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If You Loved Obsession, Watch These 15 Movies Next

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Ignacio Weil

Entertainment - June 8th 2026, 22:00 GMT+2

Vertigo 1958 — 1. Vertigo (1958)

James Stewart’s Scottie doesn’t simply fall in love in *Vertigo*; he starts treating another human being like a restoration project with lipstick. Hitchcock wraps that sickness in dream colors, San Francisco fog, and Bernard Herrmann’s swooning score, which is exactly why the movie still feels so dangerous. The romance is gorgeous until you realize the fantasy needs a woman to disappear inside it. | © Paramount Pictures

Obsession 1976 — 2. Obsession (1976)

Brian De Palma’s *Obsession* earns its spot for reasons far better than a matching title. Cliff Robertson plays a man whose grief has fermented into romantic delusion, especially once he meets a woman who looks uncannily like the wife he lost. Where Curry Barker’s film turns desire into a supernatural consent nightmare, De Palma makes it gothic, guilt-ridden, and wrapped in the dangerous fantasy of getting a second chance with the wrong person. | © Columbia Pictures

3. Audition (1999)

Takashi Miike’s *Audition* opens with a premise so casually gross that the movie hardly needs to raise its voice at first: a widower uses a fake casting call to find a new partner. Then Asami enters, the room temperature changes, and the male fantasy begins eating itself from the inside. It is patient, elegant, sadistic, and much smarter than any “twist” summary can capture. | © Omega Project

Cropped possession 1981 — 4. Possession (1981)

Nobody in *Possession* has a normal breakup, and frankly, normal breakups should send this movie a thank-you card. Andrzej Żuławski throws jealousy, marital collapse, political dread, and body horror into one screaming apartment, then lets Isabelle Adjani and Sam Neill tear through the wreckage. Love here is not a feeling to protect; it is a parasite with excellent dramatic timing. | © Gaumont

The Skin I Live In 2011 — 5. The Skin I Live In (2011)

Pedro Almodóvar’s *The Skin I Live In* begins with elegance and ends somewhere much closer to a nightmare wearing couture. Antonio Banderas plays a brilliant surgeon whose grief, revenge, and control issues have fused into one immaculate horror show. The film pushes the idea of remaking another person past romance, past obsession, and straight into a surgical violation of identity. | © El Deseo

Ruby Sparks 2012 1 — 6. Ruby Sparks (2012)

*Ruby Sparks* looks like a whimsical indie romance until Calvin realizes his dream girl can be edited like a second draft. Paul Dano’s blocked writer does not chase a fantasy; he creates one, then exposes how ugly control can become when it hides behind sensitivity. The film’s smartest trick is making the cute premise curdle without abandoning its charm completely. | © Fox Searchlight Pictures

Cropped phantom thread 2017 — 7. Phantom Thread (2017)

*Phantom Thread* is too polished to shout, which is why its romantic warfare lands with such a delicious little sting. Daniel Day-Lewis’ Reynolds Woodcock wants love arranged around his routines, his work, and his breakfast preferences, because apparently genius also needs very specific mushrooms. Vicky Krieps’ Alma does not simply resist being shaped; she finds her own unsettling way to shape him back. | © Focus Features

The Collector 1965 — 8. The Collector (1965)

William Wyler’s *The Collector* is chilling because Freddie truly believes his prison has a courtship section. Terence Stamp plays him with the soft-spoken entitlement of a man who thinks admiration should count as intimacy, while Samantha Eggar’s Miranda becomes trapped inside his warped idea of romance. It is a kidnapping movie, yes, but the nastier horror is his belief that captivity might eventually become affection. | © Columbia Pictures

Cropped fatal attraction 1987 — 9. Fatal Attraction (1987)

*Fatal Attraction* became a pop-culture warning label for infidelity, but its real voltage comes from watching desire refuse to stay in the drawer marked “bad decision.” Glenn Close gives Alex Forrest a terrifying mix of intelligence, loneliness, rage, and theatrical precision, while Michael Douglas’ Dan keeps discovering that consequences have a forwarding address. The movie is blunt, glossy, and still brutally effective. | © Paramount Pictures

Single White Female 1992 — 10. Single White Female (1992)

In *Single White Female*, admiration starts with a roommate ad and ends with a haircut that feels like a threat. Bridget Fonda’s Allie wants stability after a breakup; Jennifer Jason Leigh’s Hedy wants a life she can step into piece by piece. The movie understands that imitation is not always flattery — sometimes it is a rehearsal for erasure. | © Columbia Pictures

He Loves Me He Loves Me Not 2002 — 11. He Loves Me… He Loves Me Not (2002)

Audrey Tautou’s presence gives *He Loves Me… He Loves Me Not* a dangerous advantage, because the movie knows exactly how much sweetness can hide in plain sight. What first appears to be a wounded romance gradually rearranges itself into something far more alarming, with delusion editing reality like a jealous screenwriter. Its cleverness comes from making obsession look sincere before showing the machinery underneath. | © UGC Images

May 2002 — 12. May (2002)

*May* is what happens when loneliness stops asking politely and starts drafting blueprints. Angela Bettis gives the title character a fragile, funny, unnerving humanity, so even the movie’s most grotesque turns come from a recognizable hunger for connection. Lucky McKee keeps the tone strange without sanding off the sadness, turning the dream of a perfect companion into a handmade little catastrophe. | © Lions Gate Films

Rebecca 1940 — 13. Rebecca (1940)

The cruelest presence in *Rebecca* barely needs to appear, because the first Mrs. de Winter has already colonized the mansion, the marriage, and everyone’s imagination. Joan Fontaine’s unnamed heroine is not just competing with a dead woman; she is fighting a brand, a legend, a household aesthetic. Hitchcock turns romantic insecurity into a ghost story where memory has better lighting than the living. | © United Artists

Laura 1944 — 14. Laura (1944)

*Laura* begins as a murder mystery, then quietly admits that the detective may be the strangest suspect in the room emotionally speaking. Dana Andrews’ McPherson studies a portrait, interviews the men who adored Laura, and slowly falls for a woman he has mostly assembled from fragments. Otto Preminger makes obsession look civilized here, which somehow makes it more perverse. | © 20th Century Fox

Cropped perfect blue — 15. Perfect Blue (1997)

Satoshi Kon’s *Perfect Blue* treats fame like a mirror maze where every reflection wants a piece of Mima. The obsession is not purely romantic, but the violence of projection is unmistakable: fans, managers, screens, and fantasy versions of the self all compete to decide who she is allowed to become. It remains one of the sharpest movies ever made about identity being stolen in public. | © Madhouse

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Obsession doesn’t treat desire like a candlelit confession; it treats it like a trap that keeps getting smaller. Its mix of romantic fixation, control, fantasy, and psychological horror puts it in a nasty little tradition of movies where love stops looking noble and starts looking dangerous. From Hitchcock’s Vertigo to modern stories about identity, possession, and people trying to rewrite the object of their desire, these 15 films chase that same uncomfortable thrill.

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Obsession doesn’t treat desire like a candlelit confession; it treats it like a trap that keeps getting smaller. Its mix of romantic fixation, control, fantasy, and psychological horror puts it in a nasty little tradition of movies where love stops looking noble and starts looking dangerous. From Hitchcock’s Vertigo to modern stories about identity, possession, and people trying to rewrite the object of their desire, these 15 films chase that same uncomfortable thrill.