other (low-key scary and high-key creepy) level.
15. The Perfect Guy
I don't know about you, but whenever the word "perfect" is followed by the word "guy," my eyebrows immediately raise and my bullsh*t antenna goes on red alert. I'm not cynical, I'm sensible, and I know that no human being is perfect except for maybe Ryan Reynolds or Michael B. Jordan. Case in point: Carter Duncan in The Perfect Guy. Played by the smoldering Michael Ealy, Duncan checks all the boxes at first (charming, gorgeous, attentive) but then turns out to be a lil too perfect—as in, possessive, obsessive, AND aggressive.
14. Lolita
Adapted from Vladimir Nabokov's infamous 1955 novel of the same name, Lolita is about an older man who becomes so completely infatuated with a 14-year-old girl that he'll go to the most extreme (read: illegal, psychopathic, pedophilloic) measures to stay close to her. It's famously disturbing and problematic because, out of all the movies on this list, it's probably the closest to a story that could (and has) happened in real life.
13. Vertigo
Vertigo is a classic Alfred Hitchcock movie about Scottie (James Stewart), a detective with a fear of heights, who becomes infatuated with a woman he sees die by suicide. He later meets another woman (Kim Novak) and, in his desperate obsession, begs her to change her hair and affect to resemble the dead woman he can't get out of his head. It's all part of a bigger psychological thriller about trauma, deception, and murder, and while Scottie claims his motive is love, he displays some serious controlling and stalker-like behavior.
12. The Boy Next Door
First of all, pretty much everything you need to know about The Boy Next Door is in the trailer. Second, Ryan Guzman (of Step Up Revolution fame) does a great job of taking charge and seducing J.Lo before things get real violent and ridiculous. Lesson learned: Don't have sex with hot young neighbors. Or at least...be aware of the risks.
11. Gone Girl
Gillian Flynn's best-selling mystery-thriller adapted for the big screen by the visionary David Fincher? Yes, please. So many unexpected twists and turns in this film, which isn't so much about one person's romantic obsession so much as the obsession with the perfect life. It's also full of surprising, deeply flawed characters and anchored by a stellar cast, including Ben Affleck, Tyler Perry, Neil Patrick Harris, and the crazy-compelling, Oscar-nominated Rosamund Pike.
10. Ingrid Goes West
Aubrey Plaza goes full Instagram stalker in Ingrid Goes West as a young woman who becomes so obsessed with an online influencer (Elizabeth Olsen) from LA that she starts copying her hair, her speech, and eventually worms her way into the influencer’s life.
9. Sleeping With the Enemy
The nerve of director Joseph Ruben to put America's newest sweetheart, a then post-Pretty Woman Julia Roberts, in a film that required her battered wife character Laura to fight, swim, and run for her life. Laura is terrified that her husband is going to kill her eventually, so she fakes her own death to get away from him. And it works...at least, for a little while.
8. The Girl on the Train
This is one of those movies that's best to go into without a lot of backstory so you can experience its full effect. All I'm going to say is prepare to board the non-stop train to utter mind-f*ckery, featuring an awesome cast that includes Emily Blunt, Laura Prepon, Justin Theroux, and more of your faves.
7. Single White Female
Sweet, unsuspecting Allison Jones (Bridget Fonda) thought she'd find the perfect roommate when she placed an ad in the classifieds. Instead she got "Hedy" (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and a whole bunch of terrible behavior. Hedy's dirtiest deed? Impersonating Allison and then sleeping with her boyfriend Sam (Steven Weber) in an attempt to break them up. Feel free to watch the Minka Kelly/Leighton Meester version, The Roommate, instead. It's not technically a remake, nor is it nearly as good, but it's a "college years" take that is entertaining nonetheless.
6. Fear
Oh, David. Pretty, chiseled David (played by a 25-year-old Mark Wahlberg). I'll never forget "Wild Horses" and that rollercoaster ride, but must you handle your breakup with too-young-for-you-at-the-time Nicole Walker (Reese Witherspoon) by losing your damned mind? Stalker activities include: the beating up of friends and cars, the building of creepy shrines, and the carving of names into chests.
5. Black Swan
Natalie Portman won her first Academy Award for her performance in Black Swan and rightly so, given that anytime you mention this movie, you're 100 percent guaranteed to hear audible gasps and murmurs about how brilliant(ly f*cked up) it is from anyone whose seen it. A chilling reminder of how obsession materializes not only psychologically, but also physically.
4. The Voyeurs
If you take nothing else away from watching The Voyeurs, remember this: Curtains are your friend. The movie stars Sydney Sweeney as a woman who becomes obsessed with the sex lives of the neighbors across the way, specifically the infidelities of the man in the couple. But is she really the one stalking them? Or are they watching her?
3. Obsessed
Only in the movies could Idris Elba cheat on Beyoncé and live to tell the tale. Or...try to, at least. In Obsessed, Ali Carter plays the other woman-turned-unhinged lover (and totally inappropriate working professional) who wreaks all kinds of havoc upon Queen Bey's peaceful, domestic existence.
2. The Invisible Man
This freaky film is about an abusive man (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) who is so obsessed with his wife (Elisabeth Moss) that he finds a way to make himself invisible and fakes his death to terrorize her without anyone knowing. Yeah, that’s one admirer I wouldn’t like to have.
1. Fatal Attraction
A Best Picture nominee and legendary movie, Fatal Attraction gave us the most iconic movie stalker of all, hence its top spot on the list. Dan Gallagher (Michael Douglas) engages in a passionate weekend fling with Alex Forrest (Glenn Close) that, when broken off, triggers a series of psychotic events and acts that leads to one of the most memorable scenes in cinema. Glenn Close, you will always be famous.
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